pengrus Posted April 9, 2011 Share Posted April 9, 2011 Hi! Basically I copied the hardware from Rajahal's builds, customizing for my needs. I use the server for XBMC almost exclusively, and it does such good work with multiple streams, I have been very impressed. My goal was to completely remove the need to have a windows box running in the house at all. Running my downloads onto the cache drive, auto-updating xbmc, I'm almost completely free of Microsoft! I am very happy with it as long as it continues to get an IP address...man, when this thing works properly, or expectedly at least, it is awesome! My network is a little weird, or at least it used to be since I use UVerse. I am definitely not happy with the UVerse equipment it's proprietary and underpowered, and it doesn't work very well! AND they just announced their upcoming bandwidth throttle/cap policy, so I'll be maxing out said bandwidth all day every day until they start fining me. I got lazy and didn't take the time to make links, sorry about that, anyone feel free to ask anything, and I hope you like it. I do! OS at time of building: 4.7 CPU: i3 560 Motherboard: SuperMicro X8SIL-F-O RAM: 4GB Kingston...whatever rajahal recommended Case: CM 690. I went with something here that I now kinda wish I had not, but getting the wide open cases was becoming a problem. It's ok though, it looks cool and has plenty of room! I do like it. Drive Cage(s): 2 Icy Dock 3 in 2s, 1 Icy Dock 4 in 1. I have a bunch of laptop drives lying around... Power Supply: Corsair AX750 - Modular for my sanity SATA Expansion Card(s): SASLP-MV8, only one port used for the 2.5" cage, 4 more available! Cables: standard SATA, plus the forward breakout from the MV8 Fans: Case standard...3 120mm I think, they're all three-pin, which sucks, I currently maintain high-20s though, so it's ok I guess. Plus, each cage has a fan on the back. Parity Drive: 2TB EARS Data Drives: 2 x 2TB EARS, 1 Hitachi 2TB, 1 160GB Scorpio Blue, 2 320 GB WD used-to-be-external drives, (one of which recently failed with no data on it? weird!) Cache Drive: 160GB Seagate Total Drive Capacity: 6.8TB Primary Use: XBMC! Likes: Expandability, ease of use (when it works correctly!), awesome tinkerability, forum support... Dislikes: Holy mercy, this NIC thing was/is a GIANT pain that I live in fear of having return to haunt my house. Add Ons Used: unmenu, mail, sick, sab, cp, apcupsd... Future Plans: The enemy of good is better. So clearly, I'll be retinkering soon. I am looking forward to trying 5.0b6a perhaps, though I fear the NIC gremlin, so maybe I'll just leave things as they are. Looking forward to 3TB drive support too! I also need to set up a VPN so I can do true remote management. I am on the road QUITE a bit, and if my wife lets me cut the cable and my server goes down or requires attention in the middle of the backyardigans or something, I will be in...Trouble...with a capital T. Rhymes with P. Boot (peak): 105ish Idle (avg): 42 Active (avg): 75ish Light use (avg): 50ish This was certainly a fun build. I especially dig the 4 in 1 cage for the 2.5" hard drives. The price is prohibitive at ~100 per, but you could fit 20TB in just the 5 5.25 bays! Cool. It's also a little...blue. But that's ok, it totally looks like fireworks going off in the office during a parity check! Link to comment
wsume99 Posted April 9, 2011 Share Posted April 9, 2011 Where did you get your HDDs from in the picture? That looks like some good packaging. Link to comment
kizer Posted April 9, 2011 Share Posted April 9, 2011 Last time I ordered a drive from NewEgg it came just like that. Of course several before that came in practically nothing. LOL Link to comment
wsume99 Posted April 9, 2011 Share Posted April 9, 2011 Well I've received 3 2TB HDDs (2-5k3000 & 1-WD20EARS) from Newegg over the last month and they all were packaged the same. Drive in anti-static bag, wrapped in bubble wrap, placed in a small white box that was put inside a larger box with some packing paper. Better than it used to be but still not as good as it could be. If they are now shipping like shown above I would consider that an improvement. Link to comment
grandprix Posted April 9, 2011 Share Posted April 9, 2011 My last batch of 6 drives were in a box that appeared as though was THE box that WD's came in, in 24's. Was the nicest packaging I've had from Newegg, typically, it's just the drive in the AS bag, wrapped in bubble wrap then placed in a small white box. I'm keeping this nice box, it will be very useful when we move into our retirement home.. all 24 drives will fit in it. > Or, atleast the first 24.. heh Link to comment
Blofeld Posted April 9, 2011 Share Posted April 9, 2011 Love the Pengrus 8, but most of all, it was a good and very enjoyable read - please keep us inspired and entertained Thanks! Link to comment
pengrus Posted April 9, 2011 Author Share Posted April 9, 2011 Where did you get your HDDs from in the picture? That looks like some good packaging. Amazon. I love that place, in that it isn't really a place. Prime shipping like a boss. Or someone who has Prime. Love the Pengrus 8, but most of all, it was a good and very enjoyable read - please keep us inspired and entertained You sir, are a gentleman and a scholar. Obviously wise beyond your years. Thanks! Link to comment
Rajahal Posted April 10, 2011 Share Posted April 10, 2011 Please let me know how that 4-in-1 works for you, I've been really curious to try one out. Also, do you notice the 5400 rpm laptop drives performing any differently from 3.5" green drives? I imagine they wouldn't, but I've never tried them. I've been playing with the idea of building a tiny server based on those 4-in-1s (there are actually 6-in-1s too!) using only laptop drives and SSDs. Link to comment
pengrus Posted May 18, 2011 Author Share Posted May 18, 2011 Rajahal, The 4-in-1 works very well. Absolutely plug and play, and it fit in my case with no jumping, hammering, prying or praying. I read your post right before I went on travel for about six weeks, sorry about the late reply! I think the tiny server idea is just awesome. You could take a tiny cube with 4 bays and stick 23TB in there! No hiding in a closet or across the house somewhere...have to be cooled well, but I don't think it would be a problem. They accept up to 15mm, and the 1TB laptop drives are only 12.something. SSDs are kind of expensive for this, since you don't really need fast access for movies. Maybe for high volume storage of photos/videos for editing or something? What's your target market for that? Link to comment
Blofeld Posted May 19, 2011 Share Posted May 19, 2011 Rajahal, The 4-in-1 works very well. Absolutely plug and play, and it fit in my case with no jumping, hammering, prying or praying. I read your post right before I went on travel for about six weeks, sorry about the late reply! I think the tiny server idea is just awesome. You could take a tiny cube with 4 bays and stick 23TB in there! No hiding in a closet or across the house somewhere...have to be cooled well, but I don't think it would be a problem. They accept up to 15mm, and the 1TB laptop drives are only 12.something. SSDs are kind of expensive for this, since you don't really need fast access for movies. Maybe for high volume storage of photos/videos for editing or something? What's your target market for that? Hey Pengrus, good to have you back! And how could you possibly leave your baby alone for six weeks? Terrible parenthood....tsts... So, I think I'm not the only one exceedingly curious about your 4-in-1 setup.... because, just thinking about the possibilities, one gets giddy (ok, speak for yourself, Blofeld...). Are the speeds achieved comparable to regular HDs? I reckon it should be pretty close...but who (but you) knows? Link to comment
Rajahal Posted May 19, 2011 Share Posted May 19, 2011 SSDs are kind of expensive for this, since you don't really need fast access for movies. Maybe for high volume storage of photos/videos for editing or something? What's your target market for that? Indeed, I doubt many people would buy an SSD server today because it would so expensive. I figure that I'll start marketing the server as just a small, low power, quiet device intended for 1 TB laptop HDDs. However, as SSDs become cheaper and larger over the next few years, the option to upgrade the HDDs to SSDs would be there. I just picked up several of these for my SSD prototype build. They were on sale for $8 each, I couldn't resist. They are a bit cheap (plastic-only construction), but they work fine. I doubt I'll use them in my final design (something with higher drive density like your 4-in-1 is a much better option), but for now they are OK. Preliminary results using SSDs as both parity and data drives are very promising...write average is 85 - 90 MB/s. Link to comment
aiden Posted May 19, 2011 Share Posted May 19, 2011 If the purpose of this build is all about cramming as many 2.5" drives as you can into a small space, then the iStarUSA BPU-126-SA takes the cake: You can only use 9.5mm drives in there, but that still gives you 4.5TB per 5.25" using 750GB drives. That's kinda nutty. Link to comment
Rajahal Posted May 19, 2011 Share Posted May 19, 2011 Yep, I've seen that one too. Not sure I need that level of drive density, but we'll see. Link to comment
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.