New unRAID build

[adriandg]

Hi

 

Been doing a bit of research over the last week or so and have decided on the components below. Do they look ok for building a NAS box with no conflicts?

 

Case: Fractal R2 array

Motherboard/CPU: Zotac Intel Atom D510 1.66GHz dual core mini DTX

RAM: 2GB Kingston DDR3 1333MHz

HDD: 1 x Samsung F4 ecogreen 2TB and 2 x Seagate barracuda green 2 TB 3.5 inch drives

Flash drive: San Disk Cruzer Micro 2GB

Lycom internal motherboard header

unRAID software with free licence

 

Thanks for any advice you can give.

 

Cheers

 

[Johnm]

I am not familliar with htat board but... my upfront thoughts..

 

I am not sure that board is a good idea for several reasons.

It has a lot of junk you don't need in a "server" or nas. this leads to more instability in your system.

I have no clue what the NIC is, but i bet it is cheap. could be an issue

The video card on that board is an actual PCIe 1x card. I'm not sure if it will fit in that case when you put 6 drives in it.

Then again, It might work fine...

 

 

I would look at more basic Atom boards if that's the route you want to go.

 

[adriandg]

The only reason that I have picked that board is, it is the only one I can find in the mini itx/DTX form factor that is reasonably priced and has the six SATA ports for all the drive I will eventually put in it.

 

Cheers

[adriandg]

Would the following motherboar be any better, or would it potentially pose the same probs?

 

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/zotac-nm10-f-e-intel-atom-d525-(18ghz)-ddr2-667-800-mini-dtx-motherboard

 

Cheers

[cyrnel]

It apparently uses a Realtek nic. No idea which one. Had to download and extract the driver package to find that.

 

Would it broaden your options to mention PCI-e 2-port SATA cards are only $10-$20?

[adriandg]

Ah, Ok. If I bought a card that would give me another four SATA ports what would be a good mobocracy that would fit nicely into this case?

 

Cheers

[Rajahal]

Check out the Zotac board used in my smaller prototype builds...very cheap, and gives you choices on the CPU as well.  The Sempron 140 isn't as low power as the Atom of course, but it isn't a power hog either.  And if you need more processing power for add-ons you can upgrade to a dual core.

[adriandg]

Cheers Raj.

 

So that motherboard and processor will fit into the Fractal Array R2 case?

 

Cheers

[Johnm]

Cheers Raj.

 

So that motherboard and processor will fit into the Fractal Array R2 case?

 

Cheers

 

By "that motherboard" you meant the ZOTAC GF6100-E-E, yes it will fit fine.

[adriandg]

Sorry about my lack of clarity, I did mean the Zotac GF6100-E-E 

 

A couple more questions if you don't mind.

 

Raj mentions about upgrading to a dual core processor when I need more processing power. As I initially plan to put three dives in when would the Sempron start to struggle? Would it be when I have the full set of six drives?

 

Next question is, from other small builds 2GB of RAM should be enough but is it best to put in one 2GB stick or two 1GB sticks?

 

Last one, does this mobo enable me to mount the USB drive inside the case either directly to the mobo or using the internal motherboard header.

 

As you can probably tell I have little or no knowledge of motherboards 

[Johnm]

I should rephrase that. it "should" fit fine.

I have never had my hands on any of those components and you never know.

There is always a minor chance of a rare problem. like a memory slot where a hard drive or fan needs to be.

 

but the parts are listed as compatible.

[Rajahal]

The motherboard will fit.  miniITX uses the same screw pattern as microATX, just fewer screws.  A miniITX board will fit in any case that takes a microATX or full ATX motherboard.

 

Processing power isn't required for a simple network attached storage (NAS) type system.  A single core Sempron will support 3 drives just as well as it will support 20 drives.  unRAID itself hardly uses the CPU at all.  However, certain add-ons, especially those that deal with video encoding/transcoding (Handbrake, Air Video, PS3MS, etc.) will require more processing power to run well.  That's the beauty of the Zotac GF6100-E-E (and any board that uses an AM3 socket) - you can use a cheap Sempron for a low power NAS-type server, or a more powerful Athlon for a multi-tasking server.

 

I always recommend one single 2 GB stick over two 1 GB sticks.  With the single stick, you can upgrade RAM later without wasting anything.  With 2 x 1 GB, you will likely have to waste one or both sticks if you want to upgrade.  Reasons for upgrading would again be add-on related.  Torrents and cache_dirs are two examples of add-ons that can benefit from more RAM.  unRAID doesn't need any more than 1 or 2 GB (technically 512 MB is the min).

 

The Zotac GF6100-E-E does not have an internal USB port, so you will need to use a USB header adapter if you want to mount your flash drive inside the server.  This is completely optional.

[adriandg]

Cheers for the info guys. Youmhave been very informative and helpful.

 

I have done a bit more reading (Crikey there's soooo much info on here to digest  ). I think I may need a dual core athlon as one of the add ons I would like to use is air video so I can stream to my iPad and the wife's iPhone. Would I need 4GB of RAM for this?

 

Cheers

[prostuff1]

Cheers for the info guys. Youmhave been very informative and helpful.

 

I have done a bit more reading (Crikey there's soooo much info on here to digest  ). I think I may need a dual core athlon as one of the add ons I would like to use is air video so I can stream to my iPad and the wife's iPhone. Would I need 4GB of RAM for this?

 

Cheers

 

You would not need 4GB but the more ram you can throw at the machine the better.  My thought is always buy as much as you can afford at that point in time, RAM is easy to upgrade later if you want to.

[adriandg]

Hi again

 

Can you use the supplied power supply in this case as it isn't single rail? I think it has two 12v supplies, one rated at 14A and the other at 16A.

 

Cheers

[Rajahal]

You can safely assume that the smaller of the rails will power the HDDs, motherboard, and fans (the larger will power the CPU).  So that means you have 14A to run all of those things.  Estimate 2A for each green drive and 3A for each 7200 rpm drive.  Leave 3A or more as headroom for the motherboard and fans.  That means you can run about 5 green drives, 3 7200 rpm drives, or a mixture thereof.  Fine for a small test system, but it probably won't last you very long.