seefilms Posted September 9, 2011 Posted September 9, 2011 I have a friend who has a 16 drive unraid and a great htpc revolving around his server and a windows media center using "My Movies". His configuration is essentially this: Norco RPC-4116 Supermicro MBD-C2SEA-O LGA 775 Motherboard Intel Pentium E5700 Wolfdale 3.0G 775 Dual core Patriot 4gb DDR3 SDRAM 1333 His system runs great but perhaps a bit slow. Since I'm buying from the ground up, I'd kind of like to get: a later model motherboard with SATA III capability All advanced format drives. I'd also really like to be able to both use a windows media center device and a couple of Macs that can back up using Time Machine. OH, I'd also like to use hard drives bigger than 2tb. I read something about unRaid 5.0 (still in beta) having support for a lot of the stuff. (do we have any idea when that will be finalized...or how stable it is now?) I'm looking at getting the Norco 4020 or 4220 (i have no idea which is preferable)... If I do get that I'll likely probably pay a bit for the larger fans so that it will run quieter. Thoughts? Is this a good case? Like I said, I'm a NOOB. So, everything I'm saying might be completely idiotic. You tell me. I'm trying to learn. I looked at one of the NOOB sections that describe what kind of stuff to get and it was from 2008. Which seems rather...old. Can I get some thoughts as to what kind of motherboard, processor, etc etc I might need? I'm not looking to break the bank. I'm not going to be buying a a dozen hard drives. But I want something that I can expand over the next couple of years. (i'm sure I sound like I'm all over the place...and I probably am) Okay. Thoughts? (and thanks in advance!)
prostuff1 Posted September 9, 2011 Posted September 9, 2011 I have a friend who has a 16 drive unraid and a great htpc revolving around his server and a windows media center using "My Movies". His configuration is essentially this: Norco RPC-4116 Supermicro MBD-C2SEA-O LGA 775 Motherboard Intel Pentium E5700 Wolfdale 3.0G 775 Dual core Patriot 4gb DDR3 SDRAM 1333 His system runs great but perhaps a bit slow. If that system is "running slow" then there are other reasons. All those parts are more than capable of running unRAID (along with addon's) without issue. Since I'm buying from the ground up, I'd kind of like to get: a later model motherboard with SATA III capability SATA III will gain you almost nothing in an unRAID type environment. The only benefit would really be if you plan on adding a good SSD to the array. All mechanical drives out today can not break SATA II speeds and most can't break SATA I speeds. All advanced format drives. I'd also really like to be able to both use a windows media center device and a couple of Macs that can back up using Time Machine. OH, I'd also like to use hard drives bigger than 2tb. All of those are fine, though I would not focus on the "Advanced Format" drives part... it truely is a marketing term. I highly suggest the Hitachi CoolSpin drives if you want to use green drives that have proven reliable in all the customer builds I have used them in. I read something about unRaid 5.0 (still in beta) having support for a lot of the stuff. (do we have any idea when that will be finalized...or how stable it is now?) 5.0 is still in beta, and only Lime-Tech knows when it will come out of beta. There was talk of an RC possible here soon, but I think there are still some bugs related to moving to the new 3.0.X linux kernel that have to be worked out. I'm looking at getting the Norco 4020 or 4220 (i have no idea which is preferable)... If I do get that I'll likely probably pay a bit for the larger fans so that it will run quieter. Thoughts? Is this a good case? I would go for (and I did) the 4220, or the 4224. Like I said, I'm a NOOB. So, everything I'm saying might be completely idiotic. You tell me. I'm trying to learn. I looked at one of the NOOB sections that describe what kind of stuff to get and it was from 2008. Which seems rather...old. Can I get some thoughts as to what kind of motherboard, processor, etc etc I might need? I suggest checking out Raj's Prototype thread. It outlines a lot of base builds. Quite a bit of research and testing (from Raj's side) has gone into testing most/all of those parts. Okay. Thoughts? See above (and thanks in advance!) Your welcome.
seefilms Posted September 9, 2011 Author Posted September 9, 2011 Thanks Pro, I appreciate all the answers and I also appreciate Raj's link. Enough said!
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