So, I've been playing around with UNRAID (Both 4.7 & 5.0 (Which I notice has been in beta for almost two years)) in VMWare and I really seem to like it. It has pretty much what I want from a network drive thingy ma-do-ha. Now, I'm going to be using this to pretty much:-

1. [*]Store T.V shows[*]Store movies[*]Store family items (Pictures/movies)[*]Store other stuff I'd prefer not to lose[*]Run SABNZBD[*]Run SickBeard[*]Run CouchPotato[*]Run Plex Media Server

 

First of all, I'd like to say I'm completely and utterly shit at hardware, I can put it together, but, I really don't understand it. The thing that concerns me about those three items is that they're all CPU intensive (At times...), I notice on my windows build (Desktop, which I currently use to host all of this stuff, along with my drives over the network) that when SABnzbd is unraring, the unrar process seems to jump up to about 60% of my CPU (Which, is rare. I never see it jump above 2%, too be honest). I'm not sure if this is just a windows thing, but, it's obviously a concern. The build I'm considering getting (Refer back to where I said I'm shit at hardware, and, recommended builds sound easier than attempting to understand this all) is the recommended beast build over at the wiki:-

http://lime-technology.com/wiki/index.php?title=Hardware_Compatibility#20_Drive_Beast

 

My thought on that is that if I'm going to buy it, I might as well go full out, eh? I'll probably hold back on the HDDs for now, just buy 5ish 3TB drives (I believe the 5.0 beta supports this? I couldn't check in VMWare, told me 2TB+ wasn't supported).

 

I'm just wondering how the Intel Core i3-540 will handle running SAB & Sick & Couch & Plex 24/7, along with the occasional parity check.

 

For more information (Since I didn't really include it) of why I'm scared of each application:-

• Plex
  • Transcoding items on the fly to send to devices that my current media (Mainly h.264/mkv) can not play on (Family ipad)

  [*]SABnzbd

  • Unrar seems to use quite a bit of CPU on windows.
  • Repair/verify (Par2/Parity check) seems to use a decent amount (less than unrar, but, still high up there) amount of CPU power

  [*]SickBeard (Same as CouchPotato)[*]CouchPotato (No real issue I want to state, just wanted to make sure that it could run it idle along with the other stuff going on)

 

So, once again, the questions are:-

[*]Will that CPU run those programs smoothly, along with a constant SMB share without freezes due to the CPU being used by something else (I understand if the drive is spinning up/etc)?

[*]Does unraid beta (newest beta) support 3TB HDDS?

 

New build I attempted to build, no idea if it'll even work together, any help?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811219038

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115229

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128562

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820104344

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817151095

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130586

I have no firsthand experience with Sandy Bridge, but it looks like you've got parts picked out that will not only work together, but kick ass and make a sammich too!

 

I have no clue how much your system might be bottlenecked by the RAM speed, but for only $10 more you can kick that up to  - DDR3 2133.  That should help alleviate any potential problems.

 

unRAID 5.0-rc does 3 TB drives.  And it will be the perfect thing for storing your pr0n other stuff you'd prefer not to lose.

 

[EDIT] Oh, I checked the PSU and it has two 12V rails.  Recommended specs call for a single 12V rail.  The Power Supply Thread can set you up with some recommendations.