May 9, 201313 yr I need some help putting together a system for unRAID. My goal is to get to about 24TB of storage. I have a variety of drives of the following sizes. I have five 2TB drives, and two 1TB drives from different vendors. The size of the case isn't a big deal since I plan to put it behind my tv stand. Originally, I plan to just run unRAID on it, but over time, i may add other functionality to it like sickbeard, sabnzb, couchpotato, ftp, untangle, etc. The only other hardware I have right now, which i suspect is way too small for what I'm looking for is a PSU CORSAIR|430W CX430 R. If I can use it, great. If not, it's not the end of the world. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.
May 9, 201313 yr Did you have a budget in mind? Check out the unRAID Compulsive Design forum to look through some of the builds there. My sig also has a link to the Greenleaf sight were we sell prebuilt boxes. One of the designs there might strike your fancy.
May 11, 201313 yr For a system with up to 15 drives, this is a superb case: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811112388 It has 12 internal 3.5" drive bays, with very simple toolless drive mounting (screw 4 thumbscrews on the drive; then push it in place). With 3 140mm fans blowing directly across the drives, it will keep drives cooler than any other arrangement I've tried. So ... start with that case. For a really low-power system, I'd use an Atom-based motherboard; but since you plan on eventually running some add-ons that require a bit of CPU "horsepower", you'll probably be better off with a board that can use an Ivy Bridge CPU. A couple of good options: (a) If you want to keep the interior of the case REALLY clear, you could use a mini-ITX board like this: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131841 with a SuperMicro 8-port card (giving you a total of 14 SATA ports): http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816101358 [For what you've indicated your needs are, I'd think the above is an excellent choice.] (b) You'd get a bit more expansion capability with an ATX or micro-ATX board -- there are a lot of options; the most popular are the Asus H77 boards and the SuperMicro and Asus server boards using the C20x chipsets. For a power supply with that complement of drives, I'd use a good single-rail 650W unit ... preferably modular (to keep the cables really neat). A Seasonic X650 Gold Modular unit [http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817151088 ] or a Corsair HX series modular [http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139012 ] would be my choice -- both are excellent units. You've got 12TB of space using 7 drives right now. To get to 24TB, you'd simply need a 4TB parity drive and 3 more 4TB drives -- so you'll need to buy four 4GB units. The Seagates are very good units [http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822178338 ]. Note that these can actually be purchased cheaper by buying a 4TB external unit and pulling the drive out of it -- there are two issues with this approach: (a) some units have the excellent DM drives in them; some have the faster (but less reliable) DX units in them; and (b) Seagate may/may not honor the warranty on a drive that's been removed from an external unit. Four of those drives, plus your 7 current units, would use 11 of the 12 available internal slots. That leaves room for one more drive -- and you still have 2 5.25" bays you could add up to 3 more drives in. That will easily accommodate the 24GB you're looking for -- in fact, as you upgrade everything to 4TB, you could have up to 44TB using only the 3.5" bays
May 15, 201313 yr Author Thank you both for your help. I have ordered quite a few parts. I will post updates once the machine is built with all the details.
May 18, 201313 yr Author This is what I ended up getting. The goal was to build a 20 drive beast over time. Clearly the preclear script alone is going to make that take a while. 2 x Supermicro PCI Express x4 Low Profile SAS RAID Controller (AOC-SASLP-MV8) 1 x Kingston Technology ValueRAM 8GB Kit (2x4GB) DDR3 1333 MHz DIMM Desktop Server Memory KVR1333D3E9SK2/8G 1 x Corsair Enthusiast Series 650-Watt 80 Plus Bronze Certified Power Supply Compatible with Core i3, i5, i7 and platforms - TX650 1 x SUPERMICRO MBD-X9SCM-F-O LGA 1155 Intel C204 Micro ATX Intel Xeon E3 Server Motherboard 1 x Intel Core i3-3220 Dual-Core Processor 3.3 Ghz 3 MB Cache LGA 1155 2 x Western Digital Red WD30EFRX 3TB IntelliPower RPM 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive 4 x NORCO SS-500 5-Bay SATA / SAS Hot Swap Rack Module 1 x Antec Twelve Hundred V3 Black Steel ATX Full Tower Unbeatable Gaming Case 1 x Western Digital WD Green WD20EARX 2TB 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive - OEM Based on the above, i hopefully haven't botched this completely. The questions I have at this point are the following. 1. Is the PSU big enough? Should I get a 900W or some other seize? 2. Can I use the WD 3TB Red's ? 3. Was a there a better CPU that would be better for this build? Thanks in advance.
May 18, 201313 yr 1. Is the PSU big enough? Yes, as long as you're using low-power drives (WD Reds are an excellent choice) 2. Can I use the WD 3TB Red's ? Certainly. Use one as your parity drive; then the other as one of the data drives. What you MIGHT want to do is buy a 4TB drives for your parity drive ... then you can use any size up to 4TB for the data drives. But you can also just swap the 3TB out for 4TB later if you decide to start using that size drive. 3. Was a there a better CPU that would be better for this build? The CPU you purchased is fine.
May 19, 201313 yr Author 2. Can I use the WD 3TB Red's ? Certainly. Use one as your parity drive; then the other as one of the data drives. What you MIGHT want to do is buy a 4TB drives for your parity drive ... then you can use any size up to 4TB for the data drives. But you can also just swap the 3TB out for 4TB later if you decide to start using that size drive. A few more questions. 1. It seems that I need to use Version 5 of Unraid to use drives larger than 2TB. 5.0 is beta from my understanding. Is it stable to use? 2. I have the following drives, and I'm trying to figure out the best way to add all of the drives to the array. a. 2 x WD Red 3TB that are in the process of preclearing - blank b. 1 x WD Green 2TB that is done preclearing - blank c. 2 x WD Green 2TB - full of data d. 1 x Seagate FreeAgent GoFlex 2TB External Drive (that I need to pull out of it's enclosure) - full of data e. 1 x Seagate FreeAgent 1TB External Drive (that I need to pull out of it's enclosure) - full of data f. 1 x WD MyBook 1140 2TB External Drive (that I need to pull out of it's enclosure) - full of data g. 1 x WD Elements 1TB (that I need to pull out of it's enclosure) - full of data Basically, what I was thinking was do the following. a. make 1 x WD Red 3TB into a parity b. make 1 x WD Red 3TB and 1 x WD Green 2TB into data drives c. start moving data from one of the other drives to the available 5TB (3 + 2 in step b) and then preclear the now empty drive d. keep repeating this process until all data has been moved from their current drives to the "array" Now the question becomes, when or how do i add the parity drive? 3. Also, when I set up the drives, do i want to put the parity on the 6Gbps slot on the mother board, and the rest on other SATA2 ports and SAS ports? I'm trying to figure out the best way to arrange this. I only have 2 3TB drives that are 6Gbps. The rest are smaller or I think SATA 2. 4. Also, i'm sure this is a silly question, but i just want to make sure i understand.. if i have these drives that are rated at 6Gbps or 3Gbps, when i run pre clear, i never seen to get more than around 140MBps speed? Am I missing something. As always, thanks for the help in advance, and I apologize if I should have created a new thread in another area.
May 19, 201313 yr 1. It seems that I need to use Version 5 of Unraid to use drives larger than 2TB. 5.0 is beta from my understanding. Is it stable to use? Yes, RC12a is fine. Basically, what I was thinking was do the following. a. make 1 x WD Red 3TB into a parity b. make 1 x WD Red 3TB and 1 x WD Green 2TB into data drives c. start moving data from one of the other drives to the available 5TB (3 + 2 in step b) and then preclear the now empty drive d. keep repeating this process until all data has been moved from their current drives to the "array" Now the question becomes, when or how do i add the parity drive? That's exactly the right process. As for adding the parity drive -- I'd do it right off the bat. Copies to the array will be slower; BUT they'll be fault-tolerant as soon as they're on the array, so if any drives fail in the process you won't lose any data. 3. Also, when I set up the drives, do i want to put the parity on the 6Gbps slot on the mother board, and the rest on other SATA2 ports and SAS ports? I'm trying to figure out the best way to arrange this. I only have 2 3TB drives that are 6Gbps. The rest are smaller or I think SATA 2. 4. Also, i'm sure this is a silly question, but i just want to make sure i understand.. if i have these drives that are rated at 6Gbps or 3Gbps, when i run pre clear, i never seen to get more than around 140MBps speed? Am I missing something. You may as well put the parity drive on the 6Gb ports ... but the reality is it doesn't much matter. NO modern rotating drive comes close to the interface speeds of SATA-2, let alone SATA-3. [sSDs are a different story -- they can indeed hit SATA-3 interface speeds] That's also why you're "only" seeing 140MB/s during pre-clears. Nothing's wrong -- that's actually a very good speed. Remember: the DRIVES are NOT "rated at 6Gb/s or 3Gb/s" ==> their electrical interfaces are. The only time data is actually transferred at interface speed is when it's going to/from the drive's buffer ... a VERY tiny % of the transfer activity.
May 19, 201313 yr ... 1. It seems that I need to use Version 5 of Unraid to use drives larger than 2TB. 5.0 is beta from my understanding. Is it stable to use? Not at beta now, at RC level... While it may a bit unsettling perhaps to go with some software that is "not final released' version. The current 5 RC is FAR past beta stages. RC is used to identify a release as considered ready for release, Release Candidate, and if there are not any significant reasons to change it prior to final release, then will become the released version, with no changes other than the name... All the RC releases have been very good, with minor (mostly) changes made alone the way. It is looking like we may possibly be at the last needed change... there are always things that could be changed, but it seems there are not any major concerns now. As always there are always features that people may like to see, but that would eventually be rolled into another updated version, if accepted as valuable. ... 2. ... Now the question becomes, when or how do i add the parity drive? This comes down to a matter of preference, and comfort level... For me, I like to add parity when I create an unRAID array, without it, you have unprotected data. So why use unRAID, if it is acceptable to have unprotected data, even for a short time... Other people do not add parity till they have copied data over to an array on a new build. It allows for faster data transfers at full disc speeds, instead of limiting based on parity creation speeds... Then add the parity later to build the parity drive based on the array data. You may want to even consider a hybrid approach. Determine which data is most important to be transferred, and copy it LAST to the array. a. First transferring non-important files WITHOUT a parity drive. b. Then add the parity drive, build the parity from the array. c. Then with parity active, transfer the remaining more valuable data, including data from old drives that will then be cleared for use in the unRAID array where another backup may not then be available... ... 3. Also, when I set up the drives, do i want to put the parity on the 6Gbps slot on the mother board, and the rest on other SATA2 ports and SAS ports? I'm trying to figure out the best way to arrange this. I only have 2 3TB drives that are 6Gbps. The rest are smaller or I think SATA 2. As a rule, I always put my parity on the FASTEST port with the most bandwidth available, especially if it is on a dedicated bus! Not so important in your case, but VERY noticeable on older hardware builds with multiple interfaces and drives... After all the parity drive gets lots of work at times, so I also like to try to give it a chance to keep up with everything else and at least reduce one bottleneck as much as possible... ... 4. Also, i'm sure this is a silly question, but i just want to make sure i understand.. if i have these drives that are rated at 6Gbps or 3Gbps, when i run pre clear, i never seen to get more than around 140MBps speed? Am I missing something. There are no silly questions, when trying to learn something. :-) I would be VERY happy to see those speeds! But older hardware like I normally use will never see that good! Not bad speeds at all! :-) Also, a big thing to realize, as garycase mentioned, 6Gbps and 3Gbps refers to the INTERFACE speed on the drive, which might be able to almost be reached with cached data, but is much higher than the actual sustainable data rate in physical platter drives. This is where enterprise class server grade 10,000 RPM drives will really start to show off their power, much higher sustained data rates compared to green low power drives. (in case you were not aware, the REDs are essentially green performance drives, built with better physical parts used in the enterprise class of drives, like bearings etc.. - - unless that has changed again since the release of the RED product line...)
May 22, 201313 yr Author Repeatedly, you guys keep providing awesome answers, and I of course keep coming up with more questions. So, a couple of things. 1. As far as the current setup. so i have put the pci-e (2 x Supermicro PCI Express x4 Low Profile SAS RAID Controller (AOC-SASLP-MV8) cards into the motherboard, and i wanted to make sure i put them in the right slot for the motherboard i'm using (1 x SUPERMICRO MBD-X9SCM-F-O LGA 1155 Intel C204 Micro ATX Intel Xeon E3 Server Motherboard) the reason i'm asking is that according the spec's on this board, i believe it has the following. 2x (x8) PCI-E 3.0*** slots, 2x (x4) PCI-E 2.0 in x8 slots i believe i put the pci-e cards in the 2x (x8) PCI-E 3.0*** slots. i suspect this won't hurt, but to make it match up properly should i move it down to the pci-e 2.0 slots? 2. Also, i was trying to run a preclear on two wd green 2tb drives that previously had data that i moved onto the array. the way i had it hooked up is as follows. drive 1 (SN 5940) was plugged into a sata2 slot on the motherboard drive 2 (SN 5678) was plugged into a sata cable coming out of one of the pci-e slots mentioned above. in addition in the current array. i have one 3tb wd red plugged into the sata3 port on the motherboard one 3tb wd red plugged into the sata2 port on the motherboard one 2tb wd green plugged into the a sata cable coming out of one of the pci-e slots mentioned above. (this sata cable plugs into the card as the one above, but on the 2nd cable) with this current setup drive 1(SN 5940) was getting around 50MB throughput on the pre clear, whereas drive 2 (SN 5678) was around 110MB. when i moved drive 1 to a second cable on the pci-e card.. it started to go around 110MB for both. Any ideas what I might be doing wrong? Thanks. Also.. i plunked down the money for the pro license yesterday.. how long does it roughly take to get the key?
May 22, 201313 yr (1) The cards are fine. Since you don't have any x8 devices, it doesn't matter which slots you plug the cards into. If you had x8 devices, you'd want to use the x4 slots for your x4 cards, so the x8 devices could get full bandwidth. (2) Very strange that the drive was getting slower bandwidth on the motherboard port. I suspect the cable wasn't fully seated, and when you moved the drive that was no longer a problem. You may want to experiment with that with your next pre-clear (use the same motherboard port, but be sure the cable's well-seated. (3) Tom is usually very quick at processing key orders. I wouldn't be surprised if you already have it ... if not, you should get it tomorrow. One possible hiccup: I suspect he's very busy trying to get v5 Final released for his projected 1 June delivery of the new servers ... that may cause some slowdown in key processing (but I doubt it).
May 22, 201313 yr Very strange that the drive was getting slower bandwidth on the motherboard port. I suspect the cable wasn't fully seated... I'm not sure why a badly seated SATA cable should reduce bandwidth ... unless there are lots of errors which succeed on retry. It's just single Tx and single Rx pairs. Much more likely is that the BIOS setting is still in IDE mode - change this to AHCI mode and transfer speeds should be as good as the add-on card. It is normally expected that mobo ports operate with less delays/overheads than an add-on card.
May 22, 201313 yr A poorly seated cable can cause significant slowdown for exactly that reason ... excessive noise on the line results in a large number of retries. Granted, IDE mode could also be impacting this, but it's not likely it would cut the transfer speed in half unless there were a LOT of seeks involved in the operations being done at that point (seeks are much more efficient with AHCI when there are multiple queued requests). The actual data transfer rate is not significantly impacted by the mode.
May 25, 201313 yr Author Yes, i emailed customer service and they sent it to me. It was wierd in that I never received the initial key, but they sent me a new one. I've got 3 drives and 1 parity running. Preclearing another one and a bunch to go as a I move the data around. I am curious about what speed I should see putting data onto the array with parity turned on. I'm see as slow as 8MB/s. I'm thinking that I might need to add a cache drive. What do you all think is a reasonable size? 256GB SSD ?
May 25, 201313 yr Yes, i emailed customer service and they sent it to me. It was wierd in that I never received the initial key, but they sent me a new one. I've got 3 drives and 1 parity running. Preclearing another one and a bunch to go as a I move the data around. I am curious about what speed I should see putting data onto the array with parity turned on. I'm see as slow as 8MB/s. I'm thinking that I might need to add a cache drive. What do you all think is a reasonable size? 256GB SSD ? Typically you should see write speeds in the 30MB/s range with a gigabit network connection to the array. If you're using a 100Mb network, the max you'll get is ~ 11MB/s. Note that if you have a Gigabit network, EVERYTHING in the "path" has to be gigabit ... the adapters on both your client PC(s) and the server; any switches in the path; and (if it's part of the path between the PC and UnRAID) the router.
May 25, 201313 yr I think it's obvious from my notes above, but if you have a 100Mb network, the 8MB/s you're seeing is just fine. It should get slightly higher (10-11), but won't get any higher than that due to the network's bandwidth. ... on the other hand, if you have a Gb network -- and ALL components are rated at Gbit speeds -- then something's wrong. If that's the case, try using a different network cable.
May 27, 201313 yr Author 1. I do have Gigabit, so I'll try to check all the cables/connections again. 2. Any recommendations on the size of the cache drive? (based on having drives between 1-3Tb. Right now, i am moving a ton of data from my old drives to the array to clear up the old drives so that I can preclear them and add them to the existing array. Normally, i can't imaging having more than 200GB in a day. 3. I'm trying to set up mediabrowser to reference the array now, rather than the local disks it used to. (I know this is more of an htpc question, but i thought someone might know.) How long after changing the config in media configurator does it take for mediabrowser to see the nas, i added the location as a network location rather than a mapped drive. Thanks.
May 27, 201313 yr 1. I do have Gigabit, so I'll try to check all the cables/connections again. Does your router have gigabit ports? This is often an area folks overlook -- if the switch on the router isn't a gigabit switch, then all the Cat-6 cables and Gb network adapters you might have elsewhere are all for naught 2. Any recommendations on the size of the cache drive? (based on having drives between 1-3Tb. Right now, i am moving a ton of data from my old drives to the array to clear up the old drives so that I can preclear them and add them to the existing array. Normally, i can't imaging having more than 200GB in a day. Typically a 500GB cache drive is PLENTY. Personally, I don't use a cache drive, as I want all writes to the array to be fault-tolerant immediately after they're completed. 3. I'm trying to set up mediabrowser to reference the array now, rather than the local disks it used to. (I know this is more of an htpc question, but i thought someone might know.) How long after changing the config in media configurator does it take for mediabrowser to see the nas, i added the location as a network location rather than a mapped drive. I'd expect it to be fairly quick, although you may have to reboot for it to rescan the network.
May 27, 201313 yr Author More info on the adding the array to media browser. I've noticed when i add it by name, mediabrowser isn't seeing it. When I add it by ip, it sees it within a few seconds. I'm wondering if I have config wrong on the server itself, since all the other devices on my network are primarily windows based, they might be easier to add to the network group, whereas since this is running unraid, i might have misconfigured something. Any ideas?
May 27, 201313 yr Author I went to Settings in the main unRAID Menu. - SMB Enable SMB -> Yes (Workgroup) Workgroup -> WORKGROUP Local Master -> Yes
May 27, 201313 yr I went to Settings in the main unRAID Menu. - SMB Enable SMB -> Yes (Workgroup) Workgroup -> WORKGROUP Local Master -> Yes The question is, however, are ALL of the devices in the same workgroup? BTW I'd change your workgroup to a personalized name ... i.e. "Buddha"
May 31, 201313 yr Author Oddly, enough it just started working. Everything is on the same workgroup, and you are right I should change it off default. Another question, as far as a UPS for this, any recommendations on brand, size, etc. Thanks.
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