Hi,

 

I'm thinking of putting together a build with the following components & would appreciate some advice!

 

CPU: Intel Pentium E5200

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819116072

comment:  I've decided on going the intel route, so I think either this one or the E1400 would be the way to go.  E5200 is only slightly more expensive

 

MOBO: GIGABYTE GA-G31M-ES2L @ $52

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128357

or

SUPERMICRO MBD-C2SEA-O @ $119

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813182161

Comment: I'm tempted to get the gigabyte - seems like a steal at this price.  it only has 4 sata ports though vs. supermicro's 6.  I'm going to have 4 drives to start so that should be ok (the new 1.5TB+ WD Green drives most likely) & will buy a pci sata controller card somewhere down the line.  I'll be using the onboard video.

 

Memory: G.SKILL 2GB

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231098

Comment: Maybe 2GB is overkill...

 

PSU: PC Power & Cooling S61EPS 610W

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817703005

Comment: seems like a great single-rail PSU for the price. Not modular.  Long - one newegg commenter said that it partially covered a blowhole in his lian-li case, so that might be a concern.

 

Hard Drives:

4x WD Digital Green 1TB or POSSIBLY 2x or 3x 2TB

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136344

 

Case:

LIAN LI Lan cool PC-K12B $119

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811112191

OR

COOLER MASTER Centurion 590 $59

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811119152

 

The lian-li build quality looks fantastic, plus I like the external fan speed swich with 3 speeds (2 of which are apparently pretty quiet).  Only demerit is that it comes with one HD Case that fits 3 drives, so I'll have to get another case to be able to fit 4 drives (+$26 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811995036 ).  The coolermaster seems like a really nice alternative, can buy modules to convert the 5.25" bays to fit drives just like the lian-li:

http://www.coolermaster.com/products/product.php?language=en&act=detail&tbcate=65&id=2542

 

I hope that the PC Power & Cooling PSU will fit in these cases - any other cases that I should be looking at? 

 

Thanks,

Seth

Those components all look good to me, as in they will work, however you certainly have room to save some money if you wish.  I would go for the cheaper mobo (Gigabyte) and case (Cooler Master).  Try to find a cheaper CPU also, unRAID doesn't need much.  Single/dual core doesn't matter.

 

Also, the PSU seems like overkill to me.  If you are planning to max out the case with 12 hard drives, then I can see it.  But for 8 drives or less, a 450W - 500W would do.  I'm currently running 8 drives (only 2 of which are green) on this Corsair 450W.

 

Your RAM is fine, and no, I don't think 2 GB is overkill, especially if you use some of unRAID's add-ons.  I have 3.5 GB of RAM in my server (which probably is overkill, I'll admit).  You could save a few bucks by getting this Kingston 2GB stick and using this promo code: EMCLTPL22 (expires 7/06/2009).  I'm using the same RAM in my server (as well as 1.5 GBs of other random old RAM), and I'm buying another stick for my parent's computer since it is so damn cheap.

 

Do you have any old hard drives that you want to move into your unRAID server?  Unless you really need the extra space, I would recommend buying the 1 TB drives for now, and only buy one or two.  If you buy 4 at once, your likelihood of a multiple drive failure increases (since they were all manufactured at approximately the same time and may all have the same manufacturer defects and/or similar lifespans).  So buy one or two drives now, then purchase additional drives as you need them.  This will save you money too, since the 1.5 and 2 TB drives are constantly dropping in price.  I always look for the best value when buying drives, and the 1 TB drives are the best bang for your buck at the moment.

 

 

Thanks for the advice - I'm going to have to bite the bullet and buy a bunch of drives upfront, everything up until now I've stored on external USB drives, unfortunately.  I'm going to need 4 TBs of space upfront, (3x1TB storage + 1TB parity), but I'll be sure not to get drives of the same make/model.  should I just get a grab bag of 7200 Samsung/WD/Hitachi drives (and maybe a Seagate even though I'm hesitant because of their recent driver issues) from newegg?

 

Samsung:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822152102

or the ecogreen (5400 rpm, I know it doesn't make much of a difference vs a 7200 for an unraid box)

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822152173

hitachi:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822145233

 

I had a feeling the E5200 might be overkill, dropping down to an E1400 would save me $30 or so (or I could get a really cheap Celeron D326 or something), but I'll be a lot of watching movies off of the unraid box via my HTPC & don't want to risk any sort of playback problems.  I think you're right about the PSU also being overkill, I don't see myself ever having 12 drives.  I'm going to stick with the gigabyte mobo, and will probably choose the cooler master case, even though I'll be giving up the nifty fan switches.

 

Thanks,

Seth

I would do a grab bag of drives in the eco green type section.  The WD green drives and the samsung drives seem to be pretty good.  I have a non-green version of a samsung in my array and it is probably the coolest running drive in the array.  The thing hardly gets about 30C (good for me) when i am using it.

 

I would also go with the cheaper processor but look for a different motherboard.  One with 6 SATA would be a good start.  Or you could look into something in the AMD realm. Take a look at these motherboards and this processor.  I think if i had to do it again i would look into getting an AMD based system with 2xPCI-e slots so i could add SATA cards later.

 

I was actually looking at this board recently because it has 8 onboard SATA, 1xPCI-e and built in video.  The only thing i wish i could change about it would be the number of PCI slots... but no board can be perfect.

 

And  this board also because it has 6 onboard SATA, 2xPCI-e, and built in video.  It would have been nice to have 8 SATA on board but again, no board can be perfect (especially in the price range we are aiming for).

 

I think both of those board should work just fine with unRAID, but i have not tried either of them.

Thanks for the advice - I'm going to have to bite the bullet and buy a bunch of drives upfront, everything up until now I've stored on external USB drives, unfortunately.

 

If you want you can also pull the externals apart and use the drives in the unRAID server.  The drives would be wiped and formatted of course, but you could use them in the unRAID server.  I have done that with a couple of drives from older computer and one i have put in an external enclosure a long time ago.

Don't forget, when counting PCIe slots, that they're upwards-compatible.  That is to say, a PCIe x1 card can be used in a PCIe x1, x2, x4, x8, or x16 slot, so two x1 slots and an x16 can handle three x1 SATA cards.  If it doesn't have onboard video, just use a cheap PCI video card and free up that x16 slot for I/O.

Those AMD setups look pretty nice (especially that one with 8x sata), however, with this being my first unraid box, I really want to get a mobo that has already been thoroughly tested.  I'm a total newbie to unraid (and RAID arrays, for that matter), in fact I've never put my hands on an unraid setup.  I'll most likely be making another box in the next couple of months where I'll have to cut some serious corners cost-wise and will be more willing to put some time in doing testing once it's up and running.  For this particular box, the final price is less of a concern.  I'm pretty sold on getting a board with a bunch of onboard sata connectors now, I know I won't be contributing much to the testing community, but maybe I should just get a Supermicro C2SEA and an E1400/E5200 and call it a day?  I'm not going to make the final decision until next week at the earliest...

 

Seth

 

Edit: I went with the C2SEA and the E1400 CPU.  Next build will probably be AMD-based.  Thanks for all of your advice!