Fist Unraid build (with Xeon D, hopefully)

[mathix]

Hello !

 

After reading a bunch of articles on ServeTheHome, I have started to consider the Xeon D CPU for my first Unraid build.

 

I assume that the Xeon D 1541 is a better choice "noise-wise" (with the fanless design) than the Xeon E3 1245 v3 (+ Noctua CPU fan) I had previously in mind. However, I do not know if the case fans will be enough to cool the cpu properly (I plan to use the Fractal R5).

 

I would use my server mostly for Plex (5-6 720p transcodes) with the usual Dockers (Sonarr, Sabnzbd, Couchpotato, etc) and maybe some light VMs.

 

I would like my server to be as quiet as possible (I don't think silent is a possibility) so I would prefer to avoid the actively cooled Supermicro board (I read that the fan was very loud). The server will be in my living room, about 6ft (2m) from me. 

 

The fan of the Gigabyte MB10-DS0 seemed easier to replace, but I was unable to find more details about it.

 

What do you recommend?

 

1) Fanless Supermicro board cooled by the case fans

2) Replace the Gigabyte fan by a quieter fan (Noctua maybe?)

3) Give up Xeon D and use the E3 1245v3 with a X10 board and a Noctua cooler

 

 

Thanks a lot

 

[IamSpartacus]

Hello !

 

After reading a bunch of articles on ServeTheHome, I have started to consider the Xeon D CPU for my first Unraid build.

 

I assume that the Xeon D 1541 is a better choice "noise-wise" (with the fanless design) than the Xeon E3 1245 v3 (+ Noctua CPU fan) I had previously in mind. However, I do not know if the case fans will be enough to cool the cpu properly (I plan to use the Fractal R5).

 

I would use my server mostly for Plex (5-6 720p transcodes) with the usual Dockers (Sonarr, Sabnzbd, Couchpotato, etc) and maybe some light VMs.

 

I would like my server to be as quiet as possible (I don't think silent is a possibility) so I would prefer to avoid the actively cooled Supermicro board (I read that the fan was very loud). The server will be in my living room, about 6ft (2m) from me. 

 

The fan of the Gigabyte MB10-DS0 seemed easier to replace, but I was unable to find more details about it.

 

What do you recommend?

 

1) Fanless Supermicro board cooled by the case fans

2) Replace the Gigabyte fan by a quieter fan (Noctua maybe?)

3) Give up Xeon D and use the E3 1245v3 with a X10 board and a Noctua cooler

 

 

Thanks a lot

 

If you are going to use the passive heatsink you will need direct airflow constantly flowing across it.  Unless you can install case fans on the left side of the HDD cages I don't think that's going to be a viable option.  I have the D-1540 with the active heatsink and even that gets pretty hot if there isn't good airflow in the case.

 

I just picked up two D-1537's (also passive) that I'll be throwing in 2U cases with some good SuperMicro 80mm PWM fans.  They should be here Wednesday so I'll let you know what kind of temps I get.

[mathix]

Thanks for your reply @IamSpartacus !

 

I don't think it is possible to install fan that way in the r5 and opening the top of the case to use a fan may make it more noisy, so no fanless CPU for me I suppose!

 

How is the fan noise of your 1540 board?

[IamSpartacus]

Thanks for your reply @IamSpartacus !

 

I don't think it is possible to install fan that way in the r5 and opening the top of the case to use a fan may make it more noisy, so no fanless CPU for me I suppose!

 

How is the fan noise of your 1540 board?

 

It can get a little loud when the CPU is on full load but not any louder than the fans in my HDD cages so I guess to me it's not too bad.  However my server isn't in my living room it's in my open door office just off my living room.  I can hear the fans from the living room slightly when the server is being taxed.

 

Howerver I'm selling my 1540 board so I'll see how much better the 1537's in 2U cases are since they are slightly lower power (35w compared to 45w for the 1540).

[mattbr]

FWIW, I'm thinking of building something similar... from what I've been able to figure out, you *could* swing something that's essentially silent with one of the passive cases, and then breakout from an SAS controller to an external enclosure, or a set of discrete enclosures. The unknown is whether you'd need to heatpipe the SAS controller (which i'd conjecture is likely). It'd probably get a little bit balmy in there, but...

 

Silverstone has two cases that might serve well for that (the DS380 if you want to build yourself, add a passive PSU, dump the built-in fans and replace them with silent 120's on rubber mounts from, say, Noctua, and everything should stay relatively cool and quiet, or a bunch of TS431S's if you don't want to roll your own - here's a post in the servethehome forums that describes such a build).

 

Other options might be trying to figure out if it's possible to heatsink standalone 4-in 3's (and maaaybe, maaaybe, use the spare PSU capacity to trigger Peltier cooling if things get too warm in there), or building a shrine to The Noodly Master with "cooling"/silencing discrete enclosures and SATA - SAS breakouts.