Looking at some used parts, need advice

[born2ride]

Looking at these parts used all together for 300. is it worth it and will  they function with unraid  well? I  am looking to up grade my current system

gigabyte ga-z87-d3hp atx lga1150 motherboard

i5-4670k

crucial ballistix 1600mhz 8 gb ram

cooler master hyper t4 heatsink

[garycase]

It's not a steal, but it's not a bad price.

 

The i5-4670k sells on e-bay between $150 and $200 with a cooler [the Intel stock cooler, which is fine, although the Hyper T4 you listed is a better heatsink (costs $25 on Newegg)]

 

The motherboard sells for ~ $60 on e-bay

 

and 8GB of Crucial DDR3 RAM is about $40 these days

 

... so I'd say $300 for the set is a fair price

 

And Yes, it'll work well with UnRAID => 6 SATA ports plus a couple PCIe x16 slots for adding additional controllers if you need more ports; and the CPU has a PassMark of 7597, which is a very respectable amount of CPU "horsepower" that can easily support 3 or 4 simultaneous Plex transcodings

 

The only negative you should be aware of is the CPU does not support vt-d, so you can't do direct I/O passthrough to virtual machines.  Whether or not this is an issue depends on what your plans are for the system.

 

If the lack of vt-d is an issue, note that the i5-4670 (NOT the "k" version) DOES have vt-d support.

 

 

 

 

 

[born2ride]

It's not a steal, but it's not a bad price.

 

The only negative you should be aware of is the CPU does not support vt-d, so you can't do direct I/O passthrough to virtual machines.  Whether or not this is an issue depends on what your plans are for the system.

 

If the lack of vt-d is an issue, note that the i5-4670 (NOT the "k" version) DOES have vt-d support.

 

@garycase

I am not sure i fully understand Vt-d ... I am building a server to back up my home movies,photos and plex server. It may replace the existing plex server one day.. I have turned an old dell xps410 into a  test server to help me better understand Unraid and functions. I only access that dell unraid over home network using tower in brower, If I understand correctly then using this method i would not need to worry about vt-d. Is that correct?

 

Is there better hardware to use in that price ranges?  I am on a tight budget but still need case and psu.

Thank you for the input!

[garycase]

You're correct -- for what you described vt-d makes no difference.

 

vt-d allows you to "pass through" real I/O hardware to a virtual machine.  e.g. if you had a video card and you wanted a VM to have exclusive access to the physical card (not a virtualized display adapter), you would need vt-d.  But it's not clear you plan on ANY VM's, and even if you do, it doesn't sound like you're going to need to utilize those capabilities.

 

In other words, I wouldn't worry about vt-d 

[born2ride]

@garycase 

He offered the setup with stock cooler today for 250.00 ,  What type of case would you recommend , needs holds ten drives,  Size of case does not bother me , Would like to be less 150

[tdallen]

The Fractal Design Define R5 or XL are the mATX/ATX cases I'm most interested in (but haven't built with yet).  You'd have to use the 5.25" bays to get to 10 drives, though.  The NZXT H440 is being used by a couple of people on the forum as well.

[chazlarson]

I just finished swapping my UNRAID server into a Rosewill 15-bay case.  It's regularly $95 on Amazon.  8 fans and super quiet.  Honestly, when i powered it up for the first time I had to look at all the fans to be sure they were running.  It's one of the more economical many-bay cases i found.

 

https://www.amazon.com/Rosewill-Server-Chassis-Rackmount-Metal/dp/B0091IZ1ZG

[born2ride]

The Fractal Design Define R5 or XL are the mATX/ATX cases I'm most interested in (but haven't built with yet).  You'd have to use the 5.25" bays to get to 10 drives, though.  The NZXT H440 is being used by a couple of people on the forum as well.

 

Why is the R4 case more than the R5?  I did find the XL for 99.00.  I am leaning towards the  R5 Titanium its 69.00. I wanted the white but its out of my budget and wont match anything.lol

[tdallen]

Why is the R4 case more than the R5?  I did find the XL for 99.00.  I am leaning towards the  R5 Titanium its 69.00. I wanted the white but its out of my budget and wont match anything.lol

Dunno.  The R4 is older and I was under the impression that the R5 was meant to replace it but the R4 has continued to be available.  Originally the R5 was more expensive, now the R4 is.  Maybe there's fewer R4's in the supply chain and that's driving up the price?  Most comparisons I've seen recommend the R5 as a slight improvement - better layout, though the R4 had a reputation as very solidly built.

 

I haven't built with either one yet, but I'd use the R5.

[born2ride]

I am ordering it now.  I just need to get a power supply now

 

[garycase]

I've done a couple builds in the R4 -- it's a VERY nice case.

 

Don't skimp on the power supply => buy a quality unit ... a Seasonic X series; a Corsair from any of their mid-to-high end series (avoid the CX units); or any other name brand you like => be sure it's 80+ rated and has active PFC.

 

[born2ride]

I've done a couple builds in the R4 -- it's a VERY nice case.

 

Don't skimp on the power supply => buy a quality unit ... a Seasonic X series; a Corsair from any of their mid-to-high end series (avoid the CX units); or any other name brand you like => be sure it's 80+ rated and has active PFC.

 

Looking at this one- Corsair RM550x Power Supply  has pfc and the 80plus also say low noise..  Just not sure if 550 is enough i used a psu calculator . 8 drives ,no optical, cpu, ram and listed mb came out with 505watts. 

[garycase]

The RM550x is fine for this build.

 

[born2ride]

great thank you