February 13, 20179 yr I currently have the OS running on a spare computer I have laying around to play around with, but I am moving to an actual dedicated system soon. I just need to purchase a CPU/Mother board combo and a case. I can get a i7 3930k and the ASUS motherboard below for about $90 or so. Which would make my potential system the following. PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant CPU: Intel Core i7-3930K 3.2GHz 6-Core Processor ($90.00) CPU Cooler: Noctua NH-L9x65 33.8 CFM CPU Cooler ($48.95 @ Newegg) Motherboard: Asus Rampage IV Extreme EATX LGA2011 Motherboard Memory: Kingston HyperX Fury Black 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR3-1866 Memory (Purchased For $0.00) Memory: Kingston HyperX Fury Black 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR3-1866 Memory (Purchased For $0.00) Video Card: PNY Quadro K2000 2GB Video Card (Purchased For $0.00) Case: Silverstone GD08B (Black) HTPC Case ($138.99 @ SuperBiiz) Power Supply: Corsair RMx 750W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply (Purchased For $55.00) Total: $332.94 Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available Generated by PCPartPicker 2017-02-13 00:43 EST-0500 This would be paired with 3x 4TB WD Reds and two 1TB WD Blues. My other options would be to use an AMD FX 8350 and matching mother board I have laying around, or trying to pick up a dual CPU board and find some newer xeons to put in it. This is mainly going to be NAS, with the ability to be a PLEX server. I want the capabilities to run a windows 10 virtualization off of it as well. My question is am I on the right path with the i7 3930k or should I move to one of the other options?
February 13, 20179 yr You should investigate the processor's ability to handle 4k video (HEVC (H.265) at 60fps). If Plex/video is a primary goal, this is probably going to be important to you, if not now, soon. Guide to HEVC. Might push you to a Kaby Lake or at least Skylake CPU.
February 13, 20179 yr Author Plex isn't my main goal, yet. I am thinking virtualization and NAS is my primary focus. Yet, it might be worth it to just pull the trigger on a newer architecture CPU. Thank you for pointing that out.
February 14, 20179 yr That's a lot of horsepower for cheap $$. It looks like it will support vt-d though that is always a question with older motherboards. It's EATX but you're getting a case that supports that. It will have higher power and cooling requirements it looks like it would be able to do what you want.
February 14, 20179 yr Author I think I am just going to pull the trigger on it. It will do what I need just fine. Thanks guys!
February 14, 20179 yr I think I am just going to pull the trigger on it. It will do what I need just fine. Thanks guys! I'd look at Kaby Lake i7-7700K if HEVC decoding is important to you. Quad core not hex, but faster clock (4.2GHz) more than makes up for it. Kaby Lake CPU is $350, but the motherboard is quite a bit less expensive (Socket 1151 vs 2011). Also DDR4 memory. I'd say probably comparable or better horsepower, with couple fewer CPUs to pin. Passmark of the Four Core Kaby Lake i7-7700K: 12,304 $350 Passmark of the Six Core Sandy Bridge i7-3930K: 12,026 $90 Kaby is $160 more. Motherboard probably $160 less. I'd go for the Kaby - no question. That ASUS Rampage IV did not get good particularly good ratings on Amazon or NewEgg. And prices I saw were $300-$500. My next server will do 10bit HEVC decoding. Not in any rush - but closeout on Kaby Lake as Cannonlake 10nm technology rolls out is a definite possibility. (Note that even Skylake (e.g., Xeon E3-1275 v5), don' work for HEVC at 10bit. Guessing Intel will sell a bunch of the Kabys to the video watching crowd!) I posted this earlier - but THIS HEVC GUIDE is a pretty good description of HEVC and how it accomplishes comparable video quality at 1/2 the size. Pretty awesome algorithmic advance!
February 14, 20179 yr I bought a 7700k for $310 from monoprice the other day off of ebay. It's going in a desktop though, not for unraid. Also they should have Kaby Lake E3 xeons for sale soon.. I expect them to be released anytime now.
February 17, 20179 yr Author I think I am just going to pull the trigger on it. It will do what I need just fine. Thanks guys! I'd look at Kaby Lake i7-7700K if HEVC decoding is important to you. Quad core not hex, but faster clock (4.2GHz) more than makes up for it. Kaby Lake CPU is $350, but the motherboard is quite a bit less expensive (Socket 1151 vs 2011). Also DDR4 memory. I'd say probably comparable or better horsepower, with couple fewer CPUs to pin. Passmark of the Four Core Kaby Lake i7-7700K: 12,304 $350 Passmark of the Six Core Sandy Bridge i7-3930K: 12,026 $90 Kaby is $160 more. Motherboard probably $160 less. I'd go for the Kaby - no question. That ASUS Rampage IV did not get good particularly good ratings on Amazon or NewEgg. And prices I saw were $300-$500. My next server will do 10bit HEVC decoding. Not in any rush - but closeout on Kaby Lake as Cannonlake 10nm technology rolls out is a definite possibility. (Note that even Skylake (e.g., Xeon E3-1275 v5), don' work for HEVC at 10bit. Guessing Intel will sell a bunch of the Kabys to the video watching crowd!) I posted this earlier - but THIS HEVC GUIDE is a pretty good description of HEVC and how it accomplishes comparable video quality at 1/2 the size. Pretty awesome algorithmic advance! I finally got around to reading that HEVC guide and it was really cool. Thanks for linking that! I should clarify that I am getting the ASUS Mobo with the CPU for the $90. I am going to get it when I get a chance just because. I might get the server up and running since with it since it doesn't cost me much. I might end up going Kaby Lake when tax returns come back. It might just be worth it then.
February 18, 20179 yr I finally got around to reading that HEVC guide and it was really cool. Thanks for linking that! I should clarify that I am getting the ASUS Mobo with the CPU for the $90. I am going to get it when I get a chance just because. I might get the server up and running since with it since it doesn't cost me much. I might end up going Kaby Lake when tax returns come back. It might just be worth it then. Memory - whatever you buy will be throw away. But $90 for MB and CPU is a good deal. But my experience is that MBs can tend to wear on in ways that take time to figure out. Suggest trying it out pretty hard while in the returnable phase from eBay. I don't think Kaby Lake is a necessity now. A year from now? I might feel different. My nuc5cpyh can play back 8bit, but not 10bit. So my server would not need to transcode the 8 bit stream to those, my primary playback devices. Have fun. UnRAID is a great platform and I think you'll enjoy it.
February 18, 20179 yr Author I finally got around to reading that HEVC guide and it was really cool. Thanks for linking that! I should clarify that I am getting the ASUS Mobo with the CPU for the $90. I am going to get it when I get a chance just because. I might get the server up and running since with it since it doesn't cost me much. I might end up going Kaby Lake when tax returns come back. It might just be worth it then. Memory - whatever you buy will be throw away. But $90 for MB and CPU is a good deal. But my experience is that MBs can tend to wear on in ways that take time to figure out. Suggest trying it out pretty hard while in the returnable phase from eBay. I don't think Kaby Lake is a necessity now. A year from now? I might feel different. My nuc5cpyh can play back 8bit, but not 10bit. So my server would not need to transcode the 8 bit stream to those, my primary playback devices. Have fun. UnRAID is a great platform and I think you'll enjoy it. The mobo and CPU are from a friend. I'm not too worried about them lasting. We are usually trading stuff back and forth. I'm sure I owe him more than $90 over the years anyways. Thanks for the help!
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