Need HW Advice For UnRaid Downgrade

[curiouskid]

Right now, I am running UnRaid on Dual Xeon E5-2670 V3 8 = 16 core and 32 thread with 128 GB of ECC memory.

It's a beast machine that I had built and it handled everything I had thrown at it till date.

Because this monster PC was staying up 24X7, I notice significant raise in electricity bill.

 

So, I started looking around for low power CPU and APU and went crazy looking desperately on internet.

Finally, I am looking at following board which has 13 SATA ports onboard with J1900 low power CPU and dual intel LAN ports.

Although 8 GB RAM would be very limited, I am looking to bring down electricity bill while keeping this server up 24 x 7 just for NAS functionality using UnRaid.

 

Idea here is to move 4 HDD and 2 SSD from above monster PC to this new build.

 

Mother Board: $139 + $14 shipping = $153

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/HCIPC-M42S-6-HCM18NVR3-13SATA-Ports-2-Giga-LAN-1-COM-8-USB2-0-VGA-HDMI/32574624109.html?spm=2114.13010208.99999999.264.uaMC5g

Memory: $52

https://www.amazon.com/Crucial-Single-PC3L-12800-204-Pin-CT102464BF160B/dp/B006YG8X9Y/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1496297845&sr=8-3&keywords=8gb+ddr3+so+dimm

Power Supply: $29.99

https://www.amazon.com/EVGA-WHITE-Warranty-Supply-100-W1-0430-KR/dp/B00H33SDR4/ref=pd_lpo_vtph_147_bs_tr_t_2?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=2HFMDT6AYJYVJXDVMKFZ

Case: I have old case from a friend.

 

Because this device is passively cooled, I do not even have to worry about fan.

Or

may be couple of fan to keep HDD cool.
 

Less then $300 without HDD, I am convinced except I do know know answer to only question.

 

i.e. Will this UnRaid and also perform just as good for file sharing?

[SSD]

For basic NAS function with single parity, the CPU requirement is very low. It is Dockers (like Plex especially that does transcodes) and VMs that push the need for faster CPUs and more memory. Parity2 calc can also require a little extra computational performance, but expect the build you are looking at world handle that if parity2 is needed.

 

The J1900 has a passmark of 1864, which is not so low. Might handle one transcode from Plex.

 

Wonder what your payback period is on the new build?

[garycase]

Be sure you get the version of the board with the J1900.   The dual-core J1800 has significantly lower performance -- PassMark of 1027.    The quad-core J1900 scores 1864 on PassMark (as noted above).    This is PLENTY for NAS-only use.    3 of my 4 servers are lower than that and have absolutely no issues.

 

[HellDiverUK]

J1900 is good enough for one Plex transcode.  I used a Supermicro X10SBA for a long time and had no issues.  In fact, sometime I think about going back to it, it was super-stable and really power efficient.

[curiouskid]

To save $ without loosing data and protection, I decided to move this to low power computer build mentioned above.

So, I built replacement PC and tested it by installing Windows 10 in Mini PCIE SSD using USB bootable media. I confirmed all hardware including booting from USB worked. After doing stress test when I was happy with newly built PC's stability and performance, I decided to move UnRaid to this computer.

 

I gracefully power down above mentioned Monster PC and pulled out USB Drive for UnRaid and put it in newly built low power PC.

I had used same USB slot where i had put in another bootable USB drive for Windows install earlier. I got disappointed when UnRaid didn't boot.

I had verified and confirmed that USB stick for UnRaid was top priority in boot order and all other devices were disabled in boot order list.

 

I tried all 4 available USB ports and no luck booting Unraid from any of them. 

So, I put that USB back into old monster PC and it worked.

 

One thing I did notice is that USB drive for Unraid shows as UEFI : Samsung USB <Serial number of UnRaid USB Drive>

 

Would you please advice on what can I do to ensure newly built PC can boot into UnRaid?

I would really appreciate any assistance on this issue.

[vsixtyfour]

Have you booted into the bios and enabled UEFI for boot drives?

 

Might be ignoring it and looking for a drive with a MBR?

[pcaro]

Is this HCIPC NAS running unraid? I am interested in a similar system.

[garycase]

CuriousKid => Did you get this system to run UnRAID okay?   If the issue is a UEFI issue, the newest RC of UnRAID (6.4 RC6) supports UEFI boot, so it should definitely boot on the system regardless of the BIOS settings.

 

If you've got it running okay, I'm curious how much your power consumption has dropped (I'd expect a LOT).