August 23, 20178 yr After a few months of research on the web, I have decided to give unRAID a try for my first NAS/Media Server. unRAID looks like it will meet all of my needs and allow my to try some new things out. I plan to upgrade my main computer and use the CPU, motherboard, RAM and SSD to help build my unRAID box. My primary use for my main computer is gaming and photo editing. I have an older Core 2 Duo setup that I will use during the free trial period to learn as much as I can about the unRAID environment. Thank you to everyone for the great amount of information in the forums. I have also found many good youtube video tutorials. Please look over my hardware and needs, and let me know about any recommendations below or things worth trying. Is there a place to buy additional individual brackets to put the Hard Drives into the slots in the case? I have been looking online but cannot seem to find any? Thank you in advance for the feedback. I will use my unRAID with 1-3 users and plan to have it running 24/7. I am looking into a battery backup at this time. Uses: Daily backing up -Main computer -Laptop -Phone x 2 (what is the best way to backup phones - android) Ripping my Blu-ray collection (MakeMKV & Handbrake) about 400 discs. This should take me a few months. Plex Media Server Shared Network Drive VM to test out programs before I install them on my Main Computer New unRAID build: Case: HAF 912 Plus CPU: i5 3570K (O.C. 4.2Ghz) I love this CPU by-the-way. Motherboard: ASUS P8Z77-V RAM: 4x4GB G. Skillz DDR3 816MHz (16GB) PSU: EVGA Supernova 550 G2 Cache Drive: Samsung 840 PRO - 256GB Parity Drive: WD 10TB Red (need to purchase) HDD 1: WD 8 TB Red (need to purchase) HDD 2: WD 8TB Red (need to purchase) Boot Drive: USB 16GB x 2 Main Rig that I will upgrade: Case: HAF 932 CPU: i7 8700K or might go with Ryzen (need to purchase) Motherboard: TBD (need to purchase) RAM: 2x8GB XPG DDR3 2133 (16GB) PSU: Power and Cooling MK III 750W GPU: EVGA GTX 1080 FTW Boot Drive w/ Win 10: 512 M.2 (need to purchase) HDD 1: Samsung SSD 1TB HDD 2: WD 1TB Black Edited August 26, 20178 yr by spofoe Changed my Cache Drive to the proper name
August 23, 20178 yr 3 hours ago, spofoe said: CPU: i5 3570K (O.C. 4.2Ghz) I love this CPU by-the-way. Keep in mind that CPU does not support hardware passthrough, so any VM's will be network only, no local hardware can be used. This is not a huge deal, I am typing this message on a Windows 7 VM that is hosted on an unraid box and accessed by RDP from an old XP machine. Old as in 1999 Pentium III 1GHZ. The VM over RDP is MUCH faster than the local box native XP.
August 24, 20178 yr Author Thank you jonathanm, that is something I defiantly would not have known had someone not told me. I guess I will try it with what I have, and upgrade the processor if it becomes an issue. Does that mean if I ran a VM on my HTPC, the unRAID box would have to do the transcoding of video?
August 24, 20178 yr 9 minutes ago, spofoe said: Does that mean if I ran a VM on my HTPC, the unRAID box would have to do the transcoding of video? Can you clarify what you are asking? The lack of Vt-d on that model of processor simply means you can't use a second video card in the unraid box to display a VM, you would have to access the VM from another machine. Normally your HTPC would just access the video file from unraid directly, or possibly using emby or plex docker with the corresponding client installed on the HTPC.
August 25, 20178 yr On 8/23/2017 at 8:55 AM, spofoe said: Is there a place to buy additional individual brackets to put the Hard Drives into the slots in the case? I have been looking online but cannot seem to find any? I would very strongly recommend 1-2 5in3 drive cages. They would fit in 3 5.25" slots and provide 5 hot-swap 3.5" drive bays. The smaller case would hold one of them (5 drives), the larger case looks like it would hold 2 (10 drives). The #1 problem users have is disturbing the delicate cabling as drives are added or replaced. Having these cages allows you to easily swap drives around without that risk. Highly recommend you include in your build. Unless those 3.5" "hidden" slots are hot-swap, I'd steer clear. I like the SuperMicro CSE-M35T-1B cages. Best of luck with your build. I believe you are going to be very happy with your unRAID server once you get it stood up!
August 25, 20178 yr Author 7 minutes ago, bjp999 said: I would very strongly recommend 1-2 5in3 drive cages. They would fit in 3 5.25" slots and provide 5 hot-swap 3.5" drive bays. The smaller case would hold one of them (5 drives), the larger case looks like it would hold 2 (10 drives). The #1 problem users have is disturbing the delicate cabling as drives are added or replaced. Having these cages allows you to easily swap drives around without that risk. Highly recommend you include in your build. Unless those 3.5" "hidden" slots are hot-swap, I'd steer clear. I like the SuperMicro CSE-M35T-1B cages. Best of luck with your build. I believe you are going to be very happy with your unRAID server once you get it stood up! Thank you for the response. This is exactly what I was looking for. I had always planned on using the 3.5" internal drive slots and never considered the front 5.25" bays. The 5.25" hot swap drive bays at the front of the case looks like a much better option. Thank you for the recommendation, I am looking at them now.
August 26, 20178 yr Author bjp999, again, thank you for the recommendation. I picked up the SuperMicro CSE-M35T-1B from amazon. I ended up going with 3 x WD 8TB Reds. The promo code on new egg until the 27th along with the already more affordable $ per GB just made more sense economically. I meet my storage requirements with this configuration while being able to pickup an additional 8TB in the future, giving me 4TB more then if I had gone with my original storage plan. I was looking at doubling my cache drive (Samsung 840 PRO - 256GB) after reading many of the forum post but I was surprised to see that an SSD that I bought back in 2012 is about $40 more expensive.
August 27, 20178 yr Glad to help. Recently Best Buy has run specials on its "Easystore" 8T external drive, which contains a WD Red. Prices have fluctuated between about $160 and $200. The cases are pretty easy to open without any damage to maintain ability to return if defective. There is a thread about it with instructions over in the Good Deals forum. Good luck with your build!
September 14, 20178 yr Author I got the parts in that I was waiting for to convert my old computer to an unRAID box. I am really impressed with the Super Micro hot swap bay. It is built very well. Based on some recommendations, I order a different fan for the back to keep the noise down.
September 14, 20178 yr You may need a deep throated c-clamp to bend the tabs in your case so that the 5in3 slides in. Good luck with your build and keep us posted!
January 21, 20188 yr Author Update on my build. Yesterday I finally had some time to put my new box together. I noted the changes below. I hope to spend this coming week setting up the unRAID program. @SSD I ended up using some "hammer love" to will the tabs into place. New unRAID build: Case: HAF 912 CPU: i5 3570K (O.C. 4.2Ghz) Still puting in work. Motherboard: ASUS P8Z77-V RAM: 4x4GB G. Skillz DDR3 816MHz (16GB) PSU: EVGA Supernova 550 G2 (ECO Mode) Cache Drive: Samsung 840 PRO - 256GB Parity Drive: WD 8TB Red (CHANGE) HDD 1: WD 8 TB Red HDD 2: WD 8TB Red Boot Drive: USB 16GB x 2 SuperMicro CSE-M35T-1B SATA 6G PCI Express Card 8 x Fans. Should stay cool
January 21, 20188 yr Nice pics and welcome! Only thing I'd suggest is we don't generally advise overclocking. You're in home server territory now, stability is the name of the game. I've just woken up though, so others may have better suggestions, I've not yet had a coffee!
January 21, 20188 yr Author @CHBMB Good point. I did not think about that. I am going to reset everything in BIOS back to stock settings. Thanks for the tip.
January 21, 20188 yr Quote Main Rig that I will upgrade: Case: HAF 932 CPU: i7 8700K or might go with Ryzen (need to purchase) Motherboard: TBD (need to purchase) RAM: 2x8GB XPG DDR3 2133 (16GB) PSU: Power and Cooling MK III 750W GPU: EVGA GTX 1080 FTW Boot Drive w/ Win 10: 512 M.2 (need to purchase) HDD 1: Samsung SSD 1TB HDD 2: WD 1TB Black I suspect that when you listed the ram for this you were thinking of an intel CPU if you build a Ryzen system go with DDR4 3000 - 3200 and go dual channel instead of quad channel Ryzen performs much better with the higher ram speeds and by all means check the QVL for your mobo to ensure ram compatibility as it has been a sore spot with Ryzen.
January 22, 20188 yr Author @mrbilky I ended up going the Intel route getting an I7 8700k, ASUS ROG Maximus X Hero (Wi-Fi AC), and G.SKILL TridentZ RGB Series 16GB (2 x 8GB). I changed the case to a DB700 as well. Build Below of my gaming rig:
January 22, 20188 yr 14 hours ago, spofoe said: @mrbilky I ended up going the Intel route getting an I7 8700k, ASUS ROG Maximus X Hero (Wi-Fi AC), and G.SKILL TridentZ RGB Series 16GB (2 x 8GB). I changed the case to a DB700 as well. Build Below of my gaming rig: Nice that should serve you well!
January 23, 20188 yr Author Trying to load up the unRAID OS and I get hung at " ata12: hard resetting link." Let the troubleshooting begin. I will try to attach all of my SATA cables to the MB and see if that helps.
January 28, 20188 yr Author Turns out that the USB Drive I was using was not operating correctly. I picked up a ScanDisk 16GB from the store, reloaded 6.0, and everything booted up. The drives are formatting right now and the parity sync is taking place. Estimated speed: 177.1 MB/sec Estimated finish: 12 hours, 25 minutes Looks like I will be able to set everything up in about 12 hours. Thank you to everyone that helped me get this far.
December 31, 20187 yr Author Happy New Year everyone. I just wanted to provide a quick update. One year has past since I started my Unraid adventure. I do not post here much but use the community and archive on this forum to solve any issues that come up. Thank you for that. With Unraid, I have not had many issues at all. Everything is running smooth for the past year. I have some dockers and Plug-ins installed that I never new existed, making my life easier. I mainly use Plex on my Roku Ultra, and have backups of my main computer and phones. I almost maxed out my 16TB (2x8TB) I originally had in the system. I decided to add another 16TB (2x8TB), and a second cache drive. I was able to get my PCI-E SATA card working that enabled me to expand. Photos below show the slight increase in wires and drives, and my 2x8TB drives going through the clearing process. I also changed out my CPU cooler to a much quieter setup. With all the fans running I still put my hand over the top to see if air is coming out. (I know I need to clean the dust filter on the front)
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