Hey everyone,
 
I'm going to make the plunge soon to build my first unRAID server.
 
I’ve been running Plex and other tools from my gaming / work desktop and wanted to have a separate system to have important data backups and dedicated Plex server. (All things I could do with unRaid.)

 

What is your budget?
I’m aiming for $1500. If it could be less that is would be a bonus.
 
How many drives do you want your server to be able to support and how much capacity do you need?
I’m planning on starting with:
-    3x 1TB Red drives (1 for parity)
-    1x 500GB m.2 for Cache

 

Is expandability important to you?  If so, what's your long term goal?
Expandability
Yes – I’d like to not have to worry about having to remove old data 

 

Long Term – 
I’d like to expand my Plex library, 
Eventually have VMs for testing/plaing around like Windows, Linux, Steam.
Move my torrenting off my personal machine and use the appropriate dockers with unRaid
Use the Server as Backup/shared drives for the family
 
Are you interested in running any unRAID Add Ons (see here)?  If so, which ones?  Be specific.
I plan on using this as a Plex media server to start. Then eventually using for more (backup, downloads, NVR – when I get to that)
 
For Plex, I’d have at most 3-4 (720 or 1080 or maybe higher eventually) streams going at one time, but that could grow eventually.
I’ve been having to do some house keeping with stuff I have seen and nobody has checked out in a while to make room, and sometimes I end up re-adding stuff I want to go back to watch.
That’s why I’ve been thinking of going with a dedicated server, that I could upgrade when needed.
I am starting to get more Blu-Rays when I find something I really want. I’ve been ripping them when I can with my current Desktop, so that would be something I’d be doing with the server if I could.

 

Do you want to run green/low power drives or faster 7200 rpm drives?  If you don't have a specific need for 7200 rpm drives, then choose green drives.
 Nope- Never looked into it really

 

Do you have any spare parts laying around that you would like to apply towards your build?  This includes drives.
The parts I already have are:
-     2x WD Red 1TB drives (brand New)
-    Cooler Master - K280 ATX Mid Tower Case (NEW never opened the box yet)

 

As other Add-ons go, I'm not sure yet. still looking into things. Sonarr, couchPotato, FileBot, VMs   all seem like they would be used eventually.

 

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Here is what I’ve been thinking for a build. https://ca.pcpartpicker.com/user/supersead/saved/#view=ZttRGX
I’m looking at the ASRock Z270 Extreme 4 Motherboard because it has plenty of Sata ports to expand with, and for the same reason I bought the case I did, for futureproofing my build.

I’m totally new to unRaid so if there are any quirks I should know about that would be great.
Also if there is something missing to my build please feel free to let me know.
 
Are there any other overall suggestions or changes that can be done?

Thanks
 

Welcome to the forum!  My comments on your build are:

1. CPU: more than powerful enough to handle a lot of plex transcoding if you need this.  It only has four cores though and this might give you a sub-optimal VM experience, where more cores mean you can isolate the operation of each VM i.e. fewer conflicts from resource sharing.  Depending on how serious you are about VMs, and how many will be running concurrently, you might want a CPU with more cores
2. Memory: again, when you start dabbling in VMs you might need another 16GB - one for the future maybe
3. PSU: what kind of VMs are you planning?  Gaming VMs?  If you're going to have two gaming GPUs potentially in the future, 650W might be a bit underpowered.  What I'd recommend doing is loading up a new dummy part list with all the bits you might add in the future (GPUs, more HDDs etc) and see if the PSU will still be able to cope
4. GPU: just in case you don't know, unRAID will grab the on-board graphics so if you want to run a VM you'll need a graphics card

Other than that, a nice starter build. 

Don't forget a quality USB stick like the Sandisk Cruzer Fit.

Thanks DZMM. For now it would be for my plex server and my data backups.

 

The VMs were more of a future planning thing. If i could get one going then that would be fun to play with to try out. Not mich of a gamer anymore. So nothing that heavy. Unless i get more time to run steam games again.

 

 

Didnt forget. Just didnt write it in my list...lol

On 29/12/2017 at 3:55 PM, tdallen said:

Don't forget a quality USB stick like the Sandisk Cruzer Fit.