Finishing touches on build, moving from FreeNAS to unRaid


Remamian

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So TL;DR want to make sure i have setup correctly what i can, make sure i'm not missing anything, and speced correctly for use.

 

This system was originally speced for freeNAS will I've decided will not work for me, all parts are new, i had a few parts laying around leftover from a gaming PC build so ended up going with non-ECC. I understand the limitations but it tremendously brought down the price of my system to use stuff i already had. Also this build is going to be integrated into an open-case wall-mounted show build so aesthetics were important (Yet to find a decent black PCB miniITX mobo that could do what i wanted)

 

  • ASUS H370-I miniITX
  • Intel i7-8700t (Because passmark score+low TDP+passive cooling)
  • Arctic Alpine 12 passive cooler
  • 32gb DDR4 Kingston HyperX 3200
  • PCI Sata Controller card (4 additional Sata III ports)
  • 850w Asus ROG-THOR psu 80+ plat
  • 4-6 12tb Seagate Ironwolf Pro drives (currently 4)
  • 1 16gb USB 3.1 samsung flash drive

 

Use:

  • Plex Media - primarily 4k Video. I will be following another persons guide for creating a VM that is dedicated to ripping my physical collection and putting into Plex. Hopefully if everything is done right it will not need to be transcoded on the fly, and this will be streaming to only TV's of which all are the same brand/same software/same Plex app
  • VM - The above ripping VM, as well as likely the occasional 1-2 other VM's either for DosBOX gaming or just messing/learning various things (Ubuntu/Mac/etc)
  • Storage Archive - I do graphic design as well as 3d modeling and will be archiving onto my NAS. (This will be my 2nd redundancy for backup)

Potential Future Uses:

  • Workstation VM - For rendering, or various needs. I do have a spare p6000 Quadro that i use occasionally but not sure if i'm going to run it in this system or build up my Threadripper 2 workstation with it, but it would be nice functionality for the future to drop that card in and use it for a VM.
  • Plex Streaming/Transcoding - Sending over the internet to phones/tablets/etc on the go. Not in the LEAST a priority, just a cool feature i may use in a blue moon.

Questions: 

  • I don't see it being a problem at all, but the above specs am i missing anything for unRAID? I see people loading it off a USB drive similar to FreeNAS but couldn't find anything at a quick glance for if it ran off RAM (Like FreeNAS) or if i should invest in a small sata drive (If so does it benifit from NVMe?)
  • Is any component(s) overkill for what i'm looking for out of it?
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3 hours ago, Remamian said:

I see people loading it off a USB drive similar to FreeNAS but couldn't find anything at a quick glance for if it ran off RAM (Like FreeNAS)

Unraid must boot off of the licensed USB stick, but it runs in RAM to keep the USB stick healthy. Only config changes and the like are saved back to the USB to preserve the state for subsequent bootup.

 

So, the thing that sticks out most to me IS your USB flash drive. 3.1 spec drives may be problematic, you will have to see whether you have issues as the root cause of the 3.0/3.1 problems is illusive. USB 2.0 are MUCH preferred, typically less heat / wear, and the lower speed doesn't really change anything because Unraid runs in RAM.

 

Your next issue could be the PCIe HBA, I don't know of ANY 4 port cards that work well. Either 2 port Asmedia chipset cards or 8 port LSI chipset cards work well, Marvell based controllers can be very problematic.

 

Your post is unclear about VM access, headless or local console, so hard to comment on that.

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On 10/12/2018 at 5:43 PM, jonathanm said:

Unraid must boot off of the licensed USB stick, but it runs in RAM to keep the USB stick healthy. Only config changes and the like are saved back to the USB to preserve the state for subsequent bootup.

 

So, the thing that sticks out most to me IS your USB flash drive. 3.1 spec drives may be problematic, you will have to see whether you have issues as the root cause of the 3.0/3.1 problems is illusive. USB 2.0 are MUCH preferred, typically less heat / wear, and the lower speed doesn't really change anything because Unraid runs in RAM.

 

Your next issue could be the PCIe HBA, I don't know of ANY 4 port cards that work well. Either 2 port Asmedia chipset cards or 8 port LSI chipset cards work well, Marvell based controllers can be very problematic.

 

Your post is unclear about VM access, headless or local console, so hard to comment on that.

Hey I really appreciate your feedback. Thank you! I do have a 2.0 drive that i can use as well, no problems! The PCIe is for only once i get past 4 drives. I've also seen a couple of M.2. slot adapters, everythings cheap (less than 10$) so i can mess around till i find one that works, no big deal. The VM access, up the air right now as its just to mess around, absolutely nothing set or planned out yet. The only thing i personally care about for the build is the 4k plex server that i can move my physical copies over to.

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M2. slot adapters can be hit or miss with Unraid, also if you are using an Sata m.2 drive (not nvme) you have to hook the card up to a Sata port and if you are doing that you are better off just getting a cheap m.2>2.5 sata enclosure and turning it in to a regular form-factor SSD. Those enclosures are cheap and work well, check Amazon. Edit: I use this one - https://amzn.com/B01N6PMZLW

 

For expansion the LSI 8 ports are a solid and dependable choice. You can get them (and the 8087 breakout cables) cheap on Ebay. The 9211-8i IT mode is a common choice, for Unraid as well as FreeNAS and many other software defined storage systems that need to see JBOD. Be aware that those don't support Trim on most SSDs (pro and enterprise model SSDs do work with those controllers and Trim) which may or may not be an issue for you. I personally hook my SSDs up to my onboard Sata 3 ports and use the LSI for my spindle drives.

 

The newer versions of Unraid make it even easier to pass a video card through to a VM, you don't even need to do template XML edits any longer. If it's an Nvidia card and the primary, or only, video card in your system you'll need to load the vbios with the VM to get it to work; this too can now be done right in the VM template GUI. Watch Spaceinvader One's video on it, it's easy (you can skip the steps where he manually adds it to the template, his video was made before Unraid added the option to the gui.).

 

I pass through a 1070ti to my Windows 10 VM, works great.

Edited by planetix
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1 hour ago, planetix said:

M2. slot adapters can be hit or miss with Unraid, also if you are using an Sata m.2 drive (not nvme) you have to hook the card up to a Sata port and if you are doing that you are better off just getting a cheap m.2>2.5 sata enclosure and turning it in to a regular form-factor SSD. Those enclosures are cheap and work well, check Amazon. Edit: I use this one - https://amzn.com/B01N6PMZLW

 

For expansion the LSI 8 ports are a solid and dependable choice. You can get them (and the 8087 breakout cables) cheap on Ebay. The 9211-8i IT mode is a common choice, for Unraid as well as FreeNAS and many other software defined storage systems that need to see JBOD. Be aware that those don't support Trim on most SSDs (pro and enterprise model SSDs do work with those controllers and Trim) which may or may not be an issue for you. I personally hook my SSDs up to my onboard Sata 3 ports and use the LSI for my spindle drives.

 

The newer versions of Unraid make it even easier to pass a video card through to a VM, you don't even need to do template XML edits any longer. If it's an Nvidia card and the primary, or only, video card in your system you'll need to load the vbios with the VM to get it to work; this too can now be done right in the VM template GUI. Watch Spaceinvader One's video on it, it's easy (you can skip the steps where he manually adds it to the template, his video was made before Unraid added the option to the gui.).

 

I pass through a 1070ti to my Windows 10 VM, works great.

 

The sata card i got was https://www.amazon.com/Express-Expansion-Controller-Marvell-88SE9215/dp/B07GW5VSHG/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1539620843&sr=8-3&keywords=88SE9215+4+Ports+SATA

 

The M.2. drive version was talking about is similar to https://www.amazon.com/CHEN-LI-SHENG-88SE9215-Controller/dp/B07GTGG7QY/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1539620843&sr=8-2&keywords=88SE9215+4+Ports+SATA

 

 

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40 minutes ago, johnnie.black said:

Both Marvell and not recommended for Unraid.

 

38 minutes ago, planetix said:

Look for ones with Asmedia chips. Or just get an LSI 2008 (like the 9211-8i) like many of us :)

 

I'm not using the adapter for Virtualization. The sata ports would be used for the Plex Media NAS storage only. If/when i would do a Virtualized desktop i would run a regular NVMe M.2. drive (512 or 1tb) for those. 

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7 minutes ago, johnnie.black said:

It's not just for virtualization, Marvell devices have a tendency for dropping devices, though they can work well for some, still not recommended.

Gotcha, ok. I'll give it a try and if it doesnt work i'll go with one of the other options. The primary reason i've gone with this was because of the aesthetics(All-black PCB) (Again once i'm done with the build i'll post and things will make more sense)

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