Using old FreeNAS setup for Unraid

[Zenergy]

Hello!  My story is long an boring, but I will try and do the "long story short version";

Back in 2014, I built a decent rig for Free NAS; my goal at the time was personal storage, Plex server, and small Minecraft server

LIAN LI PC-V354B

SUPERMICRO MBD-X9SCM-F-O

Intel Xeon E3-1230 V2

Rosewill Fortress 80 PLUS Platinum Certified -550w

Kingston -KVR16E11K4/32

8Gb Flashdrive - USB 2.0

6x WD - Red 3TB (raid6)

1x Samsung 120 SSD

 

I sucked at configuring my FreeNAS, I got the SMB share up and running within a day... but every time I want to charge or add, Plex or Minecraft server something it took me days to weeks of reading, posting and configuring... I thought being a Weekend IT warrior would be enough to learn but alas I got so frustrated I bought a QNAP 670 Pro. I moved my drives into that and converted my NAS rig to a personal PC. Did a few small upgrades over the years;

 

Added / changed to;

GIGABYTE-6UASL3

NVIDIA GTX 1050 Ti

2X SAMSUNG 512GB

 

With the current Qsnatch crisis in the Qnap community, (I was infected)... I am looking to move away from prebuilt back into my own rig. I am hoping Unraid will be a good fit for as a self proclaimed IT weekend warrior. 

 

At this point, I would like to use as many components as possible above, 6x Reds, case, PS etc.  BUT I would like to upgrade some things to improve my rig. Looking to improve my Plex experience, resurrect my Minecraft server idea again (no more then 5 players), NVR software and storage (Win10 VM?), and a Linux VM for my son to learn on. OH, and keep to budget of $500ca upgrading if possible.

 

 Any suggestions on upgrades would be most grateful… 

(and I apologise my first post is a long winded ask for help)

[trurl]

Is there is any data on these existing disks that you want to keep?

 

Unraid must format any disk it will use in the parity array or cache pool.

[Zenergy]

I have most cloud backed up, and recently bought a 8tb USB drive I am currently copy the remainder of data.  I’ll be good to wipe and reinstall in a day or two once everything is copied.  

[Vr2Io]

For your son learning, you could try turn QNAP 670 Pro to run Unraid OS instead QTS. ( Unplug DOM, just keep it and return to QTS anytime )

[Zenergy]

It would not have room for a cache drive, and that seems necessary for a decent Plex experience.