Unraid Upgrading Drives - Update or leave OLD GA-MA78G?

[toms_jeep]

I am a first time poster on this, I have been reading off on since I build my unraid system in Dec 2015.  I am installing 2 new WD 4Tb Red drives, 1 for replacing current parity drive and adding a 2nd parity drive.  Last weekend I installed everything in a new case and upgraded the power supply.  This is used as a back up server only that has been up 24/7 since 2015.  When I built this back in 2015 everything was used spare parts except the WD Red drives those were all NEW. 

My question is should I leave my motherboard, CPU and motherboard alone or upgrade it?  I don't had a ton of $ to put into this at the time, I am leaning towards changing the 1 drive that is getting full with a new 2Tb or 4Tb WD Red Plus.

I have never had an issue with any of these parts but they were used when I installed them in 2015.  Side note is I have a identical spare MB, CPU & memory on a shelf.

 

Current build:

Motherboard  -  Gigabyte GA-MA78G-DS3H

CPU  -  AMD Athlon 5600+

Memory  -  4GB ddr2 667Mhz ( 4 - 1gb sticks)

USB  -  PNY  USB 2.0 512Mb (I tried to install a new cruzer 8gb one in 2015 but the MB did not see it)

NEW Cache Drives  -  (1) 4Tb WD Red Plus  ( I have one I installed finishing preclear today)  ( I have not purchased 2nd one yet)

OLD Cache Drive  -  (1) 2 GB WD Red Plus  (Retire or use for data drive?)

Drives  -  (3)  WD Red Plus 1Tb drives data  (only 1 is getting full 89%)

Power Supply  -  Seasonic  Focus+ Gold SSR550FX  (new just installed)

Case  -  Fractal Design Define R4  (new just installed)

Edited November 4, 2020 by toms_jeep

[Decto]

On 11/4/2020 at 12:29 PM, toms_jeep said:

I am a first time poster on this, I have been reading off on since I build my unraid system in Dec 2015.  I am installing 2 new WD 4Tb Red drives, 1 for replacing current parity drive and adding a 2nd parity drive.  Last weekend I installed everything in a new case and upgraded the power supply.  This is used as a back up server only that has been up 24/7 since 2015.  When I built this back in 2015 everything was used spare parts except the WD Red drives those were all NEW. 

 

If it is working, then no need to upgrade.

 

My backup server is an N40L which must be ~10 years old and has a 1.5Ghz dual core AMD cpu. 

This works fine even with a few dockers.

 

Drive decisions really depend on drive health, however as they are ~5yr old risk is increasing. 

That said, I have some WD RE3 1TB drives I use for testing which are now ~ 12 years old with no errors though these haven't been in continuous service for many years.  

 

Dual parity is one option, though single parity with 2 x new 4TB array drives significantly reduces the chance of failure as you have all new drives.

 

The original drives can then be used as additional backup for critical data or to make a raid 1 cache array (depending what you use the cache for)

If these 'redundant' drives can be externalised, you can store the data somewhere away from the server.

 

Good luck

 

 

 

[toms_jeep]

Now this may/will change the recommendations on this.  I am looking at adding Plex to my Unraid server, it will be one streaming device 90% of the time.