First FreeNAS Build

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Hi, first timer here on these forums!

I’m currently looking to build my first FreeNAS for the following goals: file server, virtual machine host, and media streaming. My budget is around 2 to 2.5k, preferably lower.

I did some research for the build according to my needs but I really would love any input you guys can provide.

I probably would need to have at least 32GB ECC RAM instead of the 16GB.

Here is a link of the build.

https://pcpartpicker.com/user/Phanto23/saved/96KLD3

Thank you very much in advance for any help you guys can provide!

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if I remember correctly freenas needs roughly 1-1.5 gb of ram per terabyte of storage. so you might need to get 64 gb of ram

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I assume you have read

http://www.freenas.org/hardware-requirements/

and

https://forums.freenas.org/index.php?threads/hardware-recommendations-read-this-first.23069/

As multiyogibear says you need 1GB of RAM per TB of storage, the only other thing is to get two USB drives for the OS so you can mirror them.

Are you going RAID5 (RAID-Z1 in FreeNAS)?

You know how much storage you need would suggest six smaller drives to save you money both on the drives and perhaps the RAM. Configure in RAID-Z2 if possible.

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Thanks for the replies,

I did take a look to the first link, but I didn’t see that had a continuation I will be reading those !

Yeah I was thinking going with RAID6 (RAID-Z2) which is a more safer approach.

Also I’ll be adding more memory then at least 32GB.

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“Need” is a bit strong. You can tune ZFS to work properly on the 16GB he’s mentioned.

I would recommend, 6 drives for a raidz2 configuration.

Just a couple side notes off the OP:

bhyve support on FreeNAS is buggy at best. You may be happy with it, but I was not.

Are you planning on running dual CPUs? I’m not entirely sure if you can run that system with only one CPU.

Additionally, you may need 4 DIMMS to run that board. Lots of server boards (especially dual or quad socket ones) require a certain number of DIMMS to post.

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I’d go for a faster clock speed CPU. 2.2GHz base is pretty meh for CIFS/Samba. Since you are doing a single CPU anyway, 1650 V3 would be good. Or, you could go with the last gen Supermicro X9 with 1650 V2 used CPU which is very cheap on Ebay. Plus, you can save money with DDR3 ECC RDIMMs.

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Yes and no. FreeNAS only needs 1GB per TB (or thereabouts) if you plan to do de-duplication (as a rule of thumb, in order to hold the ZFS de-dupe database in RAM - otherwise performance tanks horrifically).

But unless you have a very specific use case and have measured that de-duplication is a win, de-duplication isn’t worth it for most people anyway - so don’t do that, just use ZFS filesystem compression instead, which does not have that requirement.

I’d take your VM memory requirement, add 8 GB to it, and that would be a starting point for your memory requirement.

If its a single user NAS… minus the VMs and streaming, i’ve been happily running an HP Micrososerver with AMD Turion based CPU since 2012 or something and it is still running just fine. I’ve even run a few light VMs on it, but it only has 10 GB of RAM so there’s that.

But for a single user (or household) on gigabit ethernet, it is plenty.

Unless you’re running 10 GbE, going for some massively overpowered CPU, disk subsystem or massive amounts of RAM is just simply overkill.

AS to my disk config: i’m running 4 drives with a pair of mirrors.

Why?
Because i have 4 drive bays, and a pair of mirrors gives you more flexibility in upgrades. You can replace one mirror at a time and ZFS will load balance across them. I.e., to expand storage, i can do it 2 drives at a time, instead of needing to replace them all in one hit.

Yes, RAIDZ2 is in theory more reliable, but it is much slower on writes (as you only have 1 VDEV, your IOPs are limited to the speed of a single disk rather than 2 or 3 in the case of a 2x2 or 3x2 drive mirror - which will help for VMs) and disk capacity is a lot cheaper than IOPs (i.e., sure you burn 50% of your capacity for mirrors, but you might be OK with that depending on your use case and thinking forward to upgrade path down the line).

Personal opinion, for home use with small numbers of drives, 2 drive mirrors are the way to go. YMMV but just be aware that upgrading a RAIDZ2 array will hurt the hip pocket in a big way in one hit.

Hypothetically, if i have one of the drives in my box fail, i can simply either buy one replacement or buy 2 drives that are larger and get a storage capacity upgrade for minimal extra outlay…