NAS build planning

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So I’ll start off with what I currently have and am looking to replace. I’ve been running a Dell PowerEdge T20 for a long time, it’s not a NAS and has been used as a home server for running various game servers as well as a Plex server.

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It’s quite frankly a monstrosity, taping the PSU to the top like that was required because for some reason Dells mounting bracket makes it impossible to fit a standard power supply in the case due to there being a metal strip in the way which cuts the PSU short by about 1/2 inch. I do have an old GTX960 in this machine.

The machine currently only has mechanical storage, no redundancy nothing fancy whatsoever.

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         `Y$$b.                  GPU: GeForce GTX 960/PCIe/SSE2
            `"Y$b._              RAM: 5010MiB / 15984MiB

The reason I’m mentioning this, is I would like the NAS to also be able to host everything that I previously used this server for, thus not only being a NAS. From what I’ve researched that means Unraid would be a better solution than TrueNAS.

What I’ve already bought:
6x 14TB WD RED drives (3x shucked from easystore)

Everything else is up in the air, when searching around I found this 4U case which looks like it would be good:

And via a LTT video I found that I should use a USB DOM (I’ve seen lots of reports of peoples Unraid flash drives dying):

Unfortunately, I haven’t seen anywhere to purchase the one listed in the video short of refurbished ones on eBay. So I’m not really sure where to pick one of these up.

As for the mobo, and CPU I’m not really sure what to expect, as stated I often host game servers on here as well as a plex server, so I’d need those in addition to the NAS. I was anticipating throwing a m.2 SSD in there to run as the boot drive for the server so that it had some fast storage for the game servers, but I’m not sure if that’s necessary.

I was also intending to buy a 10G switch to have the best throughput for the drives (to potentially store games on the NAS) although I’ve also seen mixed reports of how viable this is. But I’m not well versed in what to look for.

So to wrap it up the tl;dr:

  • Where should I look for buying a USB DOM?
  • Any mobo recommendations?
  • What kind of CPU should I be looking at for hosting a NAS with 6x 14TB drives as well as a plex/game servers?
  • Any recommendations for a 10Gig switch for home use?

That’s all the questions I have for now, any recommendations or info are appreciated.

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I guess you missed this thread :slight_smile: [Sammelthread] - Dell PowerEdge T20 | Hardwareluxx

You might want to consider a Precision 3650 Tower Workstation, rip out anything you don’t need and add Xeon CPU and ECC memory

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It appears you’re looking at jumping a couple grades. nothing wrong with that but these are what i’d think about.

  • are those WD drives, especially the shucked ones, SMR
  • do you actually intend to put it in a rack (if not, fractal torrent/define tower cases I’ve found very suitable and available with 8 3.5" bays)

I suggest you don’t need a USB DOM at all. an M.2 or even SATA SSD as a boot drive is more than adequate, of course be aware anything too cheap (there are ‘NAS grade’ SSD’s from seagate et al).

a)
If you’re on a budget of consumer equipment I feel AMD is strongly better for the availability, though not necessity of ECC, even if unregistered DDR ECC DIMMs can be a pain to get at least where I am. you’ll want to research these (and board ‘tolerance’ to ECC) if this applies/of interest to you.

I don’t suggest you need all that many cores if you’re not enabling a lot of simultaneous users (vm’s can be oversubscribed on cores/threads) but I’d think about the largest workload and work backwards.

for what you state, you’ll want pci-e passthrough (graphics) & for adding 10g i’d suggest to consider any target board’s pci-e capabilities per slot carefully, for which ones can pass through at what throughput ( PCI Express - Wikipedia ) - you might only have 2 slots that can pass through practically, and you might want one of those on a HBA.

b)
if you really want a lot of virtual machines you might want to look instead at cast off enterprise equipment (I don’t find oversubscribing RAM to be unnoticeable) - the registered ram may make it cheaper in using large quantities, in ECC .

i’ve read postive things but not personally used this mikrotik 4 port:

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These are normal consumer drives with extra overprovisioning. And they are rather old and can’t really compete with modern SSDs. Certainly not anything special despite what price might suggest. They don’t even have PLP. I wouldn’t put much money into a boot drive. Cheapest reliable with some endurance will do. Something like 500GB Samsung 980 or 870 EVO or equivalent from others. Mirror it if needed.

5

I can’t read German so I definitely never read this.

Nope, apparently WD doesn’t make SMR drives above 8TB. Found that info here with people asking about the same model number as the shucked drives.

I’m heavily considering it since having multiple towers on my desk isn’t great that combined with all the networking wires which I would be able to cut down on if I were to move everything to a rack in the future. I also like the idea of hotswap bays.

AFAIK unraid will not boot from an internal drive, I’m not sure how it distinguishes but I’ve seen tons of info saying that this doesn’t work, and if you get it working it’s not supported.

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Use Bing or Google, https://www-hardwareluxx-de.translate.goog/community/threads/dell-poweredge-t20.1031138/?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en&_x_tr_pto=wapp

Not sure why you’re going to bother with a DOM device at all, a decent SSD will in most cases last long than the lifetime of the build itself. Just make sure to get a decent controller.

You probably need to do some measurements but if you’re lucky it uses a standard form factor such as mATX

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Reading more into it here: https://www.reddit.com/r/unRAID/comments/moyfvh/can_i_install_unraid_into_an_external_ssd/

Apparently it’s because unraid uses the flash drives serial number to identify your key?

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That’s always been a complete deal breaker for me. I can’t imagine being limited to a flash drive as my boot device

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Hardware dongles never really went into extinction. Still a method to make people pay for your stuff. Another reason why I prefer FOSS. Not messing with nasty licensing and their restrictions and inconveniences. TrueNAS4Life, baby! :wink:

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Nitpick/neckbeard/note: this is true today but entirely a business decision, not a technical limitation (hyperscalers have all kinds of weird smr and weird rpm and weird firmware drives in all kinds of weird capacities). It’s always worth double-checking… Especially if you’re reading this in the future.

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Yeah it’s mentioned in that thread that they do have a 20TB SMR drive for enterprise.

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