Looking for help with an ESXi server build. The VMs will be for a NAS(needing to service at least 3 devices simultaneously), VPN, Printer, an OwnCloud setup, and maybe a pfsense or mumble(maybe 10 people simultaneously). All VMs will be running Linux OSe Which of the following would be best...
CPU: Intel Core i7-4790K 4.0GHz Quad-Core Processor ($320.99 @ NCIX US)
Motherboard: Supermicro C7Z87-OCE ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($249.99 @ Micro Center)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 32GB (4 x 8GB) DDR3-1600 Memory (Purchased For $234.00)
Storage: Hitachi Deskstar NAS 4TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($164.98 @ OutletPC)
Storage: Hitachi Deskstar NAS 4TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($164.98 @ OutletPC)
Case: Nanoxia NXDS6B ATX Full Tower Case (Purchased For $179.99)
Power Supply: Corsair RM 850W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($139.99 @ B&H)
Total: $1454.92
CPU: Intel Core i7-4790K 4.0GHz Quad-Core Processor ($279.99 @ Micro Center)
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-Z97X-UD5H-BK ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($166.95 @ SuperBiiz)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 32GB (4 x 8GB) DDR3-1600 Memory (Purchased For $234.00)
Storage: Hitachi Deskstar NAS 4TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($164.98 @ OutletPC)
Storage: Hitachi Deskstar NAS 4TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($164.98 @ OutletPC)
Case: Nanoxia NXDS6B ATX Full Tower Case (Purchased For $179.99)
Power Supply: Corsair RM 750W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($105.81 @ Amazon)
Total: $1296.70
...The memory and case I already had. Thinking of updating to ECC memory in the future for my first upgrade.
*As a WD user mainly, I did research the HDD. According to some sites I read, the Hitachi drives outlast and out perform the WD red drives. Has anyone had first hand experience with these 2 drives? I currently have 2 WD red drives that these 2 Hitachi drives will be paired with in either raid 5 or 6. I've only used software raids. Was curious to hear pros/cons on if I should go with a software raid or hardware raid setup?
*My main conflict, is on the motherboard. Just looking around, the Qualcomm chipset(secondary chipset on the Gigabyte mobo) doesn't appear to play nicely with ESXi, if at all. However, the Supermicro board's dual LAN chipsets, both Intel, appear to have drivers that will work, but at almost $100 dollars more. So was curious if anyone has ever used the Gigabyte board from the second listing for an ESXi build and have had both chipsets working, or should I just pony up the cash for the Supermicro board?
OR:
Does anyone have alternate suggestions for the specs? Trying to keep the price between $1200 - $1500, or lower. Also, would be open to using Xenserver if that would change anything. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!
I think that, for ECC Memory support, a Xeon processor is required? (I think certain Pentiums and I3s support it, but those are below your requirements, I think.) Since I am new to this, that is really all the of the input I can offer.
I too am a WD person i have two 2TB drives in my nas that has been running 24/7 since i bought it (6/15/2013) and have not had problems with it, as for performance i cant really say since my nas cpu is shit and cant fully use the drive speeds it maxes out with just one pc transferring files to it. Usually my speeds are 60MBps
I think you should go hardware raid. as software takes up cpu usage and preforms not quite as well.
I also think that you don't need that high of wattage power supply. my system with a 4770k and a 980 run fine on a 650w so without a video card your power supply's are really overkill.
@Calculator you are correct. Looking into it, looks like i7s do not support ECC ram. Didn't stop to think of that. Thanks for that correction. Do Xeon processors handle transcoding as good as i7 cpus?
@Urworstnit3m3r same here. I've never had any issues with my WD drives, just found it curious to read that many cloud storage sites are replacing their WD drives with Hitachi drives when the WD drive fails.
Thanks. I'll have to look more into hardware raids. Are there any other cons other than if the raid card fails and the raid is lost(obviously that's a big con)?
I agree. Looking back into it, it looks like even if I max out all HDD bays in that case, I still would only reach about 600w. I'll probably drop it down to 650 or so.
Ya I'm not really sure. But I do see that a lot of the larger WD drives>2TB seem to have a lot of bad reviews. Perhaps this is the reason they are doing so.
As long as you check the specs/reviews for the raid card it shouldn't be a problem to just plug in a new one and have the drives read. it looks like it depends on where it stores the raid configuration on whether or not this works.
some quick search looks like if the onboard raid controller dies your out of luck. now that being said I don't know how often that it would crap out. and you might be able to get a motherboard with the exact same model and bios and bios version and it might see the raid again.
I don't know enough about raid to officially provide you with answers but just some things to think about.
A quick search shows that there is little to no difference between the transcoding if they are the same architecture.
if you do go with the Xeon to make use of ECC make sure that all of the requirements are met, I'm not sure if just having a supporting cpu is enough or if you need to have a motherboard support it as well.
I also do not know how much ECC is actually required, i have just regular ram in my "server" but i do not do anything but host a small minecraft server and a teamspeak server on it.