Show off your rig..

[b0dyr0ck2006 57]

I've got quite a modest setup in comparison to you lot. Fractual R4 case housing 3x4TB Western Digital black drives, 250gb Samsung SSD, 34gb Ram, GeForce gtx 980ti 6gb

 

280 films, 72 shows (I don't know the amount of episodes), 60gb music, 18k photos and 6 PC games

[Guest asrequested]

I've got quite a modest setup in comparison to you lot. Fractual R4 case housing 3x4TB Western Digital black drives, 250gb Samsung SSD, 34gb Ram, GeForce gtx 980ti 6gb

 

280 films, 72 shows (I don't know the amount of episodes), 60gb music, 18k photos and 6 PC games

I know, right? Lol... Some of these guys have amazing setups! It's spurring me on, lol Edited October 6, 2016 by Doofus

[Guest asrequested]

Delivery of new case is delayed. I've got everything else. Damn it! Lol

[shaefurr 1337]

Delivery of new case is delayed. I've got everything else. Damn it! Lol

Yep, figures!

[Guest asrequested]

I'm pretty excited. I'm finally gonna separate the server from the HTPC.

[shaefurr 1337]

I'm pretty excited. I'm finally gonna separate the server from the HTPC.

been wanting to do that for a couple years myself. Not fun playing a game when multiple transcodes start, FPS drop to crap

[Guest asrequested]

I don't game, but I'm doing multiple things, continually. And I'm about to add some friends as users. So I wanted to free the server up. I'm taking the opportunity to improve the aesthetic, too. I see LED lighting in my future

[shaefurr 1337]

I don't game, but I'm doing multiple things, continually. And I'm about to add some friends as users. So I wanted to free the server up. I'm taking the opportunity to improve the aesthetic, too. I see LED lighting in my future

yay LEDs!

[Guest asrequested]

lol I know that feeling, I'll go a year before I can upgrade something. Next tax refund is a new GPU

 

..kinda want some led ambient lighting behind the TV too. DreamScreen looks friggin awesome.

 

[Youtube]

[/Youtube]

 

I think I need to acquire this. I want my new setup to be fancy shmancy. A lot of you guys have shamed me into spending more money. Who am I kidding? It took very little to make do this, lol

 

Update:

 

Ordered!

Edited October 8, 2016 by Doofus

[Guest asrequested]

This is a great example of DreamScreen.

 

[YouTube] 

[/YouTube] Edited October 8, 2016 by Doofus

[Guest asrequested]

I'm happy to announce that I'm having another baby!       

 

[mediacowboy 438]

It's a beauty

[fredg89 7]

I don't really post much around here but I thought since it was the weekend and I had nothing better to do, why not?

 

My setup I would say is middle ground right now, but I plan to take it up a notch once I purchase my home. Plans are to move Emby to it's own dedicated box with dual procs, hence the reason I went with a 3u cooler to save space in the rack with a new 3u case. Once I do this upgrade, I'll also be upgrading to 10Gig local networking from Proxmox/VM server > Storage Servers > Emby/Plex servers. 

 

Here are the specs as of now:

 

Case: Rosewill RSV-L4500

PSU: Seasonic SSR-650RT

CPU: Intel Xeon E5-2670v1 @ 2.60GHz

CPU Cooler: Noctua NH-D9DX i4 3U

Memory: 8x4GB Hynix ECC DRAM @ 1333MHz

HDD: Mix but mainly WD Reds, HGST, and Toshiba

SSD: Crucial MX200

JBOD Controllers: 2x2 LSI 9211-8i in IT mode

OS: Unraid 6.2.1

Docker Apps: Couchpotato, EmbyServer, NZBGet, Plex, Sonarr

VMs; Openelec (Just installed OpenELEC just to see how VM's work as I have a VM server (Proxmox))

 

Any questions or see anything I overlooked, please ask. 

Edited October 15, 2016 by fredg89

[PrincessClevage 173]

I don't really post much around here but I thought since it was the weekend and I had nothing better to do, why not?

 

My setup I would say is middle ground right now, but I plan to take it up a notch once I purchase my home. Plans are to move Emby to it's own dedicated box with dual procs, hence the reason I went with a 3u cooler to save space in the rack with a new 3u case. Once I do this upgrade, I'll also be upgrading to 10Gig local networking from Proxmox/VM server > Storage Servers > Emby/Plex servers.

 

Here are the specs as of now:

 

Case: Rosewill RSV-L4500

PSU: Seasonic SSR-650RT

CPU: Intel Xeon E5-2670v1 @ 2.60GHz

CPU Cooler: Noctua NH-D9DX i4 3U

Memory: 8x4GB Hynix ECC DRAM @ 1333MHz

HDD: Mix but mainly WD Reds, HGST, and Toshiba

SSD: Crucial MX200

JBOD Controllers: 2x2 LSI 9211-8i in IT mode

OS: Unraid 6.2.1

Docker Apps: Couchpotato, EmbyServer, NZBGet, Plex, Sonarr

VMs; Openelec (Just installed OpenELEC just to see how VM's work as I have a VM server (Proxmox))

 

Any questions or see anything I overlooked, please ask.

No redundancy in your storage? Running individual disks?

[fredg89 7]

No redundancy in your storage? Running individual disks?

 

No, none as of right now. My next purchase will be The Norco 4224 and a WD or HGST 6TB drive to add parity protection. I've lost a drive I must admit, but there wasn't anything on there that I couldn't get again. I keep a copy of what each disk has (folder structure) and just roll with it. The drive I did lost was a WD Green that was out of warranty. 

[Guest asrequested]

Here's a question for you guys. I'm planning to increase my storage. I'm looking at an 8 4TB HDDs. I was thinking about a 16TB RAID 10, as this will give me great redundancy and speed. Any other suggestions / thoughts? I should mention this will be a windows RAID and not directly through a controller.

Edited October 20, 2016 by Doofus

[mastrmind11 717]

Here's a question for you guys. I'm planning to increase my storage. I'm looking at an 8 4TB HDDs. I was thinking about a 16TB RAID 10, as this will give me great redundancy and speed. Any other suggestions / thoughts? I should mention this will be a windows RAID and not directly through a controller.

Yeah, Raid 10 is the way to go if you've got the budget.

[colejack 30]

I don't really post much around here but I thought since it was the weekend and I had nothing better to do, why not?

 

My setup I would say is middle ground right now, but I plan to take it up a notch once I purchase my home. Plans are to move Emby to it's own dedicated box with dual procs, hence the reason I went with a 3u cooler to save space in the rack with a new 3u case. Once I do this upgrade, I'll also be upgrading to 10Gig local networking from Proxmox/VM server > Storage Servers > Emby/Plex servers. 

 

Here are the specs as of now:

 

Case: Rosewill RSV-L4500

PSU: Seasonic SSR-650RT

CPU: Intel Xeon E5-2670v1 @ 2.60GHz

CPU Cooler: Noctua NH-D9DX i4 3U

Memory: 8x4GB Hynix ECC DRAM @ 1333MHz

HDD: Mix but mainly WD Reds, HGST, and Toshiba

SSD: Crucial MX200

JBOD Controllers: 2x2 LSI 9211-8i in IT mode

OS: Unraid 6.2.1

Docker Apps: Couchpotato, EmbyServer, NZBGet, Plex, Sonarr

VMs; Openelec (Just installed OpenELEC just to see how VM's work as I have a VM server (Proxmox))

 

Any questions or see anything I overlooked, please ask. 

 

 

 

 

 

Are you able to turn that cooler 90 degrees? would be better for airflow to have it blowing towards the back of the case. But I know that those oversized Noctua coolers can interfere with RAM slots so that may be why its like that.

 

I would also prefer some redundency, but thats just me.

 

(ps) I noticed I should update my sig. Moved over to OMV from NAS4Free on my media NAS.

Anybody do graphics and want to create a new sig for me? I suck at artist stuff.

[colejack 30]

Here's a question for you guys. I'm planning to increase my storage. I'm looking at an 8 4TB HDDs. I was thinking about a 16TB RAID 10, as this will give me great redundancy and speed. Any other suggestions / thoughts? I should mention this will be a windows RAID and not directly through a controller.

 

 

Unless you need IOPs, which you probably don't for media, then I would go with RAID6/RAIDZ2/Dual parity. Just me but I don't like loosing that much storage running mirrors. 

 

Which version of Windows?

[PenkethBoy 2063]

@

 

Well it depends   (Post 1 as i cant post as one for some reason)

 

From experience of lots of raid builds, issues and resolving problems the short answer for your situation - i.e. home use rather than business and leaving a lot of the detail out.

 

1. Raid6 not Raid10 - higher redundancy/ more space/ and write speed almost the same (you will find it hard to measure the difference on a modern system)

2. Build/rebuild times - will be better on Raid10 - but you are likely only to do this once(or twice) - so small issue

3. Loose the wrong two disks in raid10 and your data is toast - loose two in Raid6 your data is still accessible 

4. How are you going to back this new toy up - Raid is not a backup solution - its a redundancy solution to allow you to recover/rebuild and still have the data available - lots of people learn this hard lesson when their array goes done and they cant access there data

5. Get a UPS to protect the server - again lots of people loose an array with a power cut

6. Most important - get NAS or better class drives - HGST/WD Red etc - reason is they are rated for 24/7 running/have longer warranties/ and are spec'd to work in 8 or more raids (vibration) - surveillance drives are ok - but do not use desktop drives they will bite you at some point.

7. If you have a fast cpu and a good hba - go HGST 7200 rpm or WD Red Pro they are 7200rpm drives - run a few degrees hotter but on the HGST i have they individually do 170MB/s sustained

Edited October 20, 2016 by PenkethBoy

[PenkethBoy 2063]

(No 2)

 

Important questions for you as this will refine what the best option is and other things you will need to do/consider/buy etc.

 

What software raid are you thinking of using ?

Are you using 10g networking or will do in the near future?

Whats the raid going to be used for just media hosting or do you have other ideas as well?

What usable storage space do you actually want/need - is this a future proof expansion - based on cost - something else?

Have you considered if the raid dies you cant access the data directly - you cant mount a single raid disk in windows or Linux etc?

What are you going to use to backup this mini monster you have dreams about ?

How are you going to monitor the disk and array health - raid complicates this - unless the raid software provides these functions?

[PenkethBoy 2063]

(No 3)

 

A bit more info for you to digest

 

For comparison i have an 8 disk HGST Raid 5 array on my QNAP box and that comfortably does 300+ mb/s reads as all day long with just a lowly celeron. I also have a 12 disk Raid6 in an xpenology box with a second generation i7 and getting well north of 700mb/s - speed difference is down to cpu - the disks are WD 5400 in the Xpenology. Both are not what i said above  - but i have three backups on different boxes so if my raid5 dies its not an issue and i can wait  three days for the rebuild and restore over 1g network. I will be posting here in a few days with my replacement rig which will consolidate my situation and hopefully with my 10g network up and running. As for writes on my raids - difficult to say as they (and even a even lower power Intel Atom box i have) will accept 120mb/s writes via a 1g network - the new network will change that - yes you can check on the NAS but that's usually a synthetic test

 

 

To reduce writing lots more info () its easier to link to a couple of example threads on the QNAP forum where i also hang out (Spider99) and this comes up a lot

 

Initial discussion on raid types etc https://forum.qnap.com/viewtopic.php?f=25&t=124187

and a link to some tests done on different machines for different raid types (its linked in the one above as well) https://forum.qnap.com/viewtopic.php?f=45&t=94588&p=483674 - yes its two years old but the comparison is still valid

If you are not familiar with linux - dont worry as it does not change the figures.

 

The historical view is Raid10 is faster for writes which is correct on low power installs - i.e. a NAS or similar. However this view is now no longer relevant today as you are using windows machine that (i assume) has a modern ish desktop processor. If you put disks in a test rig and measure the difference its still there but in real world situations you will not notice the difference.

 

Everybody assumes if i get a disk failure i just replace it - yes true - but what they are missing is that the raid rebuild stresses not only the new disk but the other 7 and the number of times i see people loose there array because a second disk fails is higher than you would imagine - with all the gnashing of teeth and cat kicking that usually generates:)

 

Note: Read speeds - very simply - the more disks you have the faster the output - and thats what you want for a media server no bottle necks when people want to watch the latest 4k movie you just uploaded

 

this got a bit longer than i anticipated

 

At the end of the day its your data and your disks you can set them up anyway you want and have a strategy for backup (test it dont just assume it will work) should the inevitable disk failure happen....

 

Have Fun

[fredg89 7]

Are you able to turn that cooler 90 degrees? would be better for airflow to have it blowing towards the back of the case. But I know that those oversized Noctua coolers can interfere with RAM slots so that may be why its like that.

 

I would also prefer some redundency, but thats just me.

 

(ps) I noticed I should update my sig. Moved over to OMV from NAS4Free on my media NAS.

Anybody do graphics and want to create a new sig for me? I suck at artist stuff.

 

Unfortunately I can not turn the cooler 90 degrees, hence the reason it's orientated the way it is. On this board the heat sink to the left of the cooler is too tall so the cooler would not fit in any other orientation. 

 

Redundency will come but it's not something I'm concerned about it at the moment...and this is coming for a guy who works for a MSP. hahahaha

[Guest asrequested]

I was considering RAID 6, but in comparison to RAID 10, I prefer the functionality of 10. Sadly, I do lose space. I'll have 8 drives at 4TB each. They're all HGST, but not all NAS drives. 6 desktop and 2 NAS. I just ordered the 6 (a price point difference I couldn't ignore). So, I was just going to use Windows 10 to create the RAID, but it would seem I am better advised to use third party software?

 

]

 

[fredg89 7]

I was considering RAID 6, but in comparison to RAID 10, I prefer the functionality of 10. Sadly, I do lose space. I'll have 8 drives at 4TB each. They're all HGST, but not all NAS drives. 6 desktop and 2 NAS. I just ordered the 6 (a price point difference I couldn't ignore). So, I was just going to use Windows 10 to create the RAID, but it would seem I am better advised to use third party software?

 

]

 

 

What was the price point? Newegg currently has the HGST 4TB Megascale drives which are Enterprise drives for 113.99.