Hi! I’ve never built a NAS before and only one custom gaming PC, so I’d love if any of you more experienced folks could take a look at my parts selection and possibly suggest better options.
Of course first my use cases:
- Nextcloud
- Immich
- Jellyfin
- Possibly more, similar to the above
Planning on using Truenas with a Raidz (1? - 1 disk failure tolerance) and running most of my stuff in Docker containers. The amount of users will likely stay at or below 3, certainly at or below 5, so it doesn’t need to handle that much.
Here’s my parts list:
- CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 Pro 4650G
- iGPU, power efficient, AM4 so cheaper, performant enough (I think)
- Case: Jonsbo N3
- This is the component I started with, since I really like the form factor. It did limit my choice on motherboards heavily though.
- Motherboard: Gigabyte A520I AC
- I was trying to go for one with ECC memory support, but at least on pcpartpicker I struggled to find ones at this form factor supporting it. However from reading through Forum threads ECC isn’t critically important for a more “casual” build like mine, just a nice-to-have.
- Memory: Found about 16GB of DDR4 in my old pc, they worked before so I didn’t bother looking at them in detail
- Cheap
- Storage:
- OS: Western Digital Black SN770 1 TB M.2-2280
- Where I live the 500GB version is actually more expensive
- Cache: Samsung 870 Evo 500 GB
- Cheap enough, although if I can combine this with the OS drive, then even better
- Primary Storage: 4x Seagate IronWolf Pro 8TB (ST8000NT001)
- I have to admit, I can’t recall why I settled on these. 8TB seemed good for price-to-size and I didn’t want the server ones despite them actually being cheaper because they’re extremely loud apparently, but why Pro and not non-pro and why this exact model… I can’t recall, I just remember having a headache that afternoon TwT
- OS: Western Digital Black SN770 1 TB M.2-2280
I realize I left out the cooler and psu as I don’t think they’re particularly relevant here, I can deal with those myself. Price-wise, I am going by German prices and parts availability. On any of the parts listed, or if I forgot anything else though, I would love advice on the quality of my decision and how to improve it, thanks <3
You’re not using a CPU that most distributions support for hardware transcoding. You either need to use an Intel CPU with QuickSync or stick a discrete nvidia card in the box. The Intel route is often easiest here, and I say this as a die hard AMD fan.
Are you intent on building your own box?
I’m only asking because TerraMaster does the F6-424 (or F4-424) series which has 6 bays (or 4), a decent CPU (1235U) with hardware transcoding support, space for two 4x4 NVME m.2 SSDs, which runs silently and will just work as an appliance, even though it is a full PC. You can then install unraid or truenas on it, or heck bareback Linux and do it yourself. There are decent alternatives to putting something together yourself.
Regarding disks Seagate EXOS are often cheaper than IronWolfs and have higher MTBF than even the Pro. Don’t ask me why they’re lower cost, for more bang.
You’re not using a CPU that most distributions support for hardware transcoding. You either need to use an Intel CPU with QuickSync or stick a discrete nvidia card in the box.
I see, I chose that one based on a recommendation from I believe the channel was called “Wolfgang’s Channel”. They make a lot of home lab content and showed the iGPU working fine for Plex, so I assumed it wasn’t an issue.
Are you intent on building your own box?
Yeah pretty much, I think it sounds fun
Regarding disks Seagate EXOS are often cheaper than IronWolfs and have higher MTBF than even the Pro. Don’t ask me why they’re lower cost, for more bang.
As I mentioned in my post, apparently they’re way louder since they’re made for datacenters where noise is crazy anyways, and since I am planning to have the NAS in my hallway I’d like to avoid the datacenter vibe, even if a handful of drives won’t cause quite that level of cacophony
I run EXOS drives in the under-stair cupboard. They’re noisy but they’re not that bad.
There’s definitely a chance my knowledge is no longer current but I would 100% verify that for your operating system of choice (which I presume is Linux), your AMD CPU can deliver hardware transcoding under Plex. I’ve not heard of AMD CPUs handling this under Linux at least. Ready to be corrected.
but I would 100% verify that for your operating system of choice (which I presume is Linux), your AMD CPU can deliver hardware transcoding under Plex
How and where can this be verified? (for a not-yet-user of such a feature)
I’d just search for the specific CPU and “plex” and “transcoding” and see what comes up. I’ve not heard many success stories of AMD CPU transcoding, despite them having good hardware support. Stand ready to be corrected.
I run EXOS drives in the under-stair cupboard. They’re noisy but they’re not that bad.
I think anything described as “noisy” would be too much, especially considering the savings are decent but not huge.
I’ve not heard of AMD CPUs handling this under Linux at least.
I’ll double check that then, just to be sure. Although I have noticed that, between me writing it down and now, the CPU is no longer available where I live, so I have to find a replacement either way.
I’m not sure you need a GPU, and Jellyfin docs state:
AMD is NOT recommended if you plan to use integrated graphics for Jellyfin.
I don’t run Jellyfin but my NAS is also TrueNAS and it’s just a J5005-ITX Mainboard with integrated cpu that costs around 100€ used. I’ve seen similar newer ones with n100 with 6 SATA ports. Pretty sure you don’t need an 8 core and you mentioned power consumption is relevant.
I’ll make the obligatory unRAID suggestion. It fits a lot of less intensive scenarios like what you’re describing. It does carry a cost, and the licensing model is “interesting”, but it has top-tier ease of use, especially around container apps. It would also allow you to use that 1tb ssd as a cache drive since the OS would run from usb (well, in-memory but stored on usb). You can also trial it for free for 30 days and if you don’t like it, there’s plenty of good suggestions in the thread already
A friend of mine had an unRAID NAS and moved that over to TrueNAS later after being bothered by the licensing costs, that’s why I was looking into the latter more. I do know how to RTFM, so I think I should be fine on that? But maybe there’s gonna be a huge negative surprise, I suppose I don’t know that yet
Yeah, they did something goofy with it, but they’re at least trying to not be nakedly evil. I got in when it was just a perpetual license, but the new model isn’t as bad as a lot of people think. TrueNAS is good too - I use the enterprise version at work and it’s done well. The biggest differences are that the Ent. version doesn’t expose containers or lxc so i don’t know how that works, and TrueNAS/ZFS requires same-size disks where unRAID allows mixing sizes while retaining up to 2 parity disks. At work, I buy specific drives, so zfs is great - at home I buy what’s affordable, so zfs isn’t so good. I also saw one of your other comments, and unRAID supports hardware pass-through to containers, so exposing your AMD iGPU to jellyfin should be pretty simple. I can’t speak to how TNas would handle that
Oh I didn’t even consider the fact that I might need to pass through the iGPU. Thanks for pointing that out, will double check. Although it’d be very odd if TrueNAS struggled to do that, considering how many people use it and how many of those have some kind of self-hosted streaming service. But of course, always best to check anyways!
Truenas uses KVM for virtual machines. So that will allow GPU passthrough, but may require command line and config files to do it. For docker this seems relevant: https://forums.truenas.com/t/electric-eel-nvidia-gpu-passthrough-support/11797
may require command line and config files to do it
I’m comfortable enough with those, that shouldn’t be an issue then. Thanks for the info!
Be aware if you have the iGPU as the only video output device and passthrough to a VM it will no longer show what the host system is doing. This would be referred to as a headless server. I would suggest making sure you can SSH into the host before doing that. LearnLinuxTV has guides for how to do that with best security practices.
Docker works differently, so it may not be an issue with that.
@CatLikeLemming Seems alright at first sight. Personally I would probably double the RAM but anything you don’t (yet) have to buy is money you can save up for a future upgrade. For now the configuration feels like it will be more than capable.
Yeah, I thought about the RAM, but since I already have two 8GB sticks I decided not to bother. Couldn’t even buy two more since I have no idea what those are exactly, there are no stickers on them, so I’d have to buy 32GB entirely which is like 80-120€.
And as you said, that can always be done later if I run into trouble :)
You can check their capacities and speeds with software like cpu-z.
I sadly can not. The old PC I’m scavenging from is incomplete and my current PC has a DDR5 motherboard. So the earliest point I can check them is once I’ve built the NAS since then I’d have a functioning PC here with DDR4 support.
I assume the cache drive is for your ZFS pool. You probably don’t need that.
How come? I’ve seen those recommended quite often.
When you read files from the ZFS filesystem it will automatically keep the files in RAM. This is called the ARC and it is why people frequently recommend having a lot of RAM with ZFS. The ARC is very effective, automatic, and has no risk because it only caches reads. A cache drive is a secondary ARC generally using a fast SSD. The problem is that it generally only helps performance when you are reading lots of small files multiple times. This is because ZFS does so well reading large files from HDD that it doesn’t make much of a difference.
In short: If you already have the drive and want to play with the feature, go for it. But if your going to spend money on the drive, you will probably be better served spending it on more RAM.
Got it, thank you
them actually being cheaper because they’re extremely loud apparently
Please tell us more about your design goals and priorities.
Is noise the most important prio? Would you spend money for this goal?
How about power usage?
How about price limitations?
When looking at harddisks, there is that performance issue called “CMR or SMR” (google it). Your ST8000NT001 seem fine performance-wise as the use CMR.
Source: https://nascompares.com/answer/list-of-wd-cmr-and-smr-hard-drives-hdd/
If you need really quiet ones, then maybe you want “desktop” harddisks. But many of them use SMR which limits their performance.
Raidz (1? - 1 disk failure tolerance)
Most guides recommend Raidz2 currently. Do you use backups?
When buying SSDs, check for the “TBW” spec.
Is noise the most important prio? Would you spend money for this goal?
Not the most important, but it is an important factor. If I am not losing much otherwise, I’d like to keep it not louder than say, an idling fridge. I would spend some more for quieter drives and fans, since those are the biggest noise concerns.
How about power usage?
Absolutely important, power prices here are some of the highest globally.
How about price limitations?
I’d very much like to stay below 2000€, preferably below 1750€. Currently it’s coming out at around 1600€.
When looking at harddisks, there is that performance issue called “CMR or SMR” (google it). Your ST8000NT001 seem fine performance-wise as the use CMR.
Yup, took that into account, but nonetheless thanks for mentioning it!
If you need really quiet ones, then maybe you want “desktop” harddisks. But many of them use SMR which limits their performance.
Doesn’t need to be super quiet, just not disruptive, I’m planning on having the NAS in the hallway.
Most guides recommend Raidz2 currently. Do you use backups?
Raidz2 means there are two entire “unused” drives which would be quite painful for my budget. I am planning on renting around 1TB of rsync storage and throwing things like Immich’s data on there. This is fine to me since I’d prefer one backup off-site anyways. Any of my jellyfin stuff can always be redownloaded as long as I keep a list of what I got somewhere else. Oh also I’m planning on getting all four drives at different stores and/or different times (at least a week or two in between) to reduce the chance of them failing all at once.
When buying SSDs, check for the “TBW” spec.
Noted
So I have looked up your board and CPU specs.
The board is probably Ok. Regarding the CPU, I found some alternatives:
5750GE with better specs in everything, especially 8 cores 16 threads, lower TDP of 35W and just a little higher price, or
5700G also at higher specs, equal TDP of 65W and half the price.
My own personal choice is something different and harder to find (only on aliexpress so far): itx board with a preinstalled 5825U at 8 cores and TDP of 15W.
Very helpful, thank you! The CPU choice has had to be remade anyways as I have mentioned in other places in this thread.
Looking at the 5750GE it seems to be OEM-only, so I’m not sure where to reputably get my hands on that.
The 5700G looks very intriguing, it’s only barely more expensive compared to the last price of the 4650G I saw. If I find nothing else, I’ll probably go with that one then.
I am still concerned about wattage though, I struggled to find any regular CPUs with a notably lower TDP than 65W - although I’d honestly be most intrigued by what it draws at idle-ish, because if it’s like a <5W difference there I wouldn’t bother… but of course idle changes depending on the system so not like that can be properly listed anywhere.
Do you potentially also have any Intel suggestions? Other people here mentioned an AMD iGPU might cause problems with Jellyfin.
You’re fine with this setup, and in many respects it’s overkill.
I run 33 containers including jellyfin, frigate, and immich as the hardest working ones across 2 HP elitedesk g4 with 48 GB ram, and a 3rd low power system hosting 8gb NFS for storage on simple gigabit lan. Even that is overkill for these tasks.
The apps most commonly run in a self-hosted env are really quite lightweight and spend most of their time at idle.
Ah, sorry, I should’ve specified this further. Whether this can run what I need it to isn’t the primary concern, I believe it can do so, I primarily attached my decision making basis just in case it changes anything.
I’m more concerned about things like picking the correct drives, or if limiting my motherboard selection through an ITX case was a bad idea, or if my choice of not going with ECC was a poor one, those kinds of things.
Its fine.
Best advice I can give you is start where you are with what you have.
What you need will become apparent as you do.
I think you’re still OK.
There are lots of great itx boards out there, so basically take your pick. And there will be ppl who say you don’t need ecc, but it certainly won’t hurt, it will just cost a bunch more.
I run a supermicro mini itx with ecc, for my zfs backup, but my non ecc machines have also been fine.
I’m doing everything you list and quite a bit more on a QNAP with a Celeron J4125. A fraction of the cpu performance you’ll have, yet very capable of all the tasks I ask of it. 16gb of memory is a good starting point I think.
What does your build come out at?
Prices fluctuate but last I checked it was around 1600€. Also, after posting this thread I re-checked the CPU and noticed that isn’t even available in my region anymore apparently, so I’ll have to find a suitable replacement there anyways.
When I built my first server, TrueNAS, ZFS, and Raid z1 made perfect sense. And I loved it for the first couple months. Then an update and unexpected shutdown rendered my storage pools unrecoverable. Had backups for most but not all of the files, and spent almost a year of bits of free time here wading in way over my head on highly technical support forum threads & there trying to bring the pools back online. Nothing worked, the array was toast.
I don’t know how tech savvy you are, but here’s the advice I’d give my past self - Take a few weeks to read documentation and play with TrueNAS before filling up your drives with stuff. Peek around in troubleshooting forums, see if the troubleshooting you may have to do is in line with your experience level.
After wiping my drives and starting over, I built around Open Media Vault. It’s less pretty and less feature rich than TrueNas, but it’s also much less fragile in a raid z1 setup and I never worry about it.
This is way overkill for these applications. A low end mobile Intel processor will do all these things well and use much less power.
