Need a little guidance for starting my first Home Server?
Need a little guidance for starting my first Home Server?
Hi there stranger . I want to build myself a Homer Server and would require some help, sorry if it is a long post, but I included everything I thought could be needed below. Information: Budget (including currency): around 2.200€ (2.270 USD) Aim: It should be as power efficient as possible The system should function as a NAS for myself and close family Movie and Audio streaming Development Server Home Lab VMs Docker Services Software: OS: TrueNAS Scale Family connectivity: DuckDNS to connect to my router with dynamic IP Reverse Proxy to connect to the services which shall be exposed over the internet through DuckDNS OpenVPN for connection to development services Nextcloud for account separated access to data like photos and documents Streaming: Plex for movies and series, for audio has not been decided yet Other Info: TrueNAS with ZFS file system 2 VDEVs á 4 * 8 TB drives RAIDZ2 I am currently in the midst of configuring a home server for myself and my family and could need some advise from the pros. The use cases I have already laid out above, but it is the first time for me to create such a system. In the future I actually want to have 2 different systems, so one can just be the NAS and media streaming server and the other the development server / home lab. For now I will do everything in one single machine, out of simplicity and budgetary reasons, but of course if you see some better hardware I could use to have an easier upgrade path to a 2 system situation, please do not hesitate to point that out. I have made an initial plan on what software to use to accomplish my needs, but that of course may change in the future, I added it nonetheless because that may help some of you to have a better understanding of what I need. I have a few questions left before I want to go into buying all the parts. So I am going to lay out the planed build for you and then list the questions I have in hopes of some help from you guys, which would be greatly appreciated. My planed build: CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 5700G CPU Cooler : Stock ? Motherboard: ASRock X570M Pro4 Memory: Crucial Pro CP2K16G4DFRA32A DDR4 RAM Kit (2x16GB) 3200MHz Boot & Cache Storage: Samsung 970 EVO Plus 500GB NVMe M.2 SSD Data Storage drives: 4x Seagate IronWolf 8 TB NAS HDD Power Supply: Seasonic Vertex PX-750 ATX3.0 750W Vertex PX-750 Case: SilverStone Technology SST-CS381 v 1.2 My questions are: Is there anything you would change about this build? Knowing what it will be used for, is there anything in particular you would change? I hope I didn't mismatch any parts, but this is not my primary forte so any head ups are gladly received. What would you recommend for fan configuration? I am either going to use the Stock cooler or one from Noctua. Which one would you recommend? Other than that, I am not quite sure how many case fans I would need and in which push or pull configuration. That's why I haven't listed them above. I want to make sure that nothing gets too hot even under load, but I have no experience with it. What RAID configuration would you recommend? I have looked into this a bit and I think I want to use the ZFS file system with TrueNAS. For now I would buy four 8 TB drives which will become my first VDEV. I thought I would use the RAIDZ2 which would give me 16 TB of usable space and quite a high fault tolerance, but would that be needed? If I need more space I would add another VDEV of four drives in the same configuration. I like the data to be as save from corruption as feasible, but should I rather use RAIDZ1 or another RAID altogether. What do you think? Do I need any additionals? Like cables or something like that, which I might forget. What about GPU? I am thinking about adding a GPU for hardware transcoding for PLEX for example at some point. Is that even needed and if that is something which you would recommend, what is a good card for my configuration? OPTIONAL: Backup strategy? This is a optional question, but because family will also store data on this machine I am thinking about what I will do for backups. For me I wouldn't care too much, but with them in the mix. Are there any cloud backup services you could recommend? If not I may be just going with some good old hard drives stored with a friend. That would be all the info I could think of right now and all the questions I still have. I am more the software kinda guy, so hardware is not my real strong suit. I hope someone here can help me out a bit, so I do not make any dumb decisions and go into this as prepared as possible. Thank you all for reading and anyone helping I thank in advance also. Have a nice day stranger
Using just four hard drives for a RAID-Z2 setup isn't really the best idea because you are wasting space. There is an old rule that says you should use five, seven or eleven drives if you have room and money. https://www.truenas.com/community/t...of...ion.97202/ So I ignored this advice and put six drives on one server and eight drives on three other servers, all using TrueNAS Core RAID-Z2. Since 2018, I've only had one drive fail out of the whole bunch. TrueNAS really likes RAM. The more there is, the better it works. Any spare RAM...
Good question. That's something I've been thinking a lot about too, and honestly, I don't have a perfect answer yet. My current plan is to keep a copy of my files on some hard drives that I'll store with a friend for one backup, which I will update from time to time. Then I'll set up an onsite backup on another machine of mine where I have plenty of space for it. And actually, I'd want some cloud service to back those up too, but I haven't found anything I like yet, maybe you do? So for now, I probably will rent some cloud storage like Dropbox and back my files there, encrypt them and compress them as much as I can. In a way, that's the 3-2-1 rule: one drive with a friend, another machine on site, and one in the clouds. That works for now, but not only me is gonna use the server; my family will save their files too, so storage could fill up quickly, which makes this approach probably fall apart over time, which is why I'm still unsure where to go next.
Putting only four drives in a RAID-Z2 setup isn't very safe. There is no official rule saying you need five, seven or eleven drives for this kind of storage if space and money allow. So I ignored that advice and put six drives on one server with eight drives on three other servers, both running TrueNAS Core RAID-Z2. To this day, there has been only one drive failure since 2018. "TrueNAS" really likes RAM. The more you add, the better it gets. Any spare RAM will be used by the system to speed things up. In my two HP servers I have 60GB and 64GB of ECC memory. My desktop servers seem to have both running at least 16GB (standard non-ECC). They are basic machines so I don't need fancy features like PLEX. For extra safety, ECC RAM is recommended for TrueNAS. Some people swear by it while others prefer cheaper non-ECC versions and skip the upgrade. I use both types of memory.
One other thing to watch out for is bad bits on your drives (called "bit rot"). Of course this might never happen, so just make sure you have plenty of backups anyway. TrueNAS had very low requirements back when it started. For years, my two HP servers were booting from fast 16GB USB flash drives called Kingston Ultra Fit. Now they run on TrueNAS Core from larger 32GB mSATA drives inside USB hubs. In your situation you might actually gain from a bigger and faster drive, but you might end up with way more unused space than you need. If you plan to add more hard disks later, your motherboard will eventually run out of SATA ports for the cables. I use ex-server LSI SAS 9211-8i Gen 2 PCI Host Bus Adapters that are programmed as "IT" (Initiator Target) firmware. You might also consider buying the newer Gen3 version, though you should avoid the "e" versions like 9207-8e or 9211-8e entirely because those aren't recommended for this use case. IR cards (used to manage multiple drives in RAID) are okay if you can refresh them back to IT firmware, but it's not always ideal with TrueNAS. You'll need a special cable called an SFF8087 Breakout cable for every four drives you want to add at once.
Thanks so much for reading my message. It really helped me out. Sorry if I took too long; sometimes life happens fast and I don't get everything planned right away. After thinking about everyone's suggestions, I changed the build like this: CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 5700G CPU Cooler : Noctua NH-L9A-AM4 Motherboard: ASRock X570M Pro4 Memory: Timetec Hynix IC 32GB KIT (2 x 16GB) DDR4 2400MHz PC4-19200 Unbuffered ECC 1.2V CL17 2Rx8 Dual Rank 288Pin UDIMM Server Memory RAM Module Boot Drive: Samsung 870 EVO SATA III 2.5 Inch (6.35 cm) SSD, 250 GB Data Storage drives: 4x WD Red Plus 12TB NAS 3.5" Internal Hard Drive Power Supply: Corsair SF750 Case: SilverStone Technology SST-CS381 v 1.2 With this setup I kept things open so I can upgrade later and made sure to take everything into account from what you said. Is there something else you want me to change or just want to say more about? If not, thanks for all your time, it means a lot to me
The post says the 5700G doesn't have ECC RAM support. Make sure to check this before buying. Here is the link: https://www.reddit.com/r/Amd/comments/py...th_ecc_ram
Yeah that's one thing I looked into too and didn't get a satisfying answer other than "It officially doesn't work BUT...", but I forgot about it again, so good of you to point that out. I just have to think now if I want to change the CPU and consequently probably even more, or if I just go with NON-ECC RAM and call it a day. Edit: I think I just take NON_ECC RAM and call it a day, something like the Corcair CMK32GX4M2E3200C16.