Building a File server

P

phiquach

Limp Gawd
Joined
Feb 26, 2006
Messages
497
Okay so i want to build file/seeding server for my house.
I was thinking about using my old hardware for the build.

I have a couple of old systems lying around. Server will be basically just file sharing and seeding.

My questions are:

Should i use my P3 old equipment or AMD Sempron 2400 or AMD 64 3500+?

Also, which OS would be better to use for this? Linux(ubuntu) or Windows Server 03 or 08?

I want to have 4 drives raided for storage and 1 small drive just for the OS.

Is this is good idea?

Also wanted to add this will run off a Gigabit Wireless N router
 
Use whatever you have, if you have a a 3500, I'd use that instead.


Look at WHS ;)
 
Windows Home Server; essentially, it allows for easy-peasy redundancy through duplication in a nice GUI and easy-to-manage and cheap operating system.

I'm sure the rest of the guys can elaborate any more specific questions that you may have about WHS.
 
I personally recommend Linux. Easy-peasy redundancy with software RAID with a well-documented set of commands and a free and secure operating system, not to mention better choices in terms of filesystems.

But I'm sure WHS is the most point-n-click option, so if that's your choice, I'm not going to beg you to reconsider.
 
come on join the windows home server bangwagon...

you can use utorrent as an addin for WHS
http://mswhs.com/2007/07/12/utorrent-add-in-updated/
utorrent-thumb.png



list of known add-ins for WHS
http://mswhs.com/add-in-list/
 
Boomslang said:
I personally recommend Linux. Easy-peasy redundancy with software RAID with a well-documented set of commands and a free and secure operating system, not to mention better choices in terms of filesystems.

But I'm sure WHS is the most point-n-click option, so if that's your choice, I'm not going to beg you to reconsider.
Click to expand...

Congratulations on your condescending post. Sorry, but nothing with Linux is easy once it breaks.
 
thanks for all the input, i'll check out all the OS's and see which one i like
 
I would suggest using Linux just because it will probably run better on his build. He wants to make a fileserver that will be able to torrent files for now, but I'm pretty sure in the future those needs/wants will grow. By using Linux, it will take less system resources and be much more stable in the long run. Set up a Samba share with rtorrent and screen, and you're set.

Trepidati0n said:
Congratulations on your condescending post. Sorry, but nothing with Linux is easy once it breaks.
Click to expand...

Why would anything break after it has already been working? If you set it up the first time and don't try to mess around with it, everything should be fine. Functionality is not going to break by just letting it sit and do its work.
 
If you want Linux, go with SUSE. Very easy to set up, and works perfectly fine.
 
Boomslang said:
I personally recommend Linux. Easy-peasy redundancy with software RAID with a well-documented set of commands and a free and secure operating system, not to mention better choices in terms of filesystems.

But I'm sure WHS is the most point-n-click option, so if that's your choice, I'm not going to beg you to reconsider.
Click to expand...

I second that, Linux is my choice for virtually any non gaming system. My own file server (check signature) runs on 64 bit linux

Trepidati0n said:
Congratulations on your condescending post. Sorry, but nothing with Linux is easy once it breaks.
Click to expand...

Fixing linux is no easier or harder then windows, it all depends on your familiarity with the system. I've been working with linux for about 15 years now and I'm very comfortable with it. It's no easier/harder to work on it then it is to work on the windows servers I maintain at work.

Linux gives you great flexibility in a file server, you are no longer bound to limitations of windows:
  • run any file system you want
  • mbr, gpt or no partitions at all - All upto you
  • easly show data from many different drives/sources as 1 share
  • share the data any way you want, upnp, smb, nfs, iSCSI if you can think it, it can be done
  • unlike windows version, linux software raid is very mature, reliable and flexible
There are many more pros for linux as well, those were just some that mainly apply to file servers.
 
Linux is a good choice if you are familiar with it.
But if you don't have experience a WHS box will be much simpler for you to setup.
You don't have deal with raid issues
The storage pool
Sharing
Remote desktop gateway
Backup system(best I have ever used)
All of those things are automatically setup for you during install no work on your part
Its easy to integrate with a HTPC setup
For me its a no brainer decision
 
Boomslang said:
I personally recommend Linux. Easy-peasy redundancy with software RAID with a well-documented set of commands and a free and secure operating system, not to mention better choices in terms of filesystems.

But I'm sure WHS is the most point-n-click option, so if that's your choice, I'm not going to beg you to reconsider.
Click to expand...

If you are saying that Linux is easier than WHS for file serving, I am going to laugh at you. Obviously you have never used WHS and assume it's just a regular Windows operating system product.
 
axan said:
I second that, Linux is my choice for virtually any non gaming system. My own file server (check signature) runs on 64 bit linux



Fixing linux is no easier or harder then windows, it all depends on your familiarity with the system. I've been working with linux for about 15 years now and I'm very comfortable with it. It's no easier/harder to work on it then it is to work on the windows servers I maintain at work.

Linux gives you great flexibility in a file server, you are no longer bound to limitations of windows:
  • run any file system you want
  • mbr, gpt or no partitions at all - All upto you
  • easly show data from many different drives/sources as 1 share
  • share the data any way you want, upnp, smb, nfs, iSCSI if you can think it, it can be done
  • unlike windows version, linux software raid is very mature, reliable and flexible
There are many more pros for linux as well, those were just some that mainly apply to file servers.
Click to expand...



I am going to ask you this with great respect, have you even used WHS in person?


I run a metric ton of Linux boxes, but when you have tried WHS for this type of application, nothing comes close in terms of it's offerings and simplicity.
 
WHS is good. Personally, I would use FreeNAS on the old P3 machine just to make use of the old hardware.

I've been using FreeNAS on an old Slot A Athlon 500MHz system for a few years now. $40 for a 4 port SATA card and gig ethernet card and it was good to go. It's fast enough to handle RAID 5.
 
WHS all the way. Set it up and walk away.. forget it is even there. One os the most Easiest Servers to set up for novice computer people.
 
all you need to know is that the storage god ockie says WHS is good,

if you have ever seen ockies worklogs... you would trust his opinion
 
Here's my 2 cents.

I had this same conundrum a little bit ago. I have a Areca 1220 8 port raid card and wanted to put it in a seperate file server to get the drives off my main rig. Now I'm usually a mac guy but didn't want a mac server.

First up was just a single drive and FreeNas.. while VERY easy to setup I was only getting 14 MB/sec transfers which was terrible.

Next I took the same EXACT setup and put Windows Server 2008 on it and was getting 60 MB/sec transfers with not one hardware change involved. It was there I decided to continue on with 08.

I now use 08 with a 4 500gig raid 5 and a 4 1TB drive raid 5 and am super happy with it.

The biggest use I like is RDC since I have a dual monitor setup on my vista box. I just use on monitor for my win2k8 box and treat it as another workstation. The integration of win2k8 into my network has been super easy and its very familiar since its windows based.

I will admit that I have ordered a 120day free trial dvd of WHS from microsoft which I plan on testing on a seperate system. My main concern with that is the speed of transfers not being what I'm used to using a true hardware raid card.

Zack
 
CarlsonCustoms said:
Here's my 2 cents.

I had this same conundrum a little bit ago. I have a Areca 1220 8 port raid card and wanted to put it in a seperate file server to get the drives off my main rig. Now I'm usually a mac guy but didn't want a mac server.

First up was just a single drive and FreeNas.. while VERY easy to setup I was only getting 14 MB/sec transfers which was terrible.

Next I took the same EXACT setup and put Windows Server 2008 on it and was getting 60 MB/sec transfers with not one hardware change involved. It was there I decided to continue on with 08.

I now use 08 with a 4 500gig raid 5 and a 4 1TB drive raid 5 and am super happy with it.

The biggest use I like is RDC since I have a dual monitor setup on my vista box. I just use on monitor for my win2k8 box and treat it as another workstation. The integration of win2k8 into my network has been super easy and its very familiar since its windows based.

I will admit that I have ordered a 120day free trial dvd of WHS from microsoft which I plan on testing on a seperate system. My main concern with that is the speed of transfers not being what I'm used to using a true hardware raid card.

Zack
Click to expand...

Zack I can say that on my WHS box I get 65-75 MB/s writes to the WHS from a network computer on Gbe so I doubt that you will be disappointed. Your transfer speed will essentially be limited to that of a single drive. which is typically in that same range for 7200 rpm drive.
 
nitrobass24 said:
Zack I can say that on my WHS box I get 65-75 MB/s writes to the WHS from a network computer on Gbe so I doubt that you will be disappointed. Your transfer speed will essentially be limited to that of a single drive. which is typically in that same range for 7200 rpm drive.
Click to expand...

I get the same speeds. I had one pc that was only 100mbit and I saw 12-16MB/s writes until I upgraded it.
 
Thanks for the heads up on the speeds! Sounds like it'll work for me.. I could do a raid 0 on my local machine and have it sync at night when I'm not using it if I'm not happy with the speed.
 
Well see with WHS it makes a backup of all your computers on your network at night.
I have also moved 90% of my data to the server, this keeps my desktop much cleaner.
I have moved VM's to the server and just use the remote console to access my vm's.
Its Server2K3 and WHS is essentially an application that runs on top of it.
 
axan said:
I second that, Linux is my choice for virtually any non gaming system. My own file server (check signature) runs on 64 bit linux



Fixing linux is no easier or harder then windows, it all depends on your familiarity with the system. I've been working with linux for about 15 years now and I'm very comfortable with it. It's no easier/harder to work on it then it is to work on the windows servers I maintain at work.

Linux gives you great flexibility in a file server, you are no longer bound to limitations of windows:
  • run any file system you want
  • mbr, gpt or no partitions at all - All upto you
  • easly show data from many different drives/sources as 1 share
  • share the data any way you want, upnp, smb, nfs, iSCSI if you can think it, it can be done
  • unlike windows version, linux software raid is very mature, reliable and flexible
There are many more pros for linux as well, those were just some that mainly apply to file servers.
Click to expand...

Ockie said:
I am going to ask you this with great respect, have you even used WHS in person?


I run a metric ton of Linux boxes, but when you have tried WHS for this type of application, nothing comes close in terms of it's offerings and simplicity.
Click to expand...

Yes I've played around with it, I don't deny that it makes a great out of the box file server.
It has some very nice features geared towards file server use, it's not a plain vanilla windows. Storage pool, remote access, the automatic backup thing are all great features. I just think that WHS is not the end all file server. It's not a no brainer choice.

Now I agree that if you want quick and easy file server setup WHS is the way to go.
If you are unexperienced with Linux and the thought of no point and click, cli only interface scares you then you should go WHS.

All I was trying to say is there are alternatives, while WHS is pretty damn good a Linux server can do everything WHS can and more and if you've have Linux experience it won't take much longer to set up. (- the backup thing, whs auto backup is sweet and setting up bacula or something similar or linux is major pita)

Another thing is while WHS is pretty cheap for what it offers, Linux is free and the experience you gather setting it up can go long way towards other projects(web servers, VMware etc)
 
axan said:
I just think that WHS is not the end all file server. It's not a no brainer choice.
Click to expand...

No one said it was. However, since we are all enthusiasts and we can assume that all our file serving needs are personal based, there is no need to go all guns out on software that complicates the entire process.

Simplicity is key here, which is a huge attributer to the enormous popularity with WHS.

axan said:
Now I agree that if you want quick and easy file server setup WHS is the way to go.
If you are unexperienced with Linux and the thought of no point and click, cli only interface scares you then you should go WHS.
Click to expand...

I am rather aware and experienced in Linux, it's still not something I would recomend over WHS for a home or personal operation.

axan said:
All I was trying to say is there are alternatives, while WHS is pretty damn good a Linux server can do everything WHS can and more and if you've have Linux experience it won't take much longer to set up. (- the backup thing, whs auto backup is sweet and setting up bacula or something similar or linux is major pita)
Click to expand...

Alot of the features would require linux packages or additional installations/tweaking like bacula. If you want a full feature set without the hassel, it's not a bad move.

axan said:
Another thing is while WHS is pretty cheap for what it offers, Linux is free and the experience you gather setting it up can go long way towards other projects(web servers, VMware etc)
Click to expand...

You can run VMware on WHS, web servers, etc. It's now just a GUI web interface... it's a full blown package. Running WHS can also put you on the faster track to experience because you are exposed to 2003, backup, web management, etc. While linux will give you more core knowledge, you can gain the same in the windows department if you screw around with it enough.

Although, I can't argue with the free part. But then again, if you are needing a free operating system and you are running your own personal file server, you have some weird priorities ;) Or like some who doesn't want to pay for an operating system but they have a $1,200 raid controller, lol ;)
 
If you are too frugal for WHS, you can get Windows Server 2003/2008 for free if you are a student. WHS would be better for you, but that works too...
 
WHS is the best computer purchase I have made in a long time.
Time is money....with WHS you spend hardly any time getting things to work. Works right out of the box.
 
so i installed WHS and i am having problems. everytime i install it and it finishes and everything, goes all the way to the end, i restart the computer.

Next time i restart, it has the login screen.

i can't get into the WHS anymore. User name adminstrator w/ blank password won't work. Guest won't work. nothing works. i can't do anything. Did i do something wrong?
 
Dont' feel bad, that actually was my problem too! I couldn't figure out why the connector software couldnt' find my whs.. I finally looked in the device manager and found that the network card wasn't installed so I had to do that and its been smooth sailing since.

Zack
 
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