Building a NAS file server, could use some input

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I'd like to build a NAS type file server for my engineering design work. I've been building gaming PC's for about 17 years but a NAS/server type computer is new to me. I'd say my budget is somewhere between $1000-$2000 to buy all components.

I'll be using it as a file server which will be mapped out as a hard drive on other computers that I will use to actually do the engineering work. The NAS computer will also be running DropBox and/or Carbonite so I can have backups and hopefully be able to work remotely from a laptop as well.

I do a lot of CAD work and some of my drawings will contain large aerial images (like 2+GB). Even at my current engineering company aerials seem to hang up server/computer performance so I need something zippy enough to push big files through. I will likely be the only user though.

Thanks for any input and direction you could provide!
 
I would say that if you are pushing super massive files across the network you should really focus on the switch either 1gigibit or maybe even 10 gigabit, and basically having a disk array that can saturate that. There are some nifty things you can do with teaming to double up gigabit ports. So with 1 gigabit you are maybe looking at a max of 125 mb/s over the network, so if you are having multiple people connect then you would need an array to max out past that plus some overhead.

As far as file control/ access are you looking for any kind of security or just a way to access the files?

If you need security you might look at something like Mfiles for a software solution.

Another pre-built solution that I have used in the past is a Synology Nas, great suite of apps and cloud connect stuff.
 
I built one for home system backups as well as running a couple Terraria servers and a Ventrilo server using something like this little guy. Uses about 35W under load and I have it all jammed into a little ITX box that's more hard drive than anything else.
 
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I am jelly you are making a file server. It is so much fun to pick out hardware and assemble it; install software and setup it all up.

I built my freenas back when it was version 7.x and its boringly reliable.
 
Thanks for all the input! And my parts arrived today so I can't wait to get home and put it together!
 
cortexodus said:
I built one for home system backups as well as running a couple Terraria servers and a Ventrilo server using something like this little guy. Uses about 35W under load and I have it all jammed into a little ITX box that's more hard drive than anything else.
Click to expand...
What do you have for hard drives in there? Just kind of curious given mine idles at around 180W. (course i've got 8 HDD's, a SSD and a i5-760 in there)
 
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I ended up purchasing the following components:

Lian Li M25B micro-atx case
i3-6100T (35W TDP) CPU
Gigabyte Micro ATX Server Motherboard
16GB DDR4 ECC memory
Noctua heatsink, passively cooling CPU. Turning heatsink fins to have an up-down configuration so that air from the top intake will flow through fins.
120mm Noctua low rpm intake fan on top pushing down
140mm Noctua low rpm intake fan on front blowing across hard drives
2x HGST 4 TB 7200 RPM NAS drives, will be in Raid
Zotac passively cooled Geforce 730 (lowest card that will support the 4k resolution of my monitor, also my chipset required dedicated video card when using ECC memory
1x 256GB SSD for OS and misc stuff
Corsair fully modular 550W. I know I don't need 550W but I love this series of corsair power supplies. Silent, has huge fan (that will be used for case exhaust), and is fully modular so very little clutter.

This NAS will be sitting on my desk behind my 34" monitor so I wanted it to look good and be very quiet, which is why I picked some of the parts I did.
 
FnordMan said:
What do you have for hard drives in there? Just kind of curious given mine idles at around 180W. (course i've got 8 HDD's, a SSD and a i5-760 in there)
Click to expand...

That i5's TDP is higher than the power consumption of my entire machine ;). I have a WD Red 3TB and a 2TB WD Green in there and a little 160GB laptop drive for the OS (Server 2012 R2).
 
bjornb17 said:
I ended up purchasing the following components:

Lian Li M25B micro-atx case
i3-6100T (35W TDP) CPU
Gigabyte Micro ATX Server Motherboard
16GB DDR4 ECC memory
Noctua heatsink, passively cooling CPU. Turning heatsink fins to have an up-down configuration so that air from the top intake will flow through fins.
120mm Noctua low rpm intake fan on top pushing down
140mm Noctua low rpm intake fan on front blowing across hard drives
2x HGST 4 TB 7200 RPM NAS drives, will be in Raid
Zotac passively cooled Geforce 730 (lowest card that will support the 4k resolution of my monitor, also my chipset required dedicated video card when using ECC memory
1x 256GB SSD for OS and misc stuff
Corsair fully modular 550W. I know I don't need 550W but I love this series of corsair power supplies. Silent, has huge fan (that will be used for case exhaust), and is fully modular so very little clutter.

This NAS will be sitting on my desk behind my 34" monitor so I wanted it to look good and be very quiet, which is why I picked some of the parts I did.
Click to expand...


Wait a second! Does the i3-6100T support ECC memory? I mean, even with a server board?

EDIT: Damn, just read the intel spec. YES! Cool learn something new some days.
 
SpeedyVV said:
Wait a second! Does the i3-6100T support ECC memory? I mean, even with a server board?

EDIT: Damn, just read the intel spec. YES! Cool learn something new some days.
Click to expand...

Yep, that's pretty neat huh? That chip seems to check all the boxes for a good NAS. Relatively fast, low TDP, ECC, cheap.
 
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