Help me build a WHS

[cavediver]

I've decided to build my own WHS and I need some help as I've never built a computer before. I currently have an HP EX470 MSS with 7.56 TB free space out of 26.38 TB total storage space. This is accomplished with the MSS by 1-Seagate 500GB system drive & 19-Seagate 1.5 TB storage drives. In order to accomplish this amount of storage, I have a Sans Digital TR4M 4-bay external esata box, a Sans Digital TR4U 4-bay external USB box and a Sans Digital TR8U 8-bay external USB box. I can add a lot more, but I want something more robust. The external USB boxes are ok for streaming blu-ray .m2ts files to my Popcorn Hour A-110 and serving up music to a Squeezebox via my wired gigabit home network, but I have a few issues that I think will be solved with something with all SATA drives and a stronger processor. I have modded the MSS to 2 GB ram and changed out the CPU to an AMD Athlon 64 X@ 3800+ dual core.

Case: Norco RPC- 4220; Ordered today.

Drives: 2-80 GB Intel SSDs in raid 1 for the system drive? Or would something else be better?
20-2 TB storage pool drives. I will probably use the 1.5 TB drives for now and swap them out for 2 TB drives as they come down in price.

CPU: ? I want it to be as future proof as possible to be able to handle and 64 bit WHS v2 when it comes out. File storage, streaming, a couple of websites, possible email server, and possible VM.

Mobo: ? Something to go with whatever CPU is chosen.

RAM: 2 - 4 GB. I Don't know what brand is best?

Power Suply: Corsair HX850W? Is this too much, not enough, just right, or is there something better or more appropriate?

Controller card(s): All drives will be set up as JBOD for the storage pool. I don't need or want raid as I'm happy with WHS's drive extender and duplication features.

Cables: ?

Any help or suggestions are greatly appreciated.

 

[drgnfang]

I believe the SASLP is the current ruling card for HBA usage. You'll want miniSAS -> miniSAS cables. Also, will need a "reverse" SATA -> miniSAS for the last 4 drives.

The HX850, while very likely overkill, got great #'s even for low-wattage use over at JG.

Personally I'm recommending the GA-EP45-DQ6 for the Motherboard. With 4 nics, and the 2x16x + 2x4x PCIe slots it is hard to beat. (For the record, I haven't tested teaming yet). Pair it up with a lower power C2D or C2Q (E5200, E6300, Q8400) as needed.

For RAM, just grab whatever 2x2g kit is on sale with free shipping. Make sure it runs solid at 1.8v and you should be fine.

For the OS drive, if you want to go SSD I would suggest getting either a 160g X25m, or a 256g Vertex/Falcon. Why mess with RAID if you don't have to. Just make sure you back up the OS to an external drive. Much safer that way. Otherwise, any cheap 250g spindle drive should work.

 

[novadude]

Skip that motherboard and put some money into some Intel PCI-e network cards.

Look for a 16-24 port LSI card that supports the dumb-mode firmwares, or multiple cards to get the slots you need.

Depending on what you intend to have loaded onto the server for email/website/VM you may not really need much horsepower if it's just a personal server with nothing super intensive, it'll probably sit idle most of the time. If you're set on the VM get a CPU with virtualization support (intel e7500 for example)

PSU is a very nice choice. Cables will depend on what you find for a controller and this is complicated by your case choice, use of onboard SATA ports might be limited to OS drives unless you can find a cable that will work while going from SATA to the backpanel connector, some do, some don't.

 

[drgnfang]

You'll need a 1x slot for every Intel card, or a 4x/16x if you want dual or quad on a single card. Oh, and the dual card costs almost as much as the mobo I recommended. I'm not gonna sit here and say that the onboard marvels are as good as an Intel NIC. Even without any testing I'm sure they aren't. But even if you team all 4 up and only get 50% out of them it's still cheaper than a mobo + 1 dual Intel NIC.

Another option for the onboard SATA, hook them up to esata brackets and use them with external drives. You'll need an extra card to use all of the case drives, but it might be less of a head ache. Not sure how hard it will be to get a cable that will work.

 

[Asposium]

if using a dual/quad NIC will it not be necessary to buy/have a managed/semi-managed 1GB switch to enable teaming of the NIC ports?

i briefly looking into buying such a switch, in order to get more throughput on the home network, then thought again once i saw the price of such switches. they ain't cheap.

 

[novadude]

You'll need a 1x slot for every Intel card, or a 4x/16x if you want dual or quad on a single card. Oh, and the dual card costs almost as much as the mobo I recommended. I'm not gonna sit here and say that the onboard marvels are as good as an Intel NIC. Even without any testing I'm sure they aren't. But even if you team all 4 up and only get 50% out of them it's still cheaper than a mobo + 1 dual Intel NIC.

Lots of boards have 1x slots, and even one intel gigabit card will give you higher performance than with four of those shitty realtek ports.
Gigabyte EP45-UD3p is a solid board, has three 1x slots. You could do one network card and have 2 left over.

if using a dual/quad NIC will it not be necessary to buy/have a managed/semi-managed 1GB switch to enable teaming of the NIC ports?

i briefly looking into buying such a switch, in order to get more throughput on the home network, then thought again once i saw the price of such switches. they ain't cheap.

Yes, you'll need a switch that supports teaming and that will only benefit you if you have multiple requests to the server for different transfers.



Without more details from the OP, I'd suggest one intel gigabit card for the internal network, use the onboard LAN for for the external (run the servers in the VM and only give the VM access to onboard ports, no need for added expense of trunking at home without a specific need)

 

[cavediver]

I don't have or want a managed switch. My router and all switches are all Cisco/Linksys business class. Router is RVS4000, Switches are SR2016, SD2008 & SD2005. Network is not an issue. The virtualization thing is just something I want to be able to do or try out in the future, maybe. I'm more concerned now about which CPU/mobo combo I should get for this box, and whether I should go with AMD (4040e or 5050e) or Intel Core 2 Duo?

 

[Asposium]

I'm more concerned now about which CPU/mobo combo I should get for this box, and whether I should go with AMD (4040e or 5050e) or Intel Core 2 Duo?

how much "horsepower" does the cpu require for your proposed whs box?

if not very much "horsepower" how about this mobo
i'm intending to get one when it is available in the UK

http://www.supermicro.com/products/motherboard/ATOM/945/X7SLA.cfm?typ=H

i currently have an intel atom mobo, and it does fine for my whs from a cpu point of view, though it is somewhat limited by only having one PCI slot and no PCIe slots.

my server, with the intel mobo, an adaptec 4x sata card, one seagate 320gig 7200.11 hdd and four seagate 1tb 7200.12 hdds pulls ~ 42w (@ at 240v)

 

[cavediver]

That mobo is not sufficient. I need 3 or 4 PCIe slots for the SASLP cards and possibly an SAS expander card, (if I want to add another box for more drives in the future), and network card. CPU horsepower requirement is not that high for WHS. I'm currently running a 35W AMD 3800+ in my MSS which has 21 drives and 4 external boxes including the box for backup database backups. That CPU has been fine so far. It's the USB stuff that's slowing down file transfers.

 

[Metaluna]

Skip that motherboard and put some money into some Intel PCI-e network cards.

Agreed. I've had lousy luck with Realtek NICs and WHS (on two different motherboards), especially at high network loads with Jumbo Frames enabled. I switched to an Intel PT single-port card (now replaced by the CT, I believe) and have not had any problems since. I also had good luck with a Marvell-based motherboard but the Intel NIC seems to be faster.

 

[novadude]

The virtualization thing is just something I want to be able to do or try out in the future, maybe. I'm more concerned now about which CPU/mobo combo I should get for this box, and whether I should go with AMD (4040e or 5050e) or Intel Core 2 Duo?

Core 2 Duos will handle the VM side a lot better, so a cheap C2D with VT support would work better than the AMD cpus, so this will need to be something you decide on now unless you want to possibly rebuild when you want to play with VMs.


Those SASLP cards might not be the best option, look into the LSI controllers.

 

[cavediver]

Those SASLP cards might not be the best option, look into the LSI controllers.

Why? And which LSi controller? I saw some posts indicating that the LSi cards only worked for WHS if the firmware is flashed to some lower level firmware to allow JBOD.