Home Server, Buy one or build one?

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Mati71

Limp Gawd
Joined
Jul 17, 2008
Messages
141
I was following the Carlitos714 thread on a home server but I'm unsure now what I want or what I should do now. I'm looking to spend around $500 on a server, but I want to get the biggest bang-for-the-buck on storage space, should I build one or just buy a HP Microserver?

Thanks.

PS, I need everything.
 
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biggest bang for the buck automatically means you cant buy one, you have to build.
and you are obviously posting here because you need some reassurance b/c deep down you want to build one.

how much space do you need?
is this purely for storage and nothing else?
 
I depends on what your going for. The HP Microservers offer a pretty solid package in a nice compact case with a warranty. The components are also all tested and designed for 24/7 runtime. I tried using a shuttle as a server only to have the PSU blow and fill the room with smoke after a few months. Luckily no fire.

If you want more than 4 drives and need a more powerful server then build one. The down side to building is it can be hard to find a nice small case, if thats what your going for.
 
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In actuality, I want to build it myself, and yes I'm looking for assurity that I am making the right decision. I already have the need for 1.5tb of space (for my movie backups) but i also want to be able to stream to my Xbox, HTPC, PC, and backup my current computers and stop spending money on offsite backup services such as Carbonite. Ideally, I'd like to have 4tb of space, but i don't think that's feasible at my budget unless I go unraided. As we all know, going unraided means I have no backup if a drive fails.

At this point, i can go higher than $500, but what are my choices of getting to 4tb of backup that will allow me to stream, store, and access remotely/ftp should I need to. Finally I would like the option to use household automation and to use a security camera.

Thanks.

PS, I'd like the flexibility to expand as well.
 
Mati71 said:
As we all know, going unraided means I have no backup if a drive fails.
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You would still have no backup even with a RAID array. Remember that RAID by itself is not a backup as the RAID array itself can still become corrupt or defective nor does it protect against malicious or accidentatal corruption, deletion, modification, or removal of data. All RAID does when it comes to data security is to make sure that the data is still acessable in the event of a single hard drive failure. It is no means a backup or a seperate copy of critcal data stored on a different medium.

Anyway, what OS were you planning on using? That's gonna dictate the hardware recommendations.
 
I use my Xbox a lot and thought WHS would play nicer with WMC. In all honesty I am unsure at the moment because it means that it would increase my cost (since I can get a free OS off the internet like Ubunto). Plus, I use windows for everything and it just seemed reasonable to use an OS of the same make.
 
Biggest bang for the buck imo.....build one out of spare parts. You don't need new or superfast server grade parts for a home fileserver. Just any old decent PC will do. If it is just the people in your household pulling from it, it should do just fine.

I used my old 2005 Athlon64x2 gaming rig for my current fileserver. (still in my sig...i need to update that) My previous fileserver was a 2000 era Dual AthlonMP box with 1GB ram. And it was working just fine for me except for the fact that it had 0 sata ports. And neither were a slouch either, they run 24/7 serving windows shares in my house , hosting a FTP, hosting VPN, go to LAN parties with me and serve shares and host game servers, test out different O.S in VMware.
Nothing special. regular parts *well for their respective build eras the parts are pretty good gaming grade parts*

You can build a super special expensive RAID cards specialized redundunt PSU etc if you like. But if you don't need the pazaaz OR if you just wana get your feet wet...setup a file server out of something you have just lying around. My fileserver cost me 0$ asside from buying a bunch of hard drives. I already had the hardware lying around. If you don't have the hardware lying around.....build yourself a new primary computer then turn your old one into a fileserver.
 
koolaidkitten suggestion is probably the best.

if you don't have older PC parts kicking around you could purchase a cheap itx board (amd bobcat or intel atom) and a small case + a couple of low rpm drives (samsung F4 or hitachi 5k3000) to start. the itx motherboards generally have basic RAID mirroring at least.

getting all these parts (itx mb, 2 low rpm drives, 200-300watt psu & case) you'll have the beginnings of a decent home sever / NAS for around $500 with room to expand HD space later on. with a copy of windows (xp/vista/win7) RDP or VNC, you could make it headless as well.
 
Unfortunately I don't have any components laying around, just wires, nuts and spare cords.

I appreciate everyones input. I think I'll first try to find something on CL for under a $100 bucks first and go from there. If I don't get anywhere with that, I'll just build a new computer and just turn my current build (see sig.) into a server. My only real problem with using my current rig as a server is power consumption. Thoughts on that?
 
You could make a really barebones server for pretty cheap, and then just upgrade as you find fit/have the money.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...91&cm_re=rosewill_case-_-11-147-091-_-Product
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103903
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820220480
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813130585

Comes to $221.96, plus the cost of disks. Not necessarily suggesting this hardware, just grabbed some of the cheapest/decent rated stuff I could to make a point.

You don't need anything fancy. That's pretty similar to the specs of my current server, and it is doing quite a bit.
 
Mati71 said:
I appreciate everyones input. I think I'll first try to find something on CL for under a $100 bucks first and go from there. If I don't get anywhere with that, I'll just build a new computer and just turn my current build (see sig.) into a server. My only real problem with using my current rig as a server is power consumption. Thoughts on that?
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Are you gonna replace the CPU and GPU of your current rig with lower power using parts when you're reusing it as a server? If not, I wouldn't bother repurposing your current rig as a server. As you've noted, power consumption is gonna be an issue as well as heat.
 
That was an opened-ended statement on my part. My concern was with power consumption and I was concerned with its use. I was thinking about following Jesse B.'s template because looking forward on what I can do for around 200 bucks, which would roughly be twice the cost of replacing my CPU for a lower powered one, I might a well just take the plunge and purchase some cheap parts instead of converting my current system (or locate a decent computer someone is selling on CL).
 
Mati71 said:
That was an opened-ended statement on my part. My concern was with power consumption and I was concerned with its use. I was thinking about following Jesse B.'s template because looking forward on what I can do for around 200 bucks, which would roughly be twice the cost of replacing my CPU for a lower powered one, I might a well just take the plunge and purchase some cheap parts instead of converting my current system (or locate a decent computer someone is selling on CL).
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Jesse B's template is a start. But your actual system is gonna be bit a different if you want a better quality PSU, better cooling case, etc etc.

Mati71 said:
I use my Xbox a lot and thought WHS would play nicer with WMC. In all honesty I am unsure at the moment because it means that it would increase my cost (since I can get a free OS off the internet like Ubunto). Plus, I use windows for everything and it just seemed reasonable to use an OS of the same make.
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WHS does play nice with both the 360 and WMC. However it does have a few issues (namely 2TB drive support, tombstone issues) and the fact that its replacement is due out soon make WHS v1 a not so good buy. With that said, it's still a viable file server OS. I'm still using WHS in fact.

Also note that some of the Linux OSes can work well with WMC and 360 after several tweaks. So we really do need you to figure out the OS. With a Windows OS factored in, thats only $400 for hardware. As you know, $400 worth of hardware is gonna be different from $500 worth of hardware.
 
I said it when I posted and I'll say it again just to drive the point home, what I posted was just a start. It didn't take me more than 2 minutes to pull those links off Newegg. As Danny Bui said, I'd definitely recommend a better power supply, and you'd need to add some case fans as well. I was just trying to prove a point that a decent rig could be built for fairly cheap.
 
Jesse B said:
I said it when I posted and I'll say it again just to drive the point home, what I posted was just a start. It didn't take me more than 2 minutes to pull those links off Newegg. As Danny Bui said, I'd definitely recommend a better power supply, and you'd need to add some case fans as well. I was just trying to prove a point that a decent rig could be built for fairly cheap.
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Understood. Probably should said that when I posted my response.
 
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