Multipurpose Home Server

[AMD_RULES]

This time around I'm looking to assemble a small low power server that can house all my digital photos, music files, and other files so that I can access them from anywhere in my home from either my desktop or laptop. I'd also like to be able to backup my laptop and desktop.

1) What will you be doing with this PC? Gaming? Photoshop? Web browsing? etc
Home server duties such as file sharing and backup
2) What's your budget? Are tax and shipping included?
$500 (Willing to spend a little more if necessary)
3) Where do you live?
Pennsylvania
4) What exact parts do you need for that budget? CPU, RAM, case, etc. The word "Everything" is not a valid answer. Please list out all the parts you'll need.
Case, MB, CPU, MEM, HDDs, PSU, etc.
5) If reusing any parts, what parts will you be reusing? Please be especially specific about the power supply. List make and model.
None
6) Will you be overclocking?
Nope
7) What size monitor do you have and/or plan to have?
Plan to run this server headless
8) When do you plan on building/buying the PC?
Soon
9) What features do you need in a motherboard? RAID? Firewire? Crossfire or SLI support? USB 3.0? SATA 6Gb/s? etc.
2-4TB of storage depending on what the budget allows
10) Do you already have a legit and reusable/transferable OS key/license? If so, what OS? Is it 32bit or 64bit?
No

 

[Dangman]

What OS are you planning on using?
And did you want baremetal backup or just regular backup?

Regular backup is when only certain selected files are backed up to the server.
Baremetal backup is when the entire OS is backed up the server. From there, you can restore the PC without having to reinstall the OS at all..

 

[AMD_RULES]

What OS are you planning on using?
And did you want baremetal backup or just regular backup?

Regular backup is when only certain selected files are backed up to the server.
Baremetal backup is when the entire OS is backed up the server. From there, you can restore the PC without having to reinstall the OS at all..

For the OS, I'm open to anything. It seems that WHS is popular, but I can also get Windows Server 08 Standard for free through my college.

I would just go with baremetal backups. I don't need the OS to be backed up, just the files.

 

[fatguy]

For turn-key data storage & backup, you should consider QNAP NAS appliances.

You could build something similar using FreeNAS or OpenFiler, but plan on dedicating a lot of time to building/tweaking.

 

[Ducman69]

The only real downside to WHS is that I believe its end of cycle in 2013, and the most compelling feature the drive pooling is apparently going away in the next version. If it comes preinstalled on a turn-key solution available in various models from HP, Acer, Asus, and Lenovo for example, great, but I wouldn't pay extra for it if you can get another license for free.

And really, any old windows box would be fine w/ appropriate software installed for automated backup (acronis is nice) and remote connectivity (such as logmein) for headless use. I would just focus on low power usage over performance though. Even my little archaic N270 single core Atom isn't stressed w/ regular utorrent/streaming/backup duty, its just not processor intensive.