Proposed 144TB V-Unraid Build

[deionmann]

Hello all, I have been planning a new future proof file serving machine that I can build over time for my home media and backup solutions for my family of 6. The goal is to ditch all other forms of media except plex throughout my house, yet still have the versatility of shows/movies for my very diverse family. Which equals LOTS of needed space. What I came up with will be built over the next year or two, then populated with hard drives as needed. Here is the proposed build for my 144TB virtual unraid machine. It will be comprised of a 4u head unit, and 2 DIY JBOD’S. I am simply in the R&D phase right now, with the head unit halfway complete.

FYI every hard dive in these box's will be the WD Red 3tb

The host box
this will be ESXI 5 with the following specs, ESXI will be loaded to the USB that is on the face of the mobo, the unraid os’s will be on usb’s that are passed through to the client machines

Case/owned - Norco RPC-470

Mobo/owned - P5B-E/4L

RAM/owned - 4 sticks of 1600 DDR3 ecc udim 4g ram = 16 gig ram

CPU - Xeon e3-1240v2

HDD - a temp 128gb SSD to host a linux based plex/seedbox server until I can build another "process esxi" box - connected simply to the 6gbs slot on the mobo

PSU will be a single rail 500w power unit

Raid cards
PIKE 2008
passed through for 8 drive unraid client (drives will be populated in the norco rpc-470)

2 M1015's passed through to 2 identical jbods for 2 more unraid clients
these will be (physically) passed through to the outside of the box using this adapter, and connect to the JBOD's.

The JBOD's
these will both be identical with...

Case - Norco 4220

SAS Expander –
Intel RES2SV240 with this Power Board
or
HP 468406-B21

I'm on the fence on whether to go with the intel or hp, simply because intel is 6g, but for simple file serving and hosting files for 2 plex servers im not sure if ill need much more than 3g from the hp expander, also with the hp, that will be 2 less 8088 to 8087 pci adapters I will have to buy. However also with the HP unit, I will have enough ports to dual link to the M1015's

as for questions I have,
1. Has anyone had any luck with the Pike 2008 Raid card on Unraid. I can't find if it's supported (officially or unofficially)
2. Is this enough processor power for 3 large scale Unraid builds? 48 hard drives is a big load.
3. Is there a way to use VHD's as unraid OS's instead of USB thumb drives? it would be nice if i could keep my box free of odd usb's hanging out of the unit

Any thoughts, ideas, and criticisms are more than welcome

 

[jimh425]

You didn't mention you backup plan or redundancy. What's the plan? Why do you think you need 146 TB? That's a lot for ripped media.

 

[deionmann]

@jimh425
per the backups, I have a 3tb datastore that I keep on another machine for family photo's, OS backup, and important document parity. Also a set of 1TB externals that take turns living off site for the truly important stuff. Other than that, it's all media - and for that I bet we'd all agree that original DVD/Blu-ray/CD copies are the best backup.

This thing is planned to be overkill, simply so that all i have to worry about in the future, or at least in the next 5 years is upgrades, and replacement parts. but as per why I NEED 144TB.... well, simply put I don't. But it would be fun to have, so .... why not?

 

[jimh425]

I would consider buying two HP Microservers and add 4 drives to each to have redundancy. Keep them in sync. I don't think you'll need more space, but if you did, add external enclosures that can be swappable between them. Consider adding an extra nic in each and max the ram. Ripping lots of dvd/cds take a lot of time. I'd keep a backup. CD/DVDs can theoretically be outlived by hard disks.

However, that would be dedicated systems. You could also make one of them a Windows Home Server and it can also serve as backup for your Windows/Mac systems. With deduplication, you don't really need that much space for backups of the pcs and it will let you know the state of all of the systems in your network that are participating. That's good to know systems that need a backup or need an update.

 

[McTurkey]

@jimh425
per the backups, I have a 3tb datastore that I keep on another machine for family photo's, OS backup, and important document parity. Also a set of 1TB externals that take turns living off site for the truly important stuff. Other than that, it's all media - and for that I bet we'd all agree that original DVD/Blu-ray/CD copies are the best backup.

This thing is planned to be overkill, simply so that all i have to worry about in the future, or at least in the next 5 years is upgrades, and replacement parts. but as per why I NEED 144TB.... well, simply put I don't. But it would be fun to have, so .... why not?

Because 2 years from now, the capacity of hard drives will have increased at least 1.5x, possibly 2x. The money you'll spend today on hard drives, could, spaced as needed over the next 5 years, provide you with massively more capacity if you actually end up needing it. Honestly, for a home user, I'd be hard pressed to justify buying more capacity now than you realistically think you could need in the next year, unless you really just have that much money to burn.

 

[KILL____]

Not to mention that hdd degrade over time as they run. And with around 40 drives, that's a lot of replacement. Streaming media will need higher transfer speeds, so its a good idea to stick with 6GB/s, and remember cache speed can make a difference.

 

[Grentz]

I would not do the ESXi piece. Just to host 2 machines in one does not seem worth it when you have so much complexity in the storage.

 

[J-Will]

I would not do the ESXi piece. Just to host 2 machines in one does not seem worth it when you have so much complexity in the storage.

That was my first critique as well. It would probably be best to install the file server on bare metal for that amount of storage space.

 

[KILL____]

True, but at the same time running it on a bare metal hypervisor that's headless has the added benefit of giving yourself a way to always have access if you mess something up yet keeping it secure from others

 

[Grentz]

True, but at the same time running it on a bare metal hypervisor that's headless has the added benefit of giving yourself a way to always have access if you mess something up yet keeping it secure from others

It is just as headless as a good OS install would be. If the hypervisor has any issue, you are in the same boat as if the OS install fails.

 

[KILL____]

Kind of. If the hypervisor fails though, you can reinstall the hypervisor and add the disks and vm's back into inventory though. Though you could always put the drives into a workstation to collect the data, but it only helps for files, not the OS.

 

[J-Will]

I dont think the specs are over built for a storage server with the capacity he wants (maybe the CPU is a tad more than needed). That said, adding virtualization will not only draw down resources from the main purpose of the build, but also add unneeded complexity to the upkeep, troubleshooting and maintenance of the system. I am all for consolidation, however in this case I think you need a single-purpose built machine.

 

[KILL____]

Vmware doesn't really use too much resources, but its not needed and would add possibly unneeded complexity. But at the same time if he really wants it then we can keep him from it, its just not needed.