New Build Analysis Xeons Secondary Cache Drives


Edvard_Grieg

Recommended Posts

Hi,

 

I'm a fairly long-time user of Unraid going from a Celeron D system with a couple gigs of RAM to now and I'm now looking to shift gears again.

 

A couple years ago I bought a used Dell T7400, it's outfitted with:

2xXeon x5482

32GB RAM

 

Array

5xToshiba 4GB NAS Drives

1xWD 4GB Red Drive

1xSeagate 3GB NAS Drive

 

Parity

1xSeagate 4GB NAS

 

Cache

Samsung 850 PRO 256GB - there is a symbolic link on cache drive to the separate BRFS array

 

Other

2x Samsung 840 EVO 120GB in BTRFS RAID 1 Array - these have all docker installs and configs on them

 

My current uses include Sonarr, NZBGet, CouchPotato and Plex.  The docker plugins have specific core assignments and memory allocations

Future uses include the above plus VMs (not sure on hypervisor yet)

 

One of the 'tweaks' I made is with the 2xEVO SSDs...I found that when pulling down large amounts of NZBs and trying to unpack them it could tank the SSDs resulting in choppy streaming or deadlocks with downloading.  To remedy this I effectively created a second cache array with the 2xEVOs and mount with the SNAP plugin.  Since Unraid forces docker to be installed on the cache drive with btrfs, I created a symbolic link to the EVO array which appears to 'work'.  The major caveat is that when the system is fully restarted, there is a bit of manual tweaking to get the right shares visible, and almost invariably I lose my docker configurations (have to rebuild/link the main download)...If there is a better way to approach this piece then please tell me!!

 

 

For my future build my main objectives are:

* Lower Noise

* Lower Power Usage

* Fewer Drives

 

I'm looking at the Seagate 8TB Archive drives to replace my current array drives...looking at probably 4 in the main array + 1 for parity.

 

I'm additionally looking at moving to new CPU/Motherboard etc so I can downsize to a smaller case (T7400 is full tower and stupidly heavy, hot, and noisy). 

 

I'm currently looking at:

Budget varies, I'll probably do this in steps of a few hundred at a time

2xE5-2620

64GB RAM

Supermicro MB

1xSeagate 8TB Archive for Parity

4xSeagate 8TB Archive for main array

Cache Drives??? Reuse the 850 Pro and 840 EVOs??

PSU??

One of the 5 in 3 adapters for the drives

A mid-tower case to hold it all

 

Thank you for reading through this- let me know your thoughts on:

How much of an improvement will I see in the areas of Performance, Power Consumption and Noise/Heat?

Is there something else I can/should do for the secondary cache setup?

What else should I consider or be thinking about?

How will stability compare to my current setup (uptime of 82 days, last downtime was due to upgrade to 6.0.1)

 

 

 

 

Link to comment
  • 3 months later...

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Restore formatting

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.