ASRock OR SuperMicro - First Build

[Natcoso9955]

Hey Guys,

 

So im looking to build my first UNRaid box to be used as a media share, torrent box & Probably Home Theater PC. I've spent alot of time going over different builds and peoples reviews of hardware and came up with a Supermicro build. Then one of my mates suggest looking at ASRock Boards. So i then went through the trouble of making a second build using an ASRock board.

 

Basically looking to purchase all parts new, so happy to swap things out of a build for better ones if people have specific recommendations.

Here are my 2 builds that i managed to come up:

https://au.pcpartpicker.com/user/Natcoso9955/saved/6YLsYJ

https://au.pcpartpicker.com/user/Natcoso9955/saved/bz9NGX

 

The CPU coolers etc where just after thoughts as i dont really know much about them but figured since it would probably be running most of the time best to have one.

You'll notice that i have added a graphics card to both builds, i figured if i plan on running kodi for the Home Theater then id probably need a graphics card.

 

Im still not sure whether and ssd is better for the cache drive or a 7200rpm black drive is better suited.

 

Pretty much looking for great storage now, with the possibility of eventually just replacing drives with larger ones. i dont need at this stage a shitload of storage. Plan on storing all the family photos and movies, as well and shows and movies, etc. maybe later down the track i may also want to run steam\steam OS from it for some couch gaming etc, but not a super important thing right now.

 

If anyone has any feedback or suggestions regarding either of these builds id greatly appreciate any advise.

[DarkHorse]

Hello there, welcome to the community!

 

I too am fairly new, been stalking the forums for a while, and just recently took the plunge and built my system (see signature for details).  I have been very happy with it.  I'm still new to unRAID, so keep that in mind when viewing my comments.  I'm sure other more experienced users will chime in.

 

I think ASRock products are pretty solid. I had an issue with the Marvell SE9230 SATA controller on my motherboard, but once I updated the firmware to the latest version, no problems since. Also found a forum member's IPMI script to help with fan control.

 

Your setup looks great, but I'm curious about your drive selections. I believe I have seen others recommend that if you plan to have more than 4 data array drives, you should consider having 2 parity drives.  As your number of drives go up, the odds for drive failure increase. Just something to consider.

 

I went with 8TB drives to keep costs down. I bought (2) Seagate 8TB "archive" drives that were "Expansion" drives (model STEB8000100) for $180 each at newegg.  Tore each apart to extract the drive. For the parity drive, I went with a Seagate 8TG IronWolf drive (around $265) at newegg.

 

So, spent $625 total on drives for 16TB of usable space vs. almost $800 for 12TB of usable space. However, WD Red's are great drives, and perhaps they are better quality than the Seagate drives I selected. 

 

Now, also consider I invested in SSD cache drives, I already had some that I removed from an older system. So the speed of my data array drives is less of an issue for me. In my opinion, if you plan to eventually do some gaming, you're probably going to want an SSD-based cache.

 

Cheers, and best wishes toward a successful build!

 

 

 

[SSD]

Curious on this advice for 2 parities for 4 data drives. Who suggested that?

 

I'm probably going against the advise of my colleagues, but this is my opinion.

 

Dual parity is a luxury once backups are in place. The capacity of a second parity would be much more valuable used to backup as much of your valuable data as possible, and stick in a safety deposit box or in your friend's or parent's home. This would protect you from fire, theft, and a wide variety of other things that could knock out your data. Things like family photos, home movies, income tax records, rare music/media, etc. should absolutely have this type of protection BEFORE thinking of dual parity.

 

The chances of needing dual parity to recover (excluding user error) are about the same as your chances of a house fire. That's assuming an array in which an actual drive failure happens every year. And I don't just mean a SMART error or loose cable - I'm talking a drive that won't read, won't power on, gets constant timeouts, etc. So the chances of having one of those a year is very unlikely, so my calculation was extremely conservative. A backup is needed as uploading 8T (or more) to a backup service is quite likely time prohibitive, A local backup option is needed.

 

The most compelling reason for dual parity is for new users (and non-new users that have not experienced a significant array event that had them learn the art of recovery) that could make mistakes and lead to data loss. Dual parity would protect them from some situations (not nearly all) of self inflicted damage. So if you have satisfactory backups, and have an extra drive that is not needed for data yet, and want to install for dual parity, it is certainly not a bad idea. Even with a small number of drives. You can make a decision later to pull it and re purpose for data once you need the space. In the mean time, you may have an option if you shoot yourself in the foot.

I'll mention the cost of parity protection goes up and up as disks get bigger. Used to be a single parity disk for a <= 1T array was ~$100. Now that cost is $200-#300 for an 8T parity. And for 10T it is closer to $400. Multiply that by 2 for dual parity. I do believe if your risk is well below 1/4 of 1% for a dual drive failure in your array for an entire year, and realizing that there are other risks, more likely than than dual drive failure that you are (like it or not) accepting, you can make a decision to accept the extremely small extra risk without apologizing.

 

If I had a monster server (20+ drives), I'd much more likely consider dual parity. With that much (assuming mostly media), the time and cost required to recover would be enormous. The cost of backup would be quite high. One extra disk worth of backup is a drop in the bucket. (I'd already have backup of my critical data backed up). So using an extra disk for backup vs for possible protection against  2 random disk failures would not have a clear answer. I could see choosing the second parity as higher value. But under 15 - unless there is a spare disk I already have that's not needed for anything else, or I know I have a high risk array of old or suspect disks, I'd pass. But between 15 and 20, the decision would depend on the confidence level of the user, the age of the disks, real frequency of disk failures, and user's own ability to sleep well at night.

[DarkHorse]

I agree, I don't think dual parity is needed, but I have seen several posts that have suggested it.  I guess it is like insurance, depends on the level of risk one is willing to take. 

[Natcoso9955]

SSssssoooo... does anyone have any feedback on either build, or suggestions on either build???

[tdallen]

Hi, some random comments:

 

- An SSD is generally better if you only plan to run applications from the cache drive, while a 7200rpm Black can be better if you want to support lots of data between mover runs.  Personally, I'd recommend an SSD and have writes go directly to the array.

- I'm curious about your thinking behind the E5-1620 v3 in the ASRock build.  Is it something you're getting a good deal on?  It has the benefits of the E5/2011 architecture, but only the cores/performance of a modern E3 (4 cores hyperthreaded, 9752 Passmarks). It's also 140w chip so a bit more expensive to run and more heat/noise.

- The ASRock motherboard and CPU support quad channel ECC RDIMMs, but the memory you've picked appears to be standard DDR4.

- I'd go further up the food chain on the Supermicro E3 build.  The E3-1220v3 is only a 4 core, non-hyperthreaded (7654 Passmarks) chip.  I'd go up at least to the 124x chips with hyperthreading.

- I wouldn't buy 3TB drives for a new build.  I prefer to manage a smaller number of large drives and would get 4TB at a minimum.  Actually, if I were doing a new build I'd put in WD 8TB Red parity drives and Seagate 8TB archive drives (best $ per TB).

[Natcoso9955]

On 16/06/2017 at 10:17 PM, tdallen said:

Hi, some random comments:

 

- An SSD is generally better if you only plan to run applications from the cache drive, while a 7200rpm Black can be better if you want to support lots of data between mover runs.  Personally, I'd recommend an SSD and have writes go directly to the array.

- I'm curious about your thinking behind the E5-1620 v3 in the ASRock build.  Is it something you're getting a good deal on?  It has the benefits of the E5/2011 architecture, but only the cores/performance of a modern E3 (4 cores hyperthreaded, 9752 Passmarks). It's also 140w chip so a bit more expensive to run and more heat/noise.

- The ASRock motherboard and CPU support quad channel ECC RDIMMs, but the memory you've picked appears to be standard DDR4.

- I'd go further up the food chain on the Supermicro E3 build.  The E3-1220v3 is only a 4 core, non-hyperthreaded (7654 Passmarks) chip.  I'd go up at least to the 124x chips with hyperthreading.

- I wouldn't buy 3TB drives for a new build.  I prefer to manage a smaller number of large drives and would get 4TB at a minimum.  Actually, if I were doing a new build I'd put in WD 8TB Red parity drives and Seagate 8TB archive drives (best $ per TB).

So let me see if i get this right, your suggesting the SSD but NOT as a cache drive?

Also what CPU you suggesting? i just picked that one because ive heard good things of Xeon CPU's

As for RAM, i guess i could swap it out for Crucial DDR4-2400 RDIMM 32GB (4x8GB)

 

As for drive size, cost in Australia 3-4TB Drives are cheaper perTB then the larger drives.

Other than those changes, Does anyone see any other issues with the ASrock build. Im liking that one more personally.

Edited June 27, 2017 by Natcoso9955

[tdallen]

6 hours ago, Natcoso9955 said:

So let me see if i get this right, your suggesting the SSD but NOT as a cache drive?

Nope, just answering your question about whether an SSD or 7200rpm black drive is better suited to the cache drive.  The main use of the cache drive these days in unRAID is *not* to cache writes the the array.  The cache drive has become the defacto "application" drive, it's where you install your Dockers and VMs.  SSDs are generally very fast but small in comparison to HDs - they are ideally suited to being the "application" drive.  If you intend to use the cache drive for both applications and in the traditional manner of caching writes to the array, though, then a fast HD may work out better depending on how much data you write each day.

 

6 hours ago, Natcoso9955 said:

Also what CPU you suggesting? i just picked that one because ive heard good things of Xeon CPU's

Xeon's are good CPUs.  That said, the ASRock - X99M Extreme4 is a very expensive 2011 motherboard over here in the states, and the E5-1620 v3 is very low end Xeon E5 CPU - seems like an odd combo unless you are getting a great deal on the parts.  If it were me, I'd either get a cheaper motherboard and an E3 Xeon (and spend a lot less overall), or I'd put a more serious E5 on that motherboard if you really need the horsepower.

[dmacias]

I have both. The ASRock 8 core Avoton as my main and a Supermicro as my backup. For the 2 boards you listed I'd get the Supermicro because of IPMI support and it is a newer board.

[Natcoso9955]

11 hours ago, tdallen said:

Nope, just answering your question about whether an SSD or 7200rpm black drive is better suited to the cache drive.  The main use of the cache drive these days in unRAID is *not* to cache writes the the array.  The cache drive has become the defacto "application" drive, it's where you install your Dockers and VMs.  SSDs are generally very fast but small in comparison to HDs - they are ideally suited to being the "application" drive.  If you intend to use the cache drive for both applications and in the traditional manner of caching writes to the array, though, then a fast HD may work out better depending on how much data you write each day.

AH ok, yeah i had been doing reading over some of the older posts and people where referencing cache write drives. being used for dockers and VM's makes sense, ill have to work out how large an SSD i will need.

 

11 hours ago, tdallen said:

Xeon's are good CPUs.  That said, the ASRock - X99M Extreme4 is a very expensive 2011 motherboard over here in the states, and the E5-1620 v3 is very low end Xeon E5 CPU - seems like an odd combo unless you are getting a great deal on the parts.  If it were me, I'd either get a cheaper motherboard and an E3 Xeon (and spend a lot less overall), or I'd put a more serious E5 on that motherboard if you really need the horsepower.

Just started looking at trying to purchase that Mobo, and its actually kinda difficult because its so old. Means ill probably do the Supermicro build and maybe up spec the mobo and CPU on that or ill look at a better asrock mobo and newer cpu.

 

GRrrrr. the hassles of building a rig. lol

[Natcoso9955]

2 hours ago, dmacias said:

I have both. The ASRock 8 core Avoton as my main and a Supermicro as my backup. For the 2 boards you listed I'd get the Supermicro because of IPMI support and it is a newer board.

IPMI was actually the reason i found that board and decided to try and do a build out of it. What cpu you running with your Supermicro, any recomendation?

Edited June 28, 2017 by Natcoso9955

[dmacias]

IPMI was actually the reason i found that board and decided to try and do a build out of it. What cpu you running with your Supermicro, any recomendation?

It's just my backup server and I bought everything used on ebay. I got the X10-SLL-F board for $100, the Hynix 4GB x 2 PC3-12800E for $38 and the Pentium G3220 for $35. I thought about getting a better processor and making it my main server and would have got the E3-1230v3 or I saw a combo of the same board and a E3-1231v3 for $279.  

 

 

However I was also looking at similar Supermicro X11 boards but micro-atx (X11SLL-F). I probably would have picked the same E3-1220v5 processor or the 1225 if it wasn't much more.

 

But then there's this thread concerning Skylake processors https://forums.lime-technology.com/topic/58371-warning-intel-skylakekaby-lake-processors-broken-hyper-threading/

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Natcoso9955]

3 hours ago, dmacias said:

But then there's this thread concerning Skylake processors https://forums.lime-technology.com/topic/58371-warning-intel-skylakekaby-lake-processors-broken-hyper-threading/

Wow that's a little concerning, maybe I should hold off a little bit and see what happens or get a CPU that supports HT but just disable for now.

 

Man, there are way to many options. Lol