Project: hold all my shits

Fish

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So it’s not badass as thirdgen’s build, but it will have it where it counts. Dem terabytes and plex capabilities.

I started with a rats nest gateway with an i5 2300. Next to it was a probox with 3 3TB drives. Two were almost full with movies and shows with the third being used as a dump and storage.

d8c80d7af9aaad7cc4dd5509abd2762f.jpg


Took the pc guts out and slapped it in a new case running UNRAID. Along with some new spinny things.

9d4dc4d5521c0ab1b8f304974795e9fe.jpg


Also bought a Hyper 212 EVO cooler for the cpu since I figure the stock fan was about 8ish years old and the cooler pulls air from the side. Not suitable for the case it went in. Which is an Antec three hundred two case.

One 8TB drive will be parity and the other along with the 4 TB drive will be data. I also recycled the 850 EVO SSD for a cache drive and plex metadata. Or I might just make it a metadata and VM drive. Not sure yet since I’ve yet to play with VMs.

So I’ll be essentially going from 6 TB to 12 with the other 3TB drives waiting in the wings just in case or fill more drives up as I go. Which is why I decided with UNRAID vs Freenas or another NAS software.

FWIW, taking apart prebuilt systems is kinda quirky. I’d love to replace it eventually but for now it will suffice. Which is another brilliant thing about UNRAID. It doesn’t give a shit about hardware. It recognizes the serials of the HDDs and will boot up normally even if you swap out for all new hardware.
 

Lord Tin Foilhat

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Nice.

I just did similar the other day. Added 6tb to the nas/plex/security video server. Moved everything to a full size case. Ssd for winblows, 2tb mirror setup for important stuff, 2tb security drive, 4tb plex drive.

Then i run 2 external drives that connect up every month or 2 to copy the mirror drive and plex media for backups.

Next is to add a cloud setup for the mirror drive for my "3-2-1 backup solution" for my important stuff I dont want to lose.
 

FESTER665

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Nice.

I just did similar the other day. Added 6tb to the nas/plex/security video server. Moved everything to a full size case. Ssd for winblows, 2tb mirror setup for important stuff, 2tb security drive, 4tb plex drive.

Then i run 2 external drives that connect up every month or 2 to copy the mirror drive and plex media for backups.

Next is to add a cloud setup for the mirror drive for my "3-2-1 backup solution" for my important stuff I dont want to lose.


So could I use my old ass Alienware Area 51 server case for this project?



Just put new internals into it?


Im guessing at this point I could find a case that is smaller and has better airflow to keep it quieter though...
 

Lord Tin Foilhat

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So could I use my old ass Alienware Area 51 server case for this project?



Just put new internals into it?


Im guessing at this point I could find a case that is smaller and has better airflow to keep it quieter though...
Yes. And big case = bigger fans = quieter with more airflow.

My server case is a full size case. 6 fans inside, super quiet.
 

Lord Tin Foilhat

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200mm fans and a 4790k at 40x multiplier rarely getting above ambient with an H100i says otherwise, kid.
You need a h100i? Thats cute.

Server is all fans and stays ambient as well...even under load it doesnt go over 40'C. Not to mention it has 5 hard drives inside and runs 24/7 with load on it all the time.
 

Fish

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Damn to those cases. LOL. I dont need anything fancy. I wanted to be conservative as possible. The Antec case was 65 bucks and holds 6 3.5 drives, 3 5.25 devices, and 2 mountable SSD spots. Perfectly fine for me. Put my blu ray drive in since I am almost sure there is a docker to rip blu rays.

Pre clears are done, formatting and will be transfering my data to it shortly. I dont doubt it will take quite awhile to get that all done. LOL. Only crappy thing is the mobo only has one fan controller, so I have the top 140MM fan running for exhaust but the rear fan is currently off. Might get a splitter to get both running in the future since my HDDs got to the low 30s with a high of 34C.

Currently moving all my movies and tv shows. Thats gonna be a hot minute. :rofl:
 

FESTER665

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Damn to those cases. LOL. I dont need anything fancy. I wanted to be conservative as possible. The Antec case was 65 bucks and holds 6 3.5 drives, 3 5.25 devices, and 2 mountable SSD spots. Perfectly fine for me. Put my blu ray drive in since I am almost sure there is a docker to rip blu rays.

Pre clears are done, formatting and will be transfering my data to it shortly. I dont doubt it will take quite awhile to get that all done. LOL. Only crappy thing is the mobo only has one fan controller, so I have the top 140MM fan running for exhaust but the rear fan is currently off. Might get a splitter to get both running in the future since my HDDs got to the low 30s with a high of 34C.

Currently moving all my movies and tv shows. Thats gonna be a hot minute. :rofl:


Can you do like a parts list of the stuff youre using?



Im interested in doing something like this but would like to not kill a budget over it... :bowrofl:
 

FESTER665

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What are you trying to accomplish?


My younger brother has a wall of DVD's and Blu-Rays, ideally I would like to have a media server with Plex or the like on it that can be viewed by him, my parents upstairs, or me at my house.


It is possible to access it from my house if it's at my parents house correct?


The biggest thing Im guessing is it would need a lot of storage for the sheer amount of movies he has...


Basically would like an extra version of Netflix. :rofl:
 

Fish

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Can you do like a parts list of the stuff youre using?



Im interested in doing something like this but would like to not kill a budget over it... :bowrofl:

Sure. Not going to lie, the most expensive pieces were the drives. Luckily I did an employee purchase of the 8TB ones so the payment gets taken out of my check instead of a CC.

Parts I reused:

i5 2300 CPU/motherboard from the old Gateway

Samsung 850 EVO for cache drive (you dont NEED this, but since I had it)

Geforce GT545 video card for VMs if I choose. (once again, I dont think you NEED this since IIRC the cpu mobo combo has onboard graphics)

LG Blu Ray drive for ripping

Parts I bought:

Antec 302 case https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B006TVQTHW/?tag=tcg21-20

EVGA 650 GQ power supply https://www.amazon.com/dp/B017HA3SQ8/?tag=tcg21-20

Seagate Ironwolf 8TB drive X2 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01M1BUBSO/?tag=tcg21-20

WD Red 4TB https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00EHBERSE/?tag=tcg21-20

Hyper 212 EVO CPU cooler (once again, probably didnt NEED this one) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B005O65JXI/?tag=tcg21-20

Flash Drive for UNRAID OS

I bought a USB extension so I could just plug it into the mobo and hide the flash drive in the case, but with this mobo being a PITA for connections since they werent labeled all that well, I was having a hard time getting it set up. So right now its just plugged into the back of the PC.
 

Fish

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My younger brother has a wall of DVD's and Blu-Rays, ideally I would like to have a media server with Plex or the like on it that can be viewed by him, my parents upstairs, or me at my house.


It is possible to access it from my house if it's at my parents house correct?


The biggest thing Im guessing is it would need a lot of storage for the sheer amount of movies he has...


Basically would like an extra version of Netflix. :rofl:

You can share Plex yes. Just create your own username and friend each other on Plex. You can then view the library and stream. It will count against your data though. I also limit my streams to 720P 2MBPS uploads which causes my PC to transcode, but saves on the data. The current one will transcode a few movies at once, but I will eventually upgrade for that HEVC goodness thirdgen loves to talk about. Since the current setup will do one, but CPU usage is pretty much maximum. :rofl:

I still get physical media for movies, but after using Plex for awhile, I am spoiled. I never want to look for a movie again. HAHA.
 

Lord Tin Foilhat

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Yeah my buddy shares my plex. I pay for the premium though so no limits.

The drives are definitely the most expensive depending on the size you go with. 1tb drives are like $40 now. 4tb NAS drive was $100 that i just bought 2 weeks ago. Id count on 1-4GB per movie depending on the quality you want to encode in. I personally have about 1.4Tb right now on plex
 

FESTER665

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Yeah my buddy shares my plex. I pay for the premium though so no limits.

The drives are definitely the most expensive depending on the size you go with. 1tb drives are like $40 now. 4tb NAS drive was $100 that i just bought 2 weeks ago. Id count on 1-4GB per movie depending on the quality you want to encode in. I personally have about 1.4Tb right now on plex


Im going to text him to see how many movies he has for giggles.


It would be nice to take the wall racks out of his room too and put all the DVDs in storage or something instead. :rofl:
 

Fish

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Yeah my buddy shares my plex. I pay for the premium though so no limits.

The drives are definitely the most expensive depending on the size you go with. 1tb drives are like $40 now. 4tb NAS drive was $100 that i just bought 2 weeks ago. Id count on 1-4GB per movie depending on the quality you want to encode in. I personally have about 1.4Tb right now on plex

I bought the 3TB drives thinking I could last awhile, and it did. Almost 2 years. :rofl: I just like the fact that I can add more storage to the array as I go and have a parity, even if its the most basic of parities, instead of my old JBOD and hope it doesnt die setup.
 

Fish

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Cpu matters the most with a plex server since it will be doing the encoding/decodings. Id go with at least a i5/ryzen 5 for that many users.

I concur. If you use UNRAID, IIRC I was reading there is a little more setup with Ryzen, but it is pretty cost effective and good for transcoding. Id either go that setup down the road, or just use my gaming stuff and upgrade that. Which is just another i5, but 6500 instead of 2300.

I have a 128BG Samsung SSD I used to use for my PS3, will that be enough for like the OS and programs or would I need something a little larger?

You need a flash drive for UNRAID no matter what. That is the boot drive. If you use windows, Id say that would fit windows and your Plex metadata.
 
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