Another Home Server Build (ITX, NAS Hot Swap)

Spooter · 14 Nov 2010 at 16:33

Right all thought I would do a little build log of my new server build. I already had a ITX build which I used as a file, streaming and print server but as it doesnt have raid I decided to build a new one with some resilience.

Just had the parts delivered so heres some pictures. Sorry about the poor picture quality it doesn't do the case any justice, they were taken on my iPhone. Much better quality than my Lian Li PCQ7 ITX case.

Case

CFI A9849 Mini-ITX NAS/Server Case - 2 Hot Swap Bays

Motherboard

Gigabyte GA-D525TUD, Intel NM10,

This seems a really nice board for the money. Low power consumption but fairly decent power with the 1.8GHz Dual Core Atom. Cost less than £70 for DDR3 and Raid support for upto 4 Sata drives.

Memory

2 x 2GB Hypertec DDR3 PC3-10666 (1333)

Hard Disks

2 x Samsung SpinPoint F2 EcoGreen 1.5TB

The case takes 2 3.5inch hot swap drives and space for one fixed 3.5inch drive inside the case.

The Plan

I plan to Raid 1 the Hot Swaps drives for storage and install Amahi Home Server on the internal drive. I have thought about using Windows Home Server or Ubuntu Server again but Amahi has pretty much the same features as Windows Home Server but free.

Purpose

DNS\DHCP - Amahi recommended
File Sharing
Steaming Media to PS3 (Amahi DLNA Server)
Adminer (To manage My SQL databases on server if necessary)
Web Keypass (To manage passwords across PCs)
Transmission (For downloads)
Maybe put Virtual box on there so I can virtualize Ubuntu server to mess around with.
Webmin (Maybe)
Print Sharing

I will post some better quality pictures when I start building it.

Spooter · 14 Nov 2010 at 16:34

Reserved for build pictures

lixxus · 15 Nov 2010 at 20:25

wow how comes I never heard of Amahi before.

really good software, its not a standalone OS ? do you just install it over fedora, can you also just do base install for fedora

Ive always looked for similar type of software to qnap/synology

Is Amahi the only of its kind ?

Spooter · 21 Nov 2010 at 20:52

Yes Amahi does look good. Still not sure what im going to use yet, its between Windows Server 2008, Ubuntu Server and Amahi.

Ordered the extra 1.5tb hard disk I needed. So I should have this build finished later in the week.

lixxus · 21 Nov 2010 at 21:15

that nas case, how much was it ?

Spooter · 22 Nov 2010 at 09:05

£69 pound with a 250watt PSU.

I can take some better pictures tonight if you want. They have a 4 bay version as well.

dekez · 22 Nov 2010 at 09:12

I'm loving that case, 4 bay version looks good as well. Subscribed

cottoneye · 22 Nov 2010 at 16:49

Nice case!

How powerful is the Atom 1.8GHz, been thinking of a NZB Download box and streaming to my iPad using AirVideo. I have a 50MB Virgin connection not sure if the Atom would be powerful enough.

Spooter · 22 Nov 2010 at 22:43

Nice case!

How powerful is the Atom 1.8GHz, been thinking of a NZB Download box and streaming to my iPad using AirVideo. I have a 50MB Virgin connection not sure if the Atom would be powerful enough.

Not sure about performance but I wouldn’t expect the atom processor to affect the virgin connection speed. Isn’t that mainly down to the nic card and router? This board has a 10/100/1000 card.

Any tests I can perform for you once built?

Got my last two disks now so I can start building soon!!

Ill get some better case pictures then.

blueacid · 23 Nov 2010 at 00:00

cottoneye said:
Nice case!

How powerful is the Atom 1.8GHz, been thinking of a NZB Download box and streaming to my iPad using AirVideo. I have a 50MB Virgin connection not sure if the Atom would be powerful enough.

As for downloading you should be fine; I had a pentium 2 @350Mhz, and it could happily cope with 16mbit downloads running the CPU around 40%...

..so it follows that usenet at 50mbit would use "around" 130% of the CPU power. I bet a dual core 1.8Ghz atom would wipe the floor with my PII, so you're laughing there.

As for airvideo, I genuinely don't know.

cottoneye · 23 Nov 2010 at 10:51

Spooter said:
Not sure about performance but I wouldn’t expect the atom processor to affect the virgin connection speed. Isn’t that mainly down to the nic card and router? This board has a 10/100/1000 card.

Any tests I can perform for you once built?..

I usually get around 6mb/sec downloads from Usenet so wasn't quite sure if that would cause any problems for the cpu. If you wouldn't mind, could you unrar a large-ish file, about 2-3GB. I'd appreciate it. If you do have access to Usenet it would be great to know how it performs at par etc, multiple threads as I'm looking at using the Atom in a download box.

Thanks, looks great so far!

blueacid said:
As for downloading you should be fine; I had a pentium 2 @350Mhz, and it could happily cope with 16mbit downloads running the CPU around 40%...

..so it follows that usenet at 50mbit would use "around" 130% of the CPU power. I bet a dual core 1.8Ghz atom would wipe the floor with my PII, so you're laughing there.

As for airvideo, I genuinely don't know.

In which case I think it'll be fine, thanks for your help.

Transcoding video on the fly so I can stream it to my iPad or PS3 is something I'm trying to find out, I don't think it would have a problem. I've seen the Asus Atom board and there is one model which says it supports 1080p playback, so should be sufficient.

Thanks