Custom Home Server Build

Phil Gr

Phil Gr

Phil Gr

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Joined
30 Nov 2003
Posts
426
Location
In a house
Hi
I know this has been asked a 1000 times before (i have searched) but i am looking for some current up to date advice on building a home server,

I have not built a PC for close to 10 years after making the jump to apple kit, so not really up to speed with the current PC hardware scene

I have a reasonable home network setup with a gigabit & wireless network with multiple Macs, iPads, iPhones, ATv and a Synology NAS

I have the following requirements
  • File server (Large media collection, Photos, Work etc..)
  • Central backup for home network machines
  • Manage parental control for internet access for the kids
  • Powerful enough to play with Virtualisation
  • Expandable
  • Quiet / Low Power - Will run 24/7 located in my Loft
  • Run Headless

Now i realise i can purchase a HP Microserver that will accomplish the above but i am looking to specifically to do a custom build as i feel i will get some enjoyment / learning from the build & configuration process.

I currently have a Synology NAS with 6tb of usable space, which is running as my fileserver, i am planning on this becoming the backup location for the new machine

I also have a passing interest in virtualisation, its something that i have increasingly come into contact with in my working life

Recommendations for a machine spec or examples of other peoples builds very much welcome, i dont really have a budget in mind, but dont mind spending to get a reasonable future proof build.

Thanks in advance
 
Hey Phil,

Funnily enough this is something I've been giving some thought to, pretty near enough the same sort of requirements as you so I hope you don't mind if I sort of join in with this thread. My thoughts on this so far have been:

- Get a mini-ITX board with as many on-board SATA connections as possible, as I'd like to avoid paying the extra for a RAID card, and can then keep the PCI-e slot free for a TV-tuner or some other type of card. I think there is an Asus mini-ITX H77 board which has 6 or 7 SATA ports which is the most I've seen.

- Pack it with as much RAM as it will allow, I think the above board maxes out at 16Gb (32 would be better but the SATA ports take priority)

- For a CPU I was thinking one of the "proper" ivy/sandy chips rather than a celeron/pentium because as far as I know their power consumption at low-usage isn't actually too bad. However by the time you pay for even an i3 you're getting on for the cost of one of the lowest end Xeons. I assume these would be best for a server but I'm not sure if it's as simple as that.

- I already have a Fractal Design Array R2 which has enough drive bays for 6 drives and will fit the mini-itx (it currently has a crappy Intel-Atom board in it which is way too weak for anything more than a simple file server)

At the moment I've just got Ubuntu server edition on my Atom machine, which is acting as a file + web server, and I've messed around with running a few game servers (which didn't work well enough) and teamspeak (which worked fine) on it. It also serves up media to my raspberry pi under my TV - I'd eventually love to have a TV tuner in the server machine and run tvheadend server allowing any device in my house to connect to the stream and watch TV.

That's my thoughts on it anyway, I'm curious to hear other opinions...
 
As uncle_rufus said, my opinion is that you want something that's got plenty of SATA ports, and can drop a better processor into at a later date.

Here's a post of mine from another topic:

Confused said:
This is basically my home server box:

YOUR BASKET
1 x Foxconn H67M Intel H67 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Micro ATX Motherboard £49.99
1 x Microsoft Windows Home Server 2011 64Bit (1 Server & 10 Client Licenses) - OEM (CCQ-00128) £39.98
1 x Intel Celeron G530 2.40GHz Socket LGA 1155 Processor - Retail £34.99
1 x Imp MicroATX Tower Case (500w PSU) £31.99
1 x Corsair Value 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-10666C9 1333MHz Low Voltage Dual-Channel Kit £29.98
Total : £198.94 (includes shipping : £10.00).



Plus 2x 3TB drives, 1x 2TB drive, 1x 1.5TB drive

(which is just under 9TB usable space)

I've got the ability to put up to 6 hard drives in there, so if I upgrade all the drives to 4TB drives (the largest currently available), that'd be around 22TB of usable storage space.

Also add $20 for a copy of StableBit DrivePool to create a "storage pool" as large as you want it, and it can duplicate stuff across multiple physical discs automatically.

Plus, I've got the ability to throw in any 1155 processor up to an i7-3770k if I need any additional processing power later on.
Click to expand...
 
I think you should consider the AMD A85X platform for this. I've been looking to do something similar for my own home file server (either that or I'll buy another HP microserver).

The Gigabyte GA-F2A85XM-D3H A85X supports 8x SATA 6gb/s and 64gb RAM (it has 4 memory slots).
 
This is what im thinking so far

As this machine will be for learning and not just a straight forward file server, i am wanting to build in some extra power and flexibility to upgrade its capability in the future

I already have an old full size tower case with plenty of room for storage drives, and as this box is going in the loft out of sight cosmetics are not a priority at this time, so i am planning on re-using this case.

To keep the noise down i am going to need some advice on a PSU

For the hardware, so far i am thinking the following purchases
  • PSU - ???
  • Motherboard - Gigabyte Z77-DS3H
  • CPU - i3-3220
  • Mem - 2 x 8 gig Ram (leave 2 slots free for later upgrade - does the board need to be full populated ? )
  • OS Drive - Crucial M4 - 64gig mSATA
  • Storage Drives - 4 x 2tb WD Greens
I might look to try and pick-up a raid card off an auction site

One question i have is setting up the system to run headless, do i need a Gfx card to set-up and then remove it ?

Thanks for the help guys

PG
 
Sounds reasonable... You don't need to get a graphics card to run it headless, the CPU has its own integrated graphics which will be perfectly adequate while setting things up.

For the PSU I'd say just get any decent (efficient) ~400 or 500W PSU, noise won't likely be an issue.

Sounds like a sensible build, the only thing I might question would be the Crucial M4 - could be overkill for a server but if it isn't too expensive then I guess it can't hurt. My current server has a 160Gb or 320Gb drive as the OS drive which came out of an old Dell machine which was being thrown away...
 
Confused said:
As uncle_rufus said, my opinion is that you want something that's got plenty of SATA ports, and can drop a better processor into at a later date.

Here's a post of mine from another topic:
Click to expand...
Do you know what your power consumption is at idle and when loaded with that set up?
 
With the usual stuff (fridge/freezer, clocks, stuff on standby, phone chargers plugged in) the British Gas thingy in the kitchen usually sits at around 200w
 
Sorry for the hijack but I'm in a similar situation myself and have been umming and ahing about all the options for a while now. In my case the server will be kept in my little office room and so noise levels are more important and so case and psu choice are the areas I'm struggling to decide on. I was looking at http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CA-029-AE&groupid=2362&catid=2278 for the case as it looks well laid out for working with but I suspect it wont be the quietest.

Confused, how is that case you linked for noise and ease of working with? I'm guessing for that price it must be pretty basic?

I notice HP have just upped the cashback offer on the Microservers though so on a purely cost basis one of those is looking very tempting if more limited in the long run and without the fun factor of tinkering.
 
I don't actually have that case, I have something similar and just as cheap.

It holds the motherboard and hard drives in the place I screwed them into, and it sits in the cellar, so I don't really care about noise/build quality. I wouldn't want a number of mechanical drives whirring away, especially not in a home office.
 
Yeah it's not an ideal situation and hopefully I'll eventually be able to get the server tucked away somewhere out of sight and earshot but not an option just yet until I can sort out proper network connectivity :(
 
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