Spec me a nas?

Dob1eman

Dob1eman

Dob1eman

Associate
Joined
24 Apr 2007
Posts
168
Location
Derbyshire
Looking to build a nas box never done one before so not sure if its possible but could it be built for £500? I need something with lots of upgrade for the future im starting with 5 HDD but looking to increase that to 15 HDD in the future so I will need a pretty big case. I already have 4 2TB HDD so only need 1 HDD in this build to reach initial target of 10TB NAS storage.
 
£500.. wow thats a nice budget

you are better off buying a proper NAS imo, the only reason for building yourself would be for the "project" of it.. an off the shelf NAS will be quieter, use less power, look better (potentially), come with automated support things like email alerts, remote access, etc etc

http://www.synology.com/products/index.php
 
personally... I just buy Netgear Stora MS2000 which cost like £50 pop 2 X 2TB disks in them and when its full I get another..its taken me almost 2 years to fill 2TB
 
Basic z68 mobo, intel i3, 4gbram, big case, decent raid catd, windowd homes server lots of hdd's plugged into the raid card not the mobo, and a ssd for the os = 1 fast home server for what ever you wanna use it for .. Unless thats gaming or video rendering
 
Last edited:
 
Last edited:
either buy off the shelf nas or if u want a project do it right

one of those PSU's that only spin up when power usage is above certain percentage
fan less CPU/heatsink
silent HDD mount options
hot swapable disk caddies
 
Problem with a lot of the affordable off the shelf NAS boxes are they're slow.... some aren't even capable of delivering enough speed for a 1080 movie :eek:

I'm currently using a quad core cpu shoved into a nice Fractal Design Define XL plenty of HDD space and using FreeNAS :cool:
 
YOUR BASKET
5 x Seagate Barracuda Green 2TB SATA 6Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM (ST2000DL003) £104.99 (£524.95)
1 x Intel Core i3-2100 3.10GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor - Retail £94.99
1 x Crucial RealSSD M4 64GB 2.5 SATA 6Gb/s Solid State Hard Drive (CT064M4SSD2) £73.99
1 x NZXT H2 Classic Silent Midi Tower Case - Black £72.98
1 x Lian Li IB-01B PCI-Express 5-Port SATA-II & 1-Port e-SATA RAID Controller £69.98
1 x Gigabyte H61MA-D3V Intel H61 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £47.99
1 x Corsair Builder Series CX 430W V2 '80 Plus' Power Supply (CMPSU-430CXUKV2) £34.99
1 x Microsoft Windows Home Server 2011 64Bit (1 Server & 10 Client Licenses) - OEM (CCQ-00128) £34.98
1 x Kingston HyperX Blu 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (KHX1600C9AD3B1K2/4G) £19.99
1 x OcUK 22x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £13.98
Total : £1,002.32 (includes shipping : £11.25).



This is the kind of thing I would have as its a whole lot more then a simple NAS can will handle almost anything you could think to pass its way :)
 
If you want it purely as a NAS with some redundancy I personally wouldn't go with windows home server you'll either have to use the onboard 'raid' or spend out on a dedicated hardware raid adaptor either way you could have issues if the controller dies.
 
Thejay said:
If you want it purely as a NAS with some redundancy I personally wouldn't go with windows home server you'll either have to use the onboard 'raid' or spend out on a dedicated hardware raid adaptor either way you could have issues if the controller dies.
Click to expand...

I quite like WDS because for people who have never played about with Linux and server setups WDS does make it a lot easier as its in the normal MDI :)
 
None of these suggestions seem to come close to accommodating 15 drives.

I suggest:
HP microserver N40L - £137
Startech 2 Port PCI Express eSATA Controller Adapter Card - Storage controller - 2 Channel - SATA-300 low profile - PCI Express x1 - £23
3x StarTech 3.5 inch 4 Drive eSATA USB Multi Bay External Hard Drive Enclosure - £350
Total: £510

That gives 16 drive bays and if you need to expand, the N40L can hold two PCIe cards, so you can get a second eSATA card and add another two multidrive bays. Also, with a bracket, you can convert the 5.25" on the microserver into a hard drive bay too.
 
If a rackmount case doesn't bother you there's a case called the RM420 you'll have to google it that'll take 20 HDD's either that get a full tower that has a large amount of 5.25" bays and put in some 3.5" caddies you can get ones that use 2 x 5.25" bays and convert it to 5 x 3.5" caddies....

Obviously you'll need a controller card too the LSI ones are pretty good but be prepared they aren't cheap...... Should probably add that'll only be needed once you move past the capacity of the onboard sata ports.
 
Last edited:
drakioned said:
None of these suggestions seem to come close to accommodating 15 drives.

I suggest:
HP microserver N40L - £137
Startech 2 Port PCI Express eSATA Controller Adapter Card - Storage controller - 2 Channel - SATA-300 low profile - PCI Express x1 - £23
3x StarTech 3.5 inch 4 Drive eSATA USB Multi Bay External Hard Drive Enclosure - £350
Total: £510

That gives 16 drive bays and if you need to expand, the N40L can hold two PCIe cards, so you can get a second eSATA card and add another two multidrive bays. Also, with a bracket, you can convert the 5.25" on the microserver into a hard drive bay too.
Click to expand...

This is the only real alternative to off the shelf NAS I have seen in this post so far as it offers REAL benefits

People saying that building your own computer, installing and maintaining an operating system, windows updates, configuring linux, etc etc is SIMPLER that buying an off the shelf NAS you are mad...

Also, most new NAS offerings which cost £100+ can handle 1080p just fine

I'll re-itterate again.. the only reason to do your own is if you want something really cool like the above quote or you want a project.. if you want a project then do it properly, not just a bunch of cheap components in a crappy case.. an off the shelf NAS will be quiet, hot swappable, self update, email alerts, offer remote access etc if you go down the do it yourself route then you must have these features and more


Google for reviews on this and look at its specs, whatever you build must be BETTER than this otherwise you are wasting your time

http://www.synology.com/products/spec.php?product_name=DS411j&lang=enu#p_submenu
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom