Building a NAS in Italy

Teodor_Patriche · January 5, 2020, 1:16am

Hi,

I’m looking for some help upgrading my nas. I’m currently using a rock64 with OMV, a 4 tb wd red and a 3 tb wd green. It works fine but I’m looking for a more robust solution.

TLDR

Usage: mostly media files, some dockers, no vms, no plex.
Software: Unraid with a parity disk
Hardware: cheap and power efficient with ecc ram; tower form factor is ok
Special needs: server parts are hard to find in italy, a prebuilt is probably a better solution
Budget: max 300€

USAGE

I need to store mostly media files (movies, music, tv series) so nothing too important but I would like to have some kind of protection against disk failures. I looked into the options and I decided to go with Unraid with a parity disk.

I currently have 2 8tb wd mybook that I need to shuck, 1 4tb wd red and 1 3tb wd green and I need to buy an SSD for cache. Leaving some room for expandability, I would say something that can hold 8 drives is good enough, maybe even less if it makes sense costwise.

HARDWARE

Performance

I don’t think I need much power (the rock64 is actually powerful enough for my needs), I would prefer something that is cheap and power efficient. I only need to run a few dockers: torrent downloader, nextcloud, homeassistant, openvpn, subsonic, sonarr, lidarr, radar and maybe others. No VMs, no Plex (I’m using an Nvidia Shield as a plex server).

Form Factor

I would prefer something small but compact form factors tend to be more expensive and have some extra issues compared to the bigger form factors, like heat dissipation and expandability. So, I can settle for a tower case.

SPECIAL NEEDS

ECC ram I guess.

Build vs Prebuilt

I can build a pc, meaning I can put the pieces together, but I would need a hand choosing the right ones. The main reason I would go with a prebuilt is parts availably is the worst here in Italy while used prebuilt systems can be ordered from Germany.

Availability

As mentioned before, parts are difficult to find here in Italy so I can’t just follow a build guide or recommendations because I might not find all the parts mentioned and if I do they would surely be at a higher price.

Budget

I would like to spend as little as possible and not more than 300€ (not including the ssd).

Questions and doubts

If I buy a used machine, should I buy a new power supply? I know that the power supply is a critical part that can destroy your entire system if something goes wrong.
Should I buy an UPS?
Why should I care about dual nics?

Some options

This is what I have found on ebay:

I think the first is the one that makes sense the most.

crewdog47 · January 5, 2020, 3:24pm

Hello, I hope that things work out with your build. If I had to start over I would pick up a prebuilt and mod from that point. But again that’s just my two cents on this matter. Take care