Question Help with custom backup storage system, network, server

[PrinceXizor]

Need some experience and direction. I will try to provide as much background info as possible.

We just recently purchased a home. Between that, my relatively new computer, my wifes likely work from home new business, the latest google Kerfluffle and a job that can pay for it all, its well passed time for me to implement a structured backup system for our devices and data. Especially if my wifes business grows there will be a lot of pictures to archive.

Current used Devices: Two android tablets, two smartphones, two desktops and two laptops, one e-note device

Needs/Desires: Centralized file storage, device backups, wired network to main computer areas (I have a basement to run cables in), data backups (I need to develop a good plan including off site), system recovery, possible email hosting although my mental concept of what is involved is probably out of date. Any other interesting things that arent too much more work when you already have the infrastructure.

We have lowest tier Spectrum at the moment but will be upgrading when the business officially rolls out. No fiber in the area yet. tmobile claims to have there home service available (surprising since I dont think they have good coverage in our area). Our old modem flaked out so I bought a nicer new one in anticipation.

I can probably cobble together some very old components into another computer if need be.

I'm looking for guidance on storage, backups which is why I postal here but also on the home network side.
Sorry this is so open ended.

 

[Tech Junky]

Build the PC, pick an OS, create shares.

Linux no matter the name or skin is more stable and uses less resources.

I use Ubuntu and mostly headless. Simple as going into /mnt and mkdir for the share name. Then add it to /etc/fstab to auto mount on boot. Set the permissions on the dir for 777 if you want everyone to have access or otherwise to restrict it per user.

Plenty of how to's on the web.

 

[PrinceXizor]

My biggest concern is running into a compatability/setup issue. And I don't use Linux typically, the most Unix I've been expose to is running a few command lines back in the day on my CAD box at Goodyear and moving around the file directory for our department. That was...a long time ago

Anywho, I'm trying to be realistic, for a change, on the amount of time I have to configure and set this up. Old me would jump right into DIY'ing. Current me wonders if a bespoke unit is a great time saver. But, the "what happens if something breaks" question is certainly a valid one.

 

[Tech Junky]

Build/configure a Linux-based NAS | Jensd's I/O buffer

How to Set Up a Simple DIY NAS Build — Technically Wizardry

Sharing files at home is easier with a shared network drive. A DIY NAS build can turn an existing server into a multimedia server with automatic

www.technicallywizardry.com

Building the perfect, cheap DIY NAS

This post was extensively discussed on Hacker News.Alex Buznik, nas.net.ua kindly provided a two-part Russian translation: part1 and part2. This post discusses hardware considerations, installing L…

blog.georgovassilis.com

 

[In2Photos]

Prior to building my unRaid server the only experience I had with Unix was during college and it was limited. UnRaid was easy and there's a decent GUI so no command line required, at least in my use. Plus it can run on a potato. Mine is an Athlon 3000, 1.8 GHz processor with 2GB of RAM.

 

[PrinceXizor]

Thanks for the posts. I cracked open the old 4U case and it looks promising. 6 mounts for 3.5" spinners not counting the two bays for optical drives. It also looks like it has some old hardware in it, a MB, fanless CPU. I'll have to see if I can ID what's in it. That does lead me to a question. How do the DIYers manage "running on a potato" vs. modern high speed backbones to run the HDs?

 

[Tech Junky]

run the HDs?

Most of the posts I've seen mention Unraid or bundling it into some other niche OS.

I used Ubuntu though to be free of any limitations of what I could bolt onto it in addition to storage. Anything Linux + mdadm works just fine. I've been running mine for a few years now w/o any issues other than self inflicted but, easily fixable. If you set it up and leave it alone it's stable.

I went Raid 10 for mirror + stripe w/o the overhead of R5 recalculations and more transfer speed. I can push 400MB/s with that setup. Using EXT4 and it just keeps spinning along w/o errors or weirdness you might see with other FS options. I can add / remove disks or capacity easily with CLI commands.

No need for special Raid cards or expensive HW. It will run just fine off the OS and doesn't require a whole lot of HW resources. Since I folded additional functions into my box I went full on for the HW and recently rebuilt it using ADL CPU when they were released in Nov. it idles along most of the time and when I throw video files at it the CPU makes quick work of them. I also use it as my router connected directly to the modem and put VPN on it for whole LAN protection. The other benefit of higher end CPU's is that it just flies on VPN processing as well to getting line rate 1gbps+ using wireguard and about 50% on OVPN connections.

 

[PrinceXizor]

I wasn't really talking about the CPU or the software but the various I/O busses. If you go TOO old in your platform, then I would presume the various busses start to bottleneck the performance. I would also think a certain baseline of I/O buss would be needed to do something like running SSDs for a cache pool?

I haven't sat down and crunched any numbers on throughput of the various PCI/PCIe iterations and the various HDD interface protocols over the years. Maybe its much ado about nothing.

 

[Ajay]

For a simple web based NAS one option is https://www.openmediavault.org.
The newest version (v6) is based on Debian. The only time you'll directly interact with the OS is during setup. After that you use their web based interface on your desktop.
You would just need to test it against your hardware.
It's free and I trialed it for a bit in a VM, seemed solid and has a small but active community/dev group.

Oh and FreeNAS is now called TrueNAS Core. Good luck!

 

[Tech Junky]

For a NAS sata 6 is your primary concern. Secondary is sata or nvme but as a cache a sata m2 is fine.

 

[In2Photos]

I wasn't really talking about the CPU or the software but the various I/O busses. If you go TOO old in your platform, then I would presume the various busses start to bottleneck the performance. I would also think a certain baseline of I/O buss would be needed to do something like running SSDs for a cache pool?

I haven't sat down and crunched any numbers on throughput of the various PCI/PCIe iterations and the various HDD interface protocols over the years. Maybe its much ado about nothing.

For my use the older hardware hasn't been an issue. I use it as storage for things like movies that I play on my htpc (which works fine but I don't watch them much anymore), music, file storage of infrequently used items, photo backups, PC backups, etc. If I were trying to access files on a continuous basis then I might see performance issues. But for just centralized mass storage that I can access by any network device it works great.

 

[PrinceXizor]

Well....I ID'd the board. It's an ECS P6SEP-Me. For you youngins that's rocking a Socket 370 and has an ISA slot on it. Only IDE connectors on this bad boy. High end baby!
I think I have a slightly newer mb/CPU/RAM combo I can toss in it, though. Wow! Blast from the past!

 

[Tech Junky]

ISA

Yeah, I think most wouldn't know what that is these days. IDE is a foreign language as well to most.

When I decided to upgrade my car's HDD I went mSATA with a PATA adapter to make things a bit snappier but, still limited to the speed of the car's PATA interface. I can take the drive out though and do a direct copy on a PC much quicker. The oddity though is that the car is using a QNX FS which requires some trickery to do a direct transfer to the drive.

Anything with a PCIE slot though helps as you can then add a HBA and have enough bandwidth for multiple drives to not bottleneck if you do a mass transfer to/from them. Gen 2 / Gen 3 provide plenty of BW.

 

[PrinceXizor]

I think I have an old Dell system with an original dual core celeron. I might have to crack that open to see what's dwelling...

 

[PrinceXizor]

Here's a pic of the old ECS MB.

 

[Ajay]

Here's a pic of the old ECS MB.

View attachment 57190

That's quite a trip down memory lane

 

[PrinceXizor]

This was going to be my music production computer back in the day. Had myself a PCI! audio interface, some rackmount preamps, analog mixer, ah...good memories.

 

[PrinceXizor]

Ok. Cracked open the old computer. It's a Lenovo ThinkCentre m57. Looks like an LGA 775 chipset. So I have 4 RAM slots (currently 2x1GB). A couple SATAs one PCI and one PCIe - X16. So, looks like I'm in business. Won't know which processor it is (they sold a bunch of different ones) until I take off the heat sink to transfer this to the server case.

Edit: Well, it's an E6650 (Core 2 Duo). Not bad at all....but....the motherboard won't fit into my 4U case. It is just a TINY bit too long to fit (and doesn't line up with any standoffs. Plus, it has a custom backplate passthrough thingy to hold the HS on. Might not be possible to make this work with that hardware combo. Bummer.

 

[Tech Junky]

Maybe a different board / fan would fit in there. Instead of a tower cooler a flat horizontal one.

Where there's a will there's a way. Depends on how much $ you want to throw at it to make it work w/o diving into a new build into that case. 4U should hold plenty of stuff though if it's sized properly.

 

[Ajay]

Ok. Cracked open the old computer. It's a Lenovo ThinkCentre m57. Looks like an LGA 775 chipset. So I have 4 RAM slots (currently 2x1GB). A couple SATAs one PCI and one PCIe - X16. So, looks like I'm in business. Won't know which processor it is (they sold a bunch of different ones) until I take off the heat sink to transfer this to the server case.

Edit: Well, it's an E6650 (Core 2 Duo). Not bad at all....but....the motherboard won't fit into my 4U case. It is just a TINY bit too long to fit (and doesn't line up with any standoffs. Plus, it has a custom backplate passthrough thingy to hold the HS on. Might not be possible to make this work with that hardware combo. Bummer.

Wow, larger than a 4U case. That’s something else. Well, sounds like a job for a bandsaw /jk

 

[PrinceXizor]

Well, It's a custom "small" form factor thinkcentre that is more slim than small. So the motherboard is deep and runs front to back. There is a fixed drive cage in the 4U that JUST gets in the way. The thinkcentre board also has a custom horizontal fan mounted HS so I have to see if the backing plate will even function outside of the thinkcentre case. It's all customized for the case. If I can, then I can probably turn the motherboard sideways and roll my own standoffs and just deal with connectors that don't stick out the back. Since this will be a server/NAS, not a big deal.

 

[In2Photos]

One thing you might want to check about using the mobo from the thinkcentre is potential limits in the BIOS. Many OEM boards like that have limited options and compatibility that could cause you issues when trying to use them for something other than a "general PC". While I can't think of anything specific to your use at the moment I have a Dell XPS8300 (circa 2011) that will not allow a GPU newer than the 10 series cards, yet my home built x58 (circa 2009) will.

 

[PrinceXizor]

It definitely has a custom BIOS on it (from the documentation I've been reading). I don't think I have another working system. I'll poke around some more and see if it's worth the time making it work. Otherwise, I might swing completely modern with something like a 5600g as the basis.

 

[PrinceXizor]

Where's everyone buying their ECC memory from these days? Seems scarce at the moment...