atom or skylake - which platform for nas/mini-server build?

[Sheninat0r]

recently had a hard drive failure, so i'm going to build a nas for backups. i also want to be able to run servers for media, video games, and mumble. is the asrock c2750d4i with its embedded atom processor going to be enough, or is it worth it to step up to a socketed mobo and a more powerful processor?

i want to keep it mini-itx if possible, but micro-atx is acceptable. ecc is also a must, and at least 6 sata ports. i was looking at the i3-6300t for the cpu, since it has a 35w tdp. i plan to use freenas.

i'm also looking for a compact, quiet case with many drive bays. i found the lian-li pc-q35 and q26, but they're quite expensive and difficult to find.

edit:
so i've now found the asrock c236 wsi mobo, which looks pretty good to me. i'd like to pair it with a xeon e3-1235l v5, but i can't seem to find one of those for sale anywhere...

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Depends on the video games you're serving - the c2750 has a lot of cores (so it'd do fine for file serving* or video encoding/streaming - stuff that is easily multithreaded) but the per core performance is pretty abysmal, so it would likely choke on something like Minecraft.

*Most file serving daemons aren't actually multithreaded, but the server will spin up a new instance of that daemon for each client, so it's making effective use of multiple CPU cores.

The server in my sig might give you some ideas. I'm very fond of the case and motherboard in particular. If you want a server and ECC ram, SuperMicro is about the only game in town for DIYers.

I'm waiting for the price on used Xeon E3-1230 v3s to drop into pizza-money territory, then I'll probably upgrade that Pentium. But it does file serving and Minecraft server duty just fine. Hosts a DNS server too.

I wouldn't use FreeNAS on that build if you're using to run servers for other things. FreeBSD jails are... wonky. At least compared to traditional virtualization. (A jail is a shared-kernel environment more like a Linux chroot or a docker container environment... but don't let anybody who's really passionate about jails, linux, or docker know I said that.)

For a general use server, IMO, your best bet is to install a boring-but-well-supported Linux OS like Ubuntu on it (with or without a GUI), install KVM for virtual machines, and go from there - a new KVM machine for each service or application you need to run, keeping them nice and walled off from each other. Ubuntu is very popular and has a lot of good tutorials if you're a linux newbie.

And before the ZFS Mafia come in here telling you that you NEED to run FreeNAS and ZFS: yes, ZFS is nice. No, it's not the only game in town. Actually, no ZFS-on-Linux is not amateur hour, it actually works just fine. Especially for the minimally demanding home environment.

 

[Sheninat0r]

thanks for the feedback. minecraft is on my list, so i guess the atom is out straight away. i'm happy about that, since i didn't really like the thought of spending similar money on a brand-new platform vs one that's 2.5 years old.

i plan to do more research on the software front, especially zfs on linux. even if i don't end up using freenas, i want to meet their recommended specs just in case i end up going with it; better to be over prepared than under. however, i'm already leaning towards rolling my own linux on it, for the reasons you mentioned - for running servers and potentially being an htpc (if i get an integrated gpu with quicksync and that mobo with hdmi/dp out), a totally nas-dedicated os is probably not a great choice.

i really liked the asrock board because of the hdmi/dp out and 8x sata ports. the only mini-itx supermicro i see on newegg has only 5x sata and is using q170, which restricts my cpu options to 35w i3s instead of 25w xeons. even supermicro's micro-atx boards are vga only.

i am still on the fence about whether i really want the integrated gpu or not. it would be nice to be able to multi-purpose this pc as much as possible, but it does put some restraints on my motherboard choice and cpu selection.