Home Server...?

[2005_dynamique]

Just wondering if any of you guys have a home server or some sort of storage device, that serves media around your house hold, i currently have a media smart server, but that technology's getting old, and its starting to reach it limits of what hardrives it can support and also it only has 4 bays, with redundancy turned on it works like raid 1,

so the question,

what do you use, and why?


and what would you suggestion for me, preferably with some sort of redundancy. re ripping dvds is a pain in the ass

cheers

 

[C.J]

I have a PC acting as a media server. It has a 1TB internal HDD, 1TB & 2TB external HDD.

I think it's a 2gb RAM and 2ghz, but it's not needed for streaming.

It all then gets streamed to my ATV/iPhones/iPads at home. Its not used as a normal PC, only for streaming. I log into fit via my iPad (VNC) to use it when needed. I have 410 movies, and 10,000 songs on there.

Just took a quick picture, it's a tiny unit.

 

[mantis946]

Mine might be taking it too literal lol It's 70GB of storage and weights 65KG lol It is rather fun to play with though.



Poweredge 6650

 

[KDF]

65 KG and only 70GB storage lol ???

I have about 10 dell poweredge/powervault servers after doing a full consolidation and virtulization migration at work... some of them will be going in a half rack in my attic serving the home automation, security and whole house audio/media system serving about 20-30TB of content..

Now that is overkill

 

[cava83]

65 KG and only 70GB storage lol ???

I have about 10 dell poweredge/powervault servers after doing a full consolidation and virtulization migration at work... some of them will be going in a half rack in my attic serving the home automation, security and whole house audio/media system serving about 20-30TB of content..

Now that is overkill

Will you be selling any, and if so, what spec

(sorry for the hijack)

 

[mantis946]

65 KG and only 70GB storage lol ???

I have about 10 dell poweredge/powervault servers after doing a full consolidation and virtulization migration at work... some of them will be going in a half rack in my attic serving the home automation, security and whole house audio/media system serving about 20-30TB of content..

Now that is overkill

Yep 70 GB xD Has a single 15k SCSI drive at the mo, it's on my growing pile of projects xD

Cost me a pocket busting £5

 

[KDF]

Will you be selling any, and if so, what spec

(sorry for the hijack)

I'll try and post up a list of the servers.. they range from a mega ancient linux box (i'm talking 1Ghz 512mb ram lol) to an NX1950 dual Xeon (8 cores, 16 virtual cores with hyperthreading and 8GB RAM)

About 7 servers were replaced with fully redundant, clustered IBM virtualized servers running over 100GB ram.

PS. The NX1950 is mine !!

Yep 70 GB xD Has a single 15k SCSI drive at the mo, it's on my growing pile of projects xD

Cost me a pocket busting £5

Can't complain for a fiver, but will cost you more than that to run it each month lol !

 

[KDF]

The list.

Poweredge 2850
Powervault NX1950
Poweredge 2650
Poweredge 600sc
Poweredge Unknown - Doesn't have a model number.. just a service tag (which I can't be bothered looking up lol) but it's a 1U rack server.
PowerEdge 2850

Most of them are brimmed to capacity with 15K SCSI drives, ram and Xeon processors.

 

[Cookie]

Give you a fiver for all of them.

 

[mantis946]

Are any of the Xeon's MP processors, need 4 around the 3GHz mark

 

[Skeeter]

Windows Home Server (V1, the Server 2003 based version) on a cheap Desktop PC chassis I bought with a bunch of high capacity HDDs in it.

It fulfills the 'just works' factor perfectly. Its Server 2003 underneith so does loads more than something like a NAS would, and the backup/recovery process is simply brilliant.

It also doesn't need a high spec at all. I ran it on a 2.4Ghz AMD Athlon with 1GB of RAM for ages with no issues at all. Its currently on a C2D of some description with 2GB of RAM and I see absolutely no reason to upgrade anything other than the HDD's s they fill up.

It has all my music on it that is played across the house, all my movies which are streamed to a media PC, all my backups of all my machines, and if I had TV signal in the room its currently in, it would be recording TV for me too. I love it. Its called Rafiki

WHS v1 is far better than the latest WHS v2 due to the inclusion of drive extender technology, too.

 

[KDF]

Windows Home Server (V1, the Server 2003 based version) on a cheap Desktop PC chassis I bought with a bunch of high capacity HDDs in it.

It fulfills the 'just works' factor perfectly. Its Server 2003 underneith so does loads more than something like a NAS would, and the backup/recovery process is simply brilliant.

It also doesn't need a high spec at all. I ran it on a 2.4Ghz AMD Athlon with 1GB of RAM for ages with no issues at all. Its currently on a C2D of some description with 2GB of RAM and I see absolutely no reason to upgrade anything other than the HDD's s they fill up.

It has all my music on it that is played across the house, all my movies which are streamed to a media PC, all my backups of all my machines, and if I had TV signal in the room its currently in, it would be recording TV for me too. I love it. Its called Rafiki

WHS v1 is far better than the latest WHS v2 due to the inclusion of drive extender technology, too.

MythTV is better. I wrote code so I can control it with Siri. All I need to do is say something like..

"Play video The Big Bang Theory Season 1 Episode 4" or "Play video The Terminator" and it plays on my HTPC


now that's cool

 

[KDF]

Are any of the Xeon's MP processors, need 4 around the 3GHz mark

Not exactly sure, they are sitting in a pile just now.. can't be arsed to power them up and check.

 

[iain187]

I just have a NAS and a mini itx PC

I need to upgrade my NAS because it's just one drive and if it goes pop ill be a bit pissed!

I've rigged the PC up to my tv and home cinema kit and just run MCE and XBMC on it

 

[Homer-Simpson]

Never mind updating your NAS, you need a duster

 

[Gareth]

lol @ being pissed at losing data held on a single drive, kind of asking for it.

 

[KDF]

At least get a free dropbox and upload the most important stuff lol

 

[Gareth]

I've only got a Netgear NAS with 2 x 2TBs mirrored. I wouldn't mind a home server but tbh have no reason to have one, I could easily get hold of the software and hardware too.

 

[iain187]

At least get a free dropbox and upload the most important stuff lol

It's all copied on a laptop that I don't use for 'backup' haha

 

[C.J]

lol @ being pissed at losing data held on a single drive, kind of asking for it.

+1

All of my media is mirrored to another drive (using GoodSync), in the event one fails. I've spent too long tagging all my media with artwork/descriptions etc to lose it all.

Music

Movies

 

[Gareth]

Ditto, all my music in iTunes is the same.

 

[2005_dynamique]

+1

All of my media is mirrored to another drive (using GoodSync), in the event one fails. I've spent too long tagging all my media with artwork/descriptions etc to lose it all.

Music

Movies

what did you use to tag all of your itunes movies?

 

[C.J]

what did you use to tag all of your itunes movies?

MetaX. It lets you add titles, artwork, descriptions, genre, and the HD icon for your HD movies.

 

[Mells]

This is my little server.

Proliant Microserver N40L
8gb ram
2 x 2tb drives.
WHS 2011

 

[2005_dynamique]

This is my little server.

Proliant Microserver N40L
8gb ram
2 x 2tb drives.
WHS 2011

How many bays does it have, im already at 6TB

 

[Gareth]

Just ordered one of those for myself, they have 4 bays and an area for the optical drive. So you can either have an optical drive + 4 HDDs, or no optical drive and 5 HDDs.

I'm going to upgrade it to 8GB memory, 3 x 2TB drives, DVDRW and I'll either keep the 250GB HDD it comes with or change it for a 1TB or 2TB also.

Which memory are you using Mells? Some people seem to suggest using non-ECC doesn't work, whereas others have said its no trouble to use (non-ECC is obviously cheaper)

 

[BatFastard]

I've been thinking of setting one up at home for a little "side project" but waiting for the cost of HD's to come down/

 

[Gareth]

Yeah I was lucky with the NAS and bought the HDDs to fill it before the prices soared, I can set this all up and upgrade the memory straight away, but the HDDs can wait as I've got the NAS also.

 

[Skeeter]

Those HP Micro Servers are brilliant. Are they still uber cheap (there was a time when you could get one for about £90)?

 

[realnumber 1]

Just ordered one of those for myself, they have 4 bays and an area for the optical drive. So you can either have an optical drive + 4 HDDs, or no optical drive and 5 HDDs.

I'm going to upgrade it to 8GB memory, 3 x 2TB drives, DVDRW and I'll either keep the 250GB HDD it comes with or change it for a 1TB or 2TB also.

Which memory are you using Mells? Some people seem to suggest using non-ECC doesn't work, whereas others have said its no trouble to use (non-ECC is obviously cheaper)

Don't forget you can get £100 cash back on these at the moment.

 

[Gareth]

Yeah I know, £250 upfront, £100 cashback (thanks). Could have got it £10 cheaper from Dabs but prefer eBuyer.

 

[Mells]

Just ordered one of those for myself, they have 4 bays and an area for the optical drive. So you can either have an optical drive + 4 HDDs, or no optical drive and 5 HDDs.

I'm going to upgrade it to 8GB memory, 3 x 2TB drives, DVDRW and I'll either keep the 250GB HDD it comes with or change it for a 1TB or 2TB also.

Which memory are you using Mells? Some people seem to suggest using non-ECC doesn't work, whereas others have said its no trouble to use (non-ECC is obviously cheaper)

Yup you can have 5 drives. I have the DVD rw in the optical bay. If you want to put something in the optical drive make sure you get a molex to sata cable.

I have boggo kingston non ecc ddr3 memory.

Btw the bubble wrap in the pic is to reduce the vibration. Hardly any fan noise but quite abit of vibration.

 

[KDF]

The HP Micro looks pretty smart, and as long as you don't go over 5 spindles and don't need any significant CPU power (which I am guessing you lot don't) then they are perfect.

Unfortunately I am already at 9 spindles.. so that wouldn't be an option for me

 

[cava83]

This is my little server.

Proliant Microserver N40L
8gb ram
2 x 2tb drives.
WHS 2011

Love these units. Excellent purchase.

 

[cava83]

The HP Micro looks pretty smart, and as long as you don't go over 5 spindles and don't need any significant CPU power (which I am guessing you lot don't) then they are perfect.

Unfortunately I am already at 9 spindles.. so that wouldn't be an option for me

What you using at the moment and are considering in getting?

 

[KDF]

I am using a Core 2 Duo Full tower server running Ubuntu Server.

:~$ cat /proc/mdstat
Personalities : [linear] [multipath] [raid0] [raid1] [raid6] [raid5] [raid4] [raid10]
md0 : active raid5 sdj1[6] sdi1[7] sdh1[8] sdg1[4] sdb1[1] sdc1[0] sdd1[2] sde1[3] sdf1[5]
      7814079488 blocks level 5, 64k chunk, algorithm 2 [9/9] [UUUUUUUUU]

unused devices: <none>

There are 3 clients streaming a mix of HD and non HD content and the box can record up to 6 Freeview channels simultaneously (although this is rare, normally a max of 2-3).

I have about 1.5TB space left. I know I am am gonna have to upgrade the disks to 2TB/3TB as I want to take to well over 15TB and probably RAID6 for extra protection. It seems very hard to find a box capable of running it. I had to get special power supplies to power 9 disks at once lol

Thinking something like this.. can take 16 disks.

http://www.mypccase.com/4uracaej16xh.html

 

[cava83]

I am using a Core 2 Duo Full tower server running Ubuntu Server.

:~$ cat /proc/mdstat
Personalities : [linear] [multipath] [raid0] [raid1] [raid6] [raid5] [raid4] [raid10]
md0 : active raid5 sdj1[6] sdi1[7] sdh1[8] sdg1[4] sdb1[1] sdc1[0] sdd1[2] sde1[3] sdf1[5]
      7814079488 blocks level 5, 64k chunk, algorithm 2 [9/9] [UUUUUUUUU]

unused devices: <none>

There are 3 clients streaming a mix of HD and non HD content and the box can record up to 6 Freeview channels simultaneously (although this is rare, normally a max of 2-3).

I have about 1.5TB space left. I know I am am gonna have to upgrade the disks to 2TB/3TB as I want to take to well over 15TB and probably RAID6 for extra protection. It seems very hard to find a box capable of running it. I had to get special power supplies to power 9 disks at once lol

Thinking something like this.. can take 16 disks.

http://www.mypccase.com/4uracaej16xh.html

Nice case. The issue is sound I think for most people, unless you stash it in the loft with your other equipment, which is not always a feasible option.

What software you using for recording?

You have quite a lot of stuff, that is a huge amount of data.

The other issue is the cost of HD's at the moment, once they go down, it makes more sense to upgrade. I always thought I had cleaned all the shite I didn't need, had a good look the other day and I deleted a further 2.2TB of stuff, I duplicated a while back by mistake.

 

[KDF]

Sound isn't an issue because it will be going in a sound insulated half rack in my loft (along with everything else).

Software I use MythTV PVR Software (www.mythtv.org).

Yes, HD costs aren't the best at the moment.. that's why I'm holding back. If you are running win 2008 r2 you can just use data deduplication. It's built in IIRC.

Haven't had a chance to look to see if there is a Linux equivalent yet.

 

[Gareth]

I can't decide between 2008 R2 and WHS2011 for my Microserver, I can't help but think 2008 R2 is going to be of more use to me.

 

[@Spoonie]

I can't decide between 2008 R2 and WHS2011 for my Microserver, I can't help but think 2008 R2 is going to be of more use to me.

WHS2011 is built on top of 2008 R2. It depends what you want from a server. I am running WHS on my microserver and it does what i wanted perfectly (mainly backing up the home machines and sharing a bit of media.