Intel® Xeon® Processor E5-2650L v4

What Base hardware did you build it on? Or is it a vm?

A dashboard as in a browser based, I can click on a pretty icon and it brings up the web page for that service? I’m going to jump and say Dashy. Once you figure out that you pretty much have to configure everything with JSON, it becomes pretty easy.

I really like what you’ve done here I think you’ve done a great job one thing I have a question of is what operating system do you run directly on the Pi?

So you’ve gotten a lot of comments here and they’re very good. They certainly give you options. Now I’m going to probably go the other way because running network attached storage from Windows has never been a great solution over the years in my experience. And I’ll also temper this with if you want the chance with this new server to learn and use other platforms you certainly have the ability with that processor.

So my normal suggestion, is to load Proxmox as a hypervisor. This allows you to run LXC containers directly and virtual machines. I would run TrueNAS Scale in a VM and give it direct access to the two 10TB volumes it needs to create your RAID1 NAS in ZFS. I might tend to put a second 256GB NVMe drive to run my VMs on. The nice thing with your setup here is you’d still have two SATA ports available for more drives in the future. The bad thing of course is if you create a RAID1 array now with two drives you’re not going to be able to expand it in the future as anything but a RAID1 array. Which won’t be what you want. Maybe food for thought.

This setup gives you the ability to learn Proxmox and to learn TrueNAS in baby steps. One thing that intrigued me about this system is that you could put four more NVMe drives and run them as a ZFS RAID5 or 6. That is a pretty sweet motherboard! Especially for being so small.

You’ve got both 10 Gbps and 20 Gbps USB channels so you could use that for an external drive for your backup. As it was already mentioned, RAID is not a backup ™ and you’ll probably want to back up your important data so you don’t have to number one lose it or number two reload it all from the internet.

With a setup I’ve mentioned you can easily run multiple VMs so you could run let’s say a Debian 12 VM and have it run Docker containers and there you have your Plex and or Jellyfin and dozens of other Dockers and you’re all happy. And yes, with Proxmox you could run those same containers as LXC. For a long time I guess I didn’t realize or understand about lxc containers and so I ignored them and through the growth of proxmox in my basement-- yes it’s like a plague I’ve got 14 systems running it now–I really do like LXC. While I really like TrueNAS Scale and have four instances of it running, I do not like running containers on it because I see it as a NAS operating system and not great at running containers. That’s completely my prejudice.

I’m sure we’ll have other people chiming in about using unRAID, Open Media Vault, and things like that but while they’re certainly options, I have always found TrueNAS to be a better NAS.

So if we really want to keep this simple:

Windows w/Python installed: py -m http.server

Linux/BSD/MacOS/Unix: python3 -m http.server

And if you’re dealing with Windows, you can install python many ways so it’s really not that difficult anymore.

Now mind you this covers downloading from a computer meaning another client computer let’s say it’s a laptop from your Windows/Linux desktop or server.

To upload files however, we have to get a little bit more creative. Let’s say that you have Windows as your operating system or that you know how to use WINE on Linux.

This program is a Windows executable that as one simple download file gives you a full web server with upload and download meaning it will accept the post request correctly and let you transfer files. Give it a shot.

HFS (HTTP File Server) https://www.rejetto.com/hfs/?f=intro

I’ve got three of the r730xd’s right now. I love the machines and I love the power that they have. I’ve got 22 core processors in them all. I run xcp-ng on them but you can run proxmox on them and you can run vmware. I believe and there are other experts that will tell you on here that VMware 7 will run just fine but VMware 8 might not on the 2600. I had VMware on one of them in the past and that’s gone away for me.

If your power bill is of interest to you, then it might not be the server for you because if you put capacity on there it’s going to draw quite a bit of watts. I’m assuming you’re going to run it 24/7 like I do. After all you want it up and running so it’s available right?

They can be a little loud, but once you get it patched well for updated firmware on all the BIOS and idrac and the LSI controller, the fans are able to ramp down. If that whole power thing is of a concern you can always remove one of the processors and put a blank immediately in place on top of the pin so you won’t bend the pins and save the processor in the power supply for future. You could then move all the ram which would be an additional 64 GB to processor one and you’d be all set and you’d be using the last power and generate less heat.

I prefer the V4 chips in both dells and an hp’s because the memory can run faster. However if you don’t want to spend money on V4 chips there’s no reason to necessarily spend money on them as the V3 chips run just fine and the two you have in there are fine (I have four HP 360 gen 9s with the V4 version of that chip with 14 cores).

I’m not sure what the front storage looks like on that if you got it with 16 or 24 bays but if you receive SAS drives assuming they’re Enterprise SAS drives and they weren’t certified then they’re probably going to die fairly soon. You have to assume it at least right? You can totally put in off the shelf SATA home user SSDs or Enterprise SAS SSDs.

You can add dual 10 Gbps or 40Gbps net working pretty cheap with a integration module that’s available on eBay. I have an iSCSI host which services up VM containers to my computer servers. That way all the containers live on shared backup storage that is well it has a pretty good up time 99.9999 all that jazz. You can always bump the power supply up if you need to again on eBay. I’m going to maybe guess that you got the kit on the back of the system that let you put two drives on the far right rear of the system you can put your boot drives there so you don’t use the front drives for booty. VMware can technically boot from a SATA Dom or a USB. 28 cores or actually even the 14 cores will run a full Red Forest just fine. And give you plenty of Linux VMs and you could run a Mac OS on there too if you want.

I gave you all this information because there are a lot of pluses with the system you’re looking at the price is certainly reasonable that’s what I’m paying in America for them at a reseller. However there are a lot of deficits a couple of the people have already pointed out in this thread I would certainly say that a 12th generation i7 or i9 from Intel or any of the Verizon 3900s or 3950s or 5900 or 5950s in a desktop PC would probably do the same. Those are a course available every day used at pretty decent prices I don’t believe you’re going to match that server in price but you’re also going to use less power which may or may not be a factor to you it’s not to me, and you’re going to generate less heat and less noise. Again not a factor to me but I think it’s worth mentioning if you’re diving into this. I’ve never had one of my systems go bad out of the r730s. I’ve had two running since 20/20 and I got one of them just recently to add for a menage a trois of TrueNAS servers.

On eBay you’re going to want to befriend the channel Cloud Ninjas. They have a complete playlist on the r730 servers they tell you what processors, memory, and networking you can add. I think they even cover the LSI controllers very well presented very clear and concise. Obviously they want to sell hardware but they do a big service to the community by providing free videos actually showing you how to do things.

If you decide to buy that and keep it and you want to run TrueNAS on there and pass through the LSI controller you’ll need it in IT mode. The YouTube channel, The Art of Server, covers how to flash the PERC controllers for it mode. Or you can always put in another LSI controller that’s already flashed in it mode and you’re all set.

That’s all I got off the top of my head.

I think over in the EU you’re going to find that the stuff I buy on the low end on Amazon and eBay here in the States is likely even more money for you. That Ryzen 3900x if you can get it pretty cheap will do everything you need to do and so much more. And you’ll save money over an external bay which is the big cost hog in this whole mess.

And if it has a decent GPU you could use that for transcoding in Plex and jelly then if that’s an interest and you could also make good use of those SATA slots.

Cloud Ninjas ROCK!

I have three Dell PE r730xd’s. You want the r730xd. I have the 12x3.5" 730xd + 2x2.5", the 24x2.5" + 2x2.5", and the 12x3.5" + 4x3.5" + 2x2.5".

Buy v4 Xeons and RAM that matches their speed. You’ll be set for years. You can run one Xeon. You can run low RAM and always add. You can have 24bays and only use six drives, it’s fine. It’s a homelab. :) Remember there is a great 14c low power 65W v4 out there so you can always get that.

Here are the real 730xd models

1. r730xd 18x1.8" + 8x3.5" front (don’t waste your money)
2. r70xd 12x3.5" front (+ optional 2x2.5" rear) (+ optional 4x3.5" internal)
3. r730xd 24x2.5" front (+ optional 2x2.5" rear)
4. r730xd 16x2.5" front (I think) + 4x2.5" NVMe front (don’t waste your money)

I have the following

a. 36x3.5" HDD (24ext) on the 12bay with 2x2.5" SSD mirrored OS for XCP-ng,

b. on the r730xd 24bay I have 24x2.5" Enterprise SSD and 24x3.5" HDD (ext) and 2x2.5" SDD mirrored OS for XCP-ng,

c. on the r730xd 16x3.5" bay I have 12 HDD and of course, 2x2.5" SSD for mirrored OS for XCP-ng.

These run 24/7, are 44c/88t, 768GB DDR4ECC, run TrueNAS Scale, and a load of VMs. They have 2x10Gbps and 2x40Gbps and 3x1Gbs NICs w/Enterprise iDRAC. They have never failed. Longest uptime is 540days but it needs updating (OS) I know. :( I really believe it can run another 540days without a boot.

Oh and I’ve replaced the (one) UPS on it without a single drop in service to my home datacenter. I was literally transcoding video to the NAS while I swapped a UPS. The Dell power supplies work great. Please test yours before you put load on the system if you’re going to use both PS and trust a fail-over.

That’s my experience. I also have a Dell PE r820 (don’t waste your money) and r910 (don’t waste your back, legs, and money, and power bill!), 4xHPDL360/Gen9 (Dell are better), and 4xCisco C220 (Dell are better). The r910 is powered off and “just looks good,” but it’s useless honestly.

I’m not the guy to ask this–I really dislike unRAID. But I’m reading this forum and you asked, so…I’ve had my morning coffee, here we go.

Before I continue, I LOVE your diagram and how it was done! I wish more people in the HL/HDC click would do decent designs like this. It helps to see what you have, and can help to show where you’re going.

No. You should never downgrade. (unRAID fans, wait to flame, k?)

Proxmox is a real hypervisor, and they (the team there) keep adding useful features. (“Oh my I could have had a V8!” Wait, they do have a V8–Proxmox V8)

Proxmox supports LXC easily. I had never liked LXC then Proxmox servers forced me at ZFS-point to use them and damn they can be nice. Proxmox makes them look like a VM. Because they almost are in Linux.

Proxmox supports VMs. And it does it well. Sure you can do Debian 12 and with QEMU do the same–Proxmox is after all a layer over that, but it’s a GOOD LAYER. It gives you control in a decent GUI. And my memory is horrible these days, but each Proxmox system looks the same. You run Docker in a VM, and you can run Kubernetes (RKE, K3s, K8s, whatever they make up next).

Proxmox clusters three or more systems together and easily supports shared (okay cloned) storage. You can move VMs much easier than multiple unRAID (I’ve only used two unRAID and tried to migrate from one to other, but I cannot imagine nine unRAID servers and trying to…really anything. My bias.

Proxmox gives you FREE backup–Proxmox Backup. Your friend failed to RTFM and see there existed an easy way to recover. (I’ll point this out very graphically in a moment.)

Now, least I suffer the flames of the unRAIDians, I’ve used, supported, and TRIED to like (love? LOL no) unRAID. There are good things about it. And it DOES support ZFS now I understand. And container support? Seems very good. Let’s talk about that damn sexy store attached to it–and you can add external stores–of apps (containers, Docker in this case).

I have six mini PCs with Intel and AMD chips, three old Intel NUCs, Dell XPS 8910, Dell XPS 8930, Dell PE T320-8bay, Dell PE T320-16bay, Dell PE T630 all running Proxmox in three clusters with shared storage in the clusters and all running backup as Proxmox Backup. And the three big servers (Dell PE) running TrueNAS Scale inside of Proxmox. Not my “real” NAS, but for some other uses.

The Dell XPS 8910 died and it took me 10 seconds to know it (notification system), and I recovered all containers, VMs to the Dell PE T320-8bay in less than 30 minutes. It was a cluster member, but still.

So I’m going to say do Proxmox right, and you’ll grow faster with it.

If you really MUST use the 8300H, here is a thought:

The 8300H is 4c/8t. Not too bad.

1. Max out the RAM
2. Install a 1TB NVMe
   1. Partition as part1 256GB for Proxmox and part2 768GB for VMs
3. Install a 512GB or 1TB SSD
   1. Partition as part1 1/2 of the full as ISO storage and part2 1/2 as various data storage (Docker, LXC, yada container data)
4. Get a USB 3.2 Gen2 10Gbps external five bay 3.5" disk dock.
   1. I have four, they work okay.
   2. This would plug into Thunderbolt3 and costs much less than a true Thunderbolt3 bay. I think I paid $240USD for a Yottamaster 10Gbps 5 Bay USB C Hard Drive Enclosure Daisy Chain, Type-C External HDD Enclosure Support 2.5" & 3.5" SATA HDD/SSD up to 5X18TB - Daisy Chain DAS Support 270TB Storage Expansion [FS5C3] but it’s now $278.
   3. This is not a RAID box, but you can run RAID over the USB. It’s not going to win speed records, but then again, i5 8300H so it will do fine for backups. I have it on a six-core i7 8000 something and it’s good.
5. This gives you a hypervisor, LXC containers, VMs, one VM running Debian 12 and Dockers (dozens of them) which can be your media servers (JellyFin/Plex), yada.
6. AND you’ll run Proxmox Backup to ensure everything is backed-up on the backup server. JUST IN CASE.
7. If you set this up correctly, you could move it to the i7 you have in minimal time. Or any other new system you get. You can always pull the drives out of the external USB case and put them in a tower case of a “new” PC you find, someone gives you, you buy very cheap, yada.

Would I do this? Well you’re spending $400USD to $500USD if you don’t have parts. You’re buying HDD if you don’t have them.

You could Craig’s List or Facebook MP or even eBay and find a better, more powerful, but still power friendly system with space inside for those drives. I see things for $150 on there with SSDs and often NVMe and space inside for HDD. I mean five SATA motherboard ports is all you need for drives (RAID5 using ZFS).

I would likely go that route vs. making an old, out-of-date laptop (I have 17 of them, I know out-of-date LOL and I love my “kids.”) work. If you want to build a Frankenstein, I’m here for it. If you want a working server you’ll have (almost?) zero issues with, shop around a little and save money. And headache. (Will the laptop even boot to BIOS screen on external LCD with the main broke?) AND a desktop can easily give you multiple 1Gbps or 10Gbps connections for future use, cheap.

Cheers!

Debian 12 on the bare hardware (which I think is 2c/4t) and then setup Docker. You can also then run KVMs if you want. QEMU will be your friend.

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If you had a newer, faster NUC, or similar, Proxmox as the hypervisor and then Debian 12 as VM with Docker on it. You get LXC with Proxmox “for free,” ( LOL ) so that kinda rocks. Two cores is not really a decent speed point. And it needs 8GB of RAM to be useful in that case. I **think** NUC 7 doesn’t normally have that, but I don’t NUC much–I used minipc non-NUC “clones.” For lack of a better word.