Ideas for an Unraid Build for a Mate

IrishMetalhead

My mate is currently in the process of renovating his home and wants to get him and the wife new PCs to go with it as well as a new file/plex server.

He knows all about Unraid and came up with the idea of having everything run off one PC and putting it behind the adjacent wall to his living room under where a stair set is going to go for the new bedrooms he is putting in the loft.

He wants to do this to completely eliminate noise from the living room and save spece. He also plans on using his VM to double up as the new file/plex server since it will be on 24/7 anyway.

So he left me in charge to plan out and build this PC for him, he has roughly a €3000 budget, this is what I've come up with so far: https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/list/XDqQ4q

Just need feedback to see if this is sufficiant to host 2 gaming PCs, he's adament about getting a 2070 for himself and a 2060 for the misses so my plan would be to set it up so he has a 6-core vm with 16gb of ram and she'll have a quad core vm with 12gb of ram with the rest of the resources going to Unraid.

Any thaughts or critiques?

Edit: Edit: Forgot to point out that they will not be using the video outputs on the docking stations, there purely there for usb, networking and possibly headphones.

ED E

Do what Linus did and use an optical USB run to each "terminal".


If he needs you to spec it for him then he's not the kind of person is suggest such a setup for. Lots of messing with iommu groups etc. Anyone that can maintain such a system should find picking parts child's play.

IrishMetalhead

Nah he should be fine, he's a network admin by trade so he can deal with all that, only reason I'm doing this for him is because between work and renovating the house he just doesn't have the time to do it himself and just wants me to go part picking and build it, he'll take care of the OS stuff when the house is done.
Any idea how much using fibre will set him back? Don't know if it'll be nessecary since his desk and the TV (where his wife uses her computer) are directly behind the wall where it's going, he's going to run cables in the wall and set up sockets out to the sitting room, like the display outputs and a usb on each side for the docks.

deceit

Would you not add a 1950x rather than 1920x to allow 8core main rig, 4core second rig, 2 core plex rig (never used plex, not sure if its enough) and 2 cores remaing for unraid?

I've never used unraid, how would you find it over say esxi 6.7?

IrishMetalhead

deceit wrote: »

Would you not add a 1950x rather than 1920x to allow 8core main rig, 4core second rig, 2 core plex rig (never used plex, not sure if its enough) and 2 cores remaing for unraid?

I've never used unraid, how would you find it over say esxi 6.7?

I wouldn't know because I never used ESXI XD, I only used Unraid once myself and found it fairly straight forward but as I said before I don't have to worry about dealing with it this time round as he'll be doing that himself.


I did have the 1950x picked out first but it pushed the build over budget by €200ish and he isn't too keen on going over the €3000 budget since he has the renovation budget to consider as well.

K.O.Kiki

I know nothing of Unraid, but I do know that the following parts could be swapped in:
https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/list/PhsxzY
CPU cooler: Arctic Freezer 33 TR. Bitwit found it could keep an overclocked 1950X under 71C. Alternatively, the Dark Rock Pro TR would get temps down below 65C, though it costs 60% more.
Motherboard: Asrock Taichi. Always heard great things about this one.
SSDs: Intel 660p M.2. No point paying that much for Samsung QVOs when they're built using QLC and interface with SATA instead of PCI-e.

IrishMetalhead

K.O.Kiki wrote: »

I know nothing of Unraid, but I do know that the following parts could be swapped in:
https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/list/PhsxzY
CPU cooler: Arctic Freezer 33 TR. Bitwit found it could keep an overclocked 1950X under 71C. Alternatively, the Dark Rock Pro TR would get temps down below 65C, though it costs 60% more.
Motherboard: Asrock Taichi. Always heard great things about this one.
SSDs: Intel 660p M.2. No point paying that much for Samsung QVOs when they're built using QLC and interface with SATA instead of PCI-e.

Thanks, for what ever reason I completely forgot that most x399 boards come with multiple m.2 slots and that cooler does look pretty decent, to use to those damned cosumer grade boards for peasents like myself =P.


My only last concern really would be inregards to the power supply, would a 1kw gold psu be enough to power this think while staying in that high efficiency sweet spot? Since this is going to be a 24/7 machine after all.

ED E

Don't just pick parts that seem good bang/buck.

You need to dig into compatibility with a multi guest gaming system setup as you're passing hardware through to the bhyve(?) guests its much more complex than a traditional VM.


IMO copy one of the two builds LTT did or another similar validated hardware setup.

K.O.Kiki

IrishMetalhead wrote: »

Thanks, for what ever reason I completely forgot that most x399 boards come with multiple m.2 slots and that cooler does look pretty decent, to use to those damned cosumer grade boards for peasents like myself =P.


My only last concern really would be inregards to the power supply, would a 1kw gold psu be enough to power this think while staying in that high efficiency sweet spot? Since this is going to be a 24/7 machine after all.

OuterVision PSU Calculator part list

Motherboard: Desktop
CPU: 1 x AMD Ryzen Threadripper 1920X
CPU Speed: 4000MHz
CPU Vcore: 1.33V
CPU Utilization: 90%
Memory: 4 x 8GB DDR4 Module
Video Card Set 1: 1 x NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2070
Core Clock: 1501MHz
Overvoltage: 5%
Memory Clock: 1750MHz
Video Card set 2: 1 x NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060
Core Clock: 1442MHz
Overvoltage: 5%
Memory Clock: 1750MHz
Storage: 2 x M.2 SSD
Storage: 1 x SATA 5.4K RPM
Keyboard: 0 x Standard Keyboard
Mouse: 0 x Standard Mouse
Fan: 2 x 140mm
Computer Utilization: Always On (24/7)
Gaming/Video Editing/3D Rendering Time: 4 hours per day

Load Wattage: 829W
Recommended Wattage: 879W
Amperage: +3.3V: 12.6A, +5V: 9.0A, +12V: 61.9A
Recommended UPS Rating: 1500VA
Generated by OuterVision PSU Calculator 2019-04-12 08:09:44

Gold 1000W should be enough.

tazzzZ

I would say just for general use you will need 2 m.2's one for each VM and then a standard SSD for your Unraid cache drive. Also if you need to log in to the server directly (not through your browser) while the 2 VMs are running for whatever reason you will need a 3rd GPU for unraid itself. Personally havent run into this issue myself as i dont use VM's at all. Dockers

Good place to look is the unraid forums. Also is this friend likely to datahord??? if so it might be worth considering
https://www.servercase.co.uk/shop/server-cases/rackmount/4u-chassis/4u-server-case-w-24x-35-hot-swappable-satasas-drive-bays-6gbs-minisas-sc-4324/

I know its a big outlay for a case but its worth IMO if you end up looking to put alot of drives into it. you will need a SAS controller and expansion card if you did decide to go that route.

Also i dont know if you considered parity drives? Unraid supports up to 2.