Building A Nas System

So I am thinking about building a NAS system for my house, And was wondering if any one had any experience with NAS. I want to have a large nas Setup preferably 12+TB with the option to upgrade to more, I have a giant library of movies and tv shows That i stream to a few boxee box's and other devices. My cash limit will be about $500-600 American for the box setup not counting the HDD's (cheaper is better) Would it be better to just buy a small tower and use it for the nas system?? Any input would be greatly appreciated


Patrick

 

Firstly would you prefer to build your own system, or buy one of those which is already built?

Do you want a quiet system or isn't noise a big factor?

Where do you plan to put it in relation to your router/modem? As it would be best connected to the router via Ethernet cable for streaming.

I assume this is to stream/play films on different devices around the house as you mention about Boxee boxes?

As for HDD's I gather you know that 12TB of HDD space would cost about $700 at the cheapest, this would either be 4x3TB or 6x2TB HDD's, quite a lot of drives and if you wanted to have the possibility of upgrading it would likely put small towers out of the question, you would be looking at a mid tower at least, does the area where you plan to place this have enough room for a 2ftx1ft (rough mid tower dimensions) tower with it not being an eyesore.

Not trying to put you off but just some things to think about and get a bit more info from you about this before some sort of hardware recommendation is made.

 

I am not to picky on building it myself or buying a pre-built one(leaning towards building one myself though)

Noise is not a factor as it will be in my electronics closet I also have Ethernet wired to this room(along with wireless n)

Yes it will be used mainly for streaming and backup

The HDD's I already have,i have Been buying them up for a few years now, I want to put them in there own dedicated machine That all the computers and Boxee box's and what ever else i am using has access to them for storage or streaming.

size is not really a problem I have a closet of hidden electronics that this will fit perfectly in.

Do you happen to know of a good case for a nas drive with easy access to the HDD's or maybe i can custom make something

 

Ok so this is kind of what i am thinking of doing the LIAN LI PC-Q08B http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811112265 as my case,

This Asus Motherboard http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131841,

I am thinking this Core i-3 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115090

8 gigs of g-skill ddr3 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231311

and this 380w PSU http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817371033

With a total of about $450. what do you guys think any suggestions on the setup?

 

Sorry about the late reply, overall it looks fine, just a couple of things.

For RAM I would suggest paying the extra $3 for the faster RAM, you wouldn't notice a massive difference but for the sake of $3 the extra performance for your video streaming is there - http://www.newegg.co...N82E16820231428

One thing to note about the PSU you picked out, is it only has 5 SATA power connectors, so you would only be able to plug a DVD drive in plus 4 HDD's and that would be the limit, so if you wanted to use all 6 HDD spaces you would need a PSU with more SATA power connectors.

 

Yeah good idea on the ram I went ahead and upped it, I was thinking i would just get a spliter or something but i guess it is easier to just to get the right one now so i was thinking something along these lines http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817703034 modular and 6 sata connectors. Do you have any suggestions on a software for the system?

 

Yep PSU looks good, in terms of software you could either go the free route of Linux (maybe Ubuntu Server) but this would likely add a learning curve to the process or buy Windows Home Server ($50 on Newegg by looks of it) which should be a simpler process though I can't vouch for either server software as I've never used them extensively enough.