New build for for everyday use + file storage,sharing and streaming

[rugrat]

Hello!

I'm about build a new pc. As stated in title it will serve mostly as storage, file sharing, backup (loads of family pics, over 600gigs) and streaming machine (mostly mp4 and avi movies up to 720p). Would also like my to use it for some basic stuff as web surfing, music and office as i have spare monitor to use.

We have 2 notebooks (both quite powerful) and recently I bought WD live tv and 2 nexus 7's so i would like to access this "new" pc from all those devices and also be able to stream movies and music from it.
So far i used all my HDDs mounted in external enclosures and that was quite messy with all those cables and got quite annoyed swapping them every now and then.

Been reading a lot about servers and raid options lately and more i do, more confused i get as i'm complete noob when it comes to servers and i really don't know where to start.

So.. i have up to 2000€ for this build but i don't need power hog and overkill.
What kind of build am i aiming at? how much power do i need? What OS/software to use?
I want it to be dead silent, cool and with low power consumption if possible.

I have some parts to reuse from my previous build and some stuff i got on good deals recently.
1x Crucial m4 128gb
2x WD10EARS 1Tb
1x Seagate ST31000524AS
2x WD250AAKX 250GB
Noctua NH-L12
Keyboard and mouse
22" asus monitor

Would like to fit everything in either Corsair's Obsidian 550d or Fractal Design's define mini as both of those cases seem quite silent.

I really apologize for this wall of text but i would really appreciate any help, suggestion, link or point in right direction
Thanks in advance

[Aquinus]

Is the machine practically only going to serve up things and act as storage or is this a machine that will be used regularly (as in someone sits at the computer and uses it, not for streaming on the network)? Honestly, you don't need much for hardware if you're just streaming over the network.

[rugrat]

I'd like to use it as storage as i have loads of photos, avi/mp4 videos and quite a lot of documents. But would also like to stream music and video to my notebooks, nexus 7 and ipad.

I was actually thinking about hooking it to spare display 22" or 27" one and run Ubuntu or Fedora in VM if that's possible so my wife can surf web (face/youtube addict) and use office without affecting main os?! But if that's complicated or annoying to maintain i'd like to stick to achieving primary goal which is storage, backup sharing and streaming through home network.

I also apologize if any of this makes no sense or if i didn't explain properly.

Looking for any advice for hardware and software to use.
How much cpu power do i need for that? Ram? Gpu?

TA

[Aquinus]

If that is the case, I would dedicate it to being a file server and keeping the hardware to what you need. File I/O doesn't need really fast memory or a fast CPU, but it benefits from more memory. So if you want something power efficient you may want to consider an E-350 or 450. Asus makes a nice E-450 ITX board with 5 SATA 6Gb ports. That might be worth while if you're looking at a power efficient platform.

I would also recommend Ubuntu Server if you don't want to pay for Windows. A Samba share should be more than adequate for what you want to do.

Personally, if I were going to built a small file server that wasn't strictly a NAS solution, this might not be completely unreasonable: ASUS E45M1-I Deluxe AMD E-450 APU AMD Hudson M1 Mi...

With something like that, you could run at low at 40-50 watts loaded usage.

[kciaccio]

I have been using Unraid for 3 years now without a problem. I now have 13 TB of storage and I can add up to 23 drives with it. I use it to store music, pics and bluray videos that I stream to 5 computers and 1 media streamer in my house plus stream to friends on their ipads, kindle fires, iphones and androids phones usind EMIT and Airvideo. I have a single core CPU and 2 gigs of ram and nobody has streaming issues. My main computer next to my server does all the heavy lifting when streaming encoding outside my network to friends.
http://lime-technology.com/technology

This is what my it looks like. The server does not need a monitor.






Uploaded with ImageShack.us

[rugrat]

@Aquinus
E-450 seems like a decent option and rather expensive if i compare it to something like A6-3500 or A6-3670k with MBO and Ram for same price, even cheaper if taking former?
Aslo i will get more power for streaming and transcoding as it seems. 8correct me if i'm wrong)

As for OS i've been using ubuntu desktop on the fly, while installing it on demand for friends and did some pretty basic stuff while doing it so i don't have much experience with it especially not with ubuntu server although it sounds quite tempting to dive in and learn something new!?
How hard is it exactly to set everything up?
Wouldn't something like WHS 2011 be more idiot proof and easier to setup?

TA

[kciaccio]

Actually it is very cheap. Any old computer will do. There is a free version that lets you use 3 drives to try it out. Then there are upgrade levels. The computer boots from a flash drive. A 6 drive license is $69 and the 23 drive is $119. Unraid has been around for years. It is linux based so there are free slackware add ons for it.
Super simple to set up. Download the free version and make a 3 drive array with an old computer.

I don't even know how to use linux. I have dabbled with unbuntu like you and that is it.

I like it because unlike a "hardware raid" if that hardware breaks you have to replace with the EXACT same hardware or your array is lost not so with Unraid. You can combine any kind of hardware or disk size to your array. As you can see in my screen shot I have different size drives.

I can add any size drive to my array at any time. The only stip is the parity drive has to be the largest drive or same size as the largest drive in the array.

I can lose any of those drives and I won't lose any data. If I lose 2 drives at once I will lose one drive of data, but how often do you lose 2 drives at once? I have pulled drives out and replaced them several times with larger drives and they were always rebuilt perfectly. I started with 1 tb drives so you can see how many times I have had to do this procedure and NEVER lost data.

They also have a strong forum just in case you have any issues or questions and the inventor is very hands on and answers his emails too.