Mini ITX Home Server Build Advice

[Dia01]

I'm toying with the prospect of a DIY Home Server simply to access stored movies, music etc from my HTPC via Kodi. I currently use a Synology DiskStation DS214J with 2 x 4GB HGST Deskstar drives in a RAID 1 config.

Although there is not at all a problem with the way the current server is operating, I simply just want to build my own mini ITX system but need a little advice. The current parts pre-selected are as follows:

• Fractal Design Node 304 Mini ITX DTX Case
• be quiet! Pure Power 10 500W Power Supply
• ASRock Fatal1ty AB350 Gaming-ITX/ac Motherboard
• AMD Ryzen 3 2200G
• Corsair Vengeance LPX CMK8GX4M2A2400C14R 8GB (2x4GB)
• ADATA XPG SX7000 NVMe M.2 128GB SSD
• REUSE EXISTING - 2 x 4GB HGST Deskstar drives

All up with the parts selected it is going to cost approximately $892.00 AUD delivered. A little more than what I wanted to actually spend.

The questions and concerns I have are below, any advice to follow would be great:

1. Fractal Design Node 304 Mini. Case has 4ea x 3.5" bays for future expansion later on and seems decent from the reviews I've read.
2. The ASRock Fatal1ty AB350 is the most expensive part in the list, however the equivalent motherboard's on the ITX AM4 platform are all around the same price roughly
3. be quiet! Pure Power 10 500W power supply is probably the the most secure purchase in the list, I don't want the lower range Corsairs, Thermaltakes etc. 500W is probably overkill but the price seems to fit
4. AMD Ryzen 3 2200G. Obviously a new APU, probably complete overkill but I wanted decent integrated graphics as I won't be installing a dedicated GPU
5. Corsair Vengeance LPX CMK8GX4M2A2400C14R. Didn't want to spend a lot of money on RAM. These kits aren't listed in the Asrock QMVL list, however I'm wondering if they will or won't have issues?
6. ADATA XPG SX7000. I wanted to keep the 4ea x SATA3 ports available hence M.2. Again, didn't want to spend large sums of unnecessary money on a system drive, the M.2 drive seems to be qualified in the QMVL, are these drives dependable?
7. What is the best way to move the existing drives which currently holds a ton of movies and music to a new server system. Is there potential to lose data?
8. I don't have much experience with server software but I was thinking maybe going with FreeNAS, thoughts?
9. Any alternate suggestions, feel welcome

 

[Hockster]

If it's just a server you don't need to upgrade graphics at all. FreeNAS runs headless after the install. And it runs on an USB drive freeing up a SATA slot, many boards share a SATA slot with the m2.

If going with FreeNAS it will wipe your drives and reformat them, you'll need everything backed up elsewhere, or will need to transfer the data afterwards then you can add that drive to the volume. There's a thread about the trials and tribulations of setting up a FreeNAS server:
https://www.techpowerup.com/forums/threads/nas-build.240073/

 

[Dia01]

If it's just a server you don't need to upgrade graphics at all. FreeNAS runs headless after the install. And it runs on an USB drive freeing up a SATA slot, many boards share a SATA slot with the m2.

If going with FreeNAS it will wipe your drives and reformat them, you'll need everything backed up elsewhere, or will need to transfer the data afterwards then you can add that drive to the volume. There's a thread about the trials and tribulations of setting up a FreeNAS server:
https://www.techpowerup.com/forums/threads/nas-build.240073/

Thanks for the advice, appreciated.