Building My FIRST EVER Server!
Building My FIRST EVER Server!
#Building #Server
“Greg Salazar”
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If you can believe this, I’ve never built a server before! I’ve used NAS enclosures, sure, but you aren’t actually “building” anything there aside from inserting some hard drives. So I went out and purchased a SilverStone server case with a HDD hot-swap enclosure and assembled an entire server rig for our new home. Come along for the ride!
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🛠️ PC parts list:
AMD Ryzen 9 7950X3D:
64GB Corsair Vengeance DDR5:
Gigabyte X670E Aorus Master:
SilverStone RM41-H08 Server Chassis:
16TB Seagate IronWolf NAS HDD (x4):
Gigabyte RTX 4060 OC Low Profile:
Noctua NH-C14S:
🎬 My studio gear on Amazon:
Sony A7C (Primary):
Sony a6600 (Secondary):
Sony a6400 (Webcam):
2x Pixio PX277 Prime 165Hz IPS Monitors:
Neewer LED…
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THE COOLER IS NOT GONNA WORK FOR THAT CPU
What your gaining is experience Greg. I'm building basically the same. Using a gaming MB to create server. Learning as we go. I'm going with TrueNas as it more efficient for me. Hope this works out for you.
Networking =/= servers
and WHERE did you pay $200 or $300 for the chassis? your link says $1,337.87 after we click on it. thumbs down im afraid!
For anyone who ever actually DID say "I thought you were building a server" to your part choices, all that matters for something to be a server is for it to be a computer that hosts services. Lots of folk use single-board computers are servers, even!
server =/= networking 😂
You can not run vm for gaming anti cheat will flag you.
Using Bios Raid means hardware raid. So if your motherboard goes bad for some reason you have to find the same or similar M/B with that supported raid structure. Software raid such as FreeNas / Truenas or Unraid frees you from that dependence. You can easily port these to any hardware setup that is x86 based and be up and running… well at least I know Unraid will do that easily. I found that the biggest bottleneck in servers is networking get a 10Gbe setup between your server and your workstation even with slow server disks it will feel seamless in edits and transferring files. I recently upgraded to 10Gbe and editing files on server or transferring files seems so much faster even with slow 5400 rpm drives. I use Unraid btw.. Edited: just realized this is 3 week old video.. probably figured your path by now. Good luck in your server journey.
Ideally you would run proxmox and ZFS for your storage along side a windows VM, but it's going to be a steep learning curve ( ask Wendel from Level 1 techs ). Or you could just run Windows 11and use the new storage spaces utility which provides redundancy, it doesn't say how it does it but it says it does. I'm led to believe that the bios based raid functions should be avoided at all costs, but I'm sure you are going to a lot of differing opinions on how to do all of this. Just ask Wendel, I think you need his help. Good luck.
optical usb c cable with high speed hub
I can't help but ask Greg – why skimp on the parts? You say you're paying out of pocket for them, but can't you write it off as a business expense since you're going to use the rig to do editing, footage storage and other channel related stuff? It just seems odd – you dont skimp out on other parts of your life, why do it here? Spend the money to get a Server Motherboard and some ECC RAM. If you can spend the money for expensive cars, you can spend the money on quality parts 😉
ZFS my guy. NOT regular raid configurations. Wendell has a good video on Level1Tech channel on "why hardware raid is dead" that you may find useful
no ecc, not a proper server
Bro came on his pants for the thumbnail
so nice !
0:02 We were all users at some point.
Maybe avoid Windows? Go for Proxmox bare metal with one VM running TrueNAS Scale VM for file shares. Unraid is okay if you want more of a turn key experience and to be easily able to install docker apps like plex and home automation stuff.
if it media server or nas but not gaming server you dont need that good gpu
If you're backing up regularly and keep a spare drive on hand, I would just do Raid 5.
What power supply?
I would try to fit the cooler so the fins of it will be parallel to the rear fans. other than that, the build is pretty nice.
There is one server motherboard I wanted to buy (never could justify the price, save the money, or find a legit listing/name of it) that had 4 CPU slots and a max supported ram of about 1 TB of ddr3 I believe. Was about 14k for the motherboard alone, and the best CPUs it could support cost roughly 7k a piece, despite being from before 2017… the RAM was similarly expensive, using like 128 GB sticks, which I think run over 600 dollars each last I checked (about a week ago). Don't even think it had a display output on the board, requiring you to manually connect another board for that purpose… if I win the lottery, maybe I will build that server, if I remember again xD
Edit: also just remembered these hot-swappable drive bays from Icydock you might find interesting; using a single 5.25 inch slot, you can store 6 2.5 inch SSD's in it, which I think supports raid as well. I do hope to implement that drive bay into my desktop as it has two 5.25 inch drive slots.
Hey Greg, thats a pretty cool build for your first foray into the server space. Personally I would have gone with the RM44 or RM51 for a rack gaming machine but they dont have much in the way of HDD support.
Given you're desire for a big GFX card AND storage I think I would have actually recommended you to look at the RM43-320-R – Its a full depth rack chassis, it comes with a sliding rails kit in the box and has 20 hot-swap SAS/SATA ports at the front as well as room for a slimline optical drive.
To get all the drives connected I'd point you at 2 options:
#1 A couple of cheap Host Bus Adapter/Initiator Target mode cards (you'll see them listed as HBA or IT mode) if you're using something like software raid or UNRAID (e.g. 16i and an extra 8i)
#2 If you wanted a hardware RAID solultion for all the drives you'd want to get a brand new i8 RAID card then surf on eBay for a 2nd hand 24i expander (I use this combo myself, an 8i RAID card with an HP 24i expander which all cost less than 150USD
PS – if you're ever looking for 2nd hand or refurbished Server hardware you can trust, have a look at Kimbrer Computer, not paid to say that, they're just REALLY good and have helped me a ton 🙂
Hey! Just from an IT guy here. I run a pretty large hosting company so I have a bit of experience building servers. We use a ton of Ryzen 7000 platform, from this build being a “server” build I really don’t think that this is the best option for motherboard. You can call it a server but without server parts doesn’t really make it a server. If I were you I would use the AsRockRack B650D4U or B650D4U-2L2T. It isn’t much more expensive than consumer boards and they are super reliable and come with IPMI, you could always use the gigabyte workstation boards but wouldn’t recommend those at all personally had a ton of bad experience with those.
Well I never knew servers had GPU's :D! This video is certainly for me I have NO IDEA what to do.
me, being an IT person, i cant really think of anything i would need a server for? unless i go into a job where 1) its hybrid/remote work 2) i need to run like multiple instances of "things" be it programs or workstations.
14:53
I´m working with Servers every Day so I´ve waited for the Fan Noise 😂😂
You basically recreated my PC. I just have another graphics card and I took the NH-U12S cooler. But my PC also has a significantly higher airflow because of the server fans and because the thing is in the basement. Your cooler probably wouldn't have been able to cool enough.
I wish I had 64TB of RAM. 😀 (8:13)
You should probably rotate the cpu cooler so that the fins allow air to pass from the front to the rear of the chassis like the chassis is designed to do. Also you only need 4 drives for a raid 6. Cool build otherwise!
64 TB's of RAM? :))) ok
do you use backup power for your server?
What OS are you running for the server though?
Not really a server, just a rack mounted gaming computer, imho.
i have started tinkering around with my home network the past few years. bought a 27u rack off ebay, some rosewill 2u/4u cases and some cheap rackmount switches/router and new but old stock dell kvm . Turned some older rigs( Lga775/Am3+/I5 systems) into file servers/plex/cctv. Hate throwing away good parts if i can still get some use out of em and learn along the way.
This is how I got into servers. Built my own storage / VM server buying a 2u case, 4 HDDs, and using spare parts. Great job, looks very clean! Now I want to build another one.
Should've used a Corsair Obsidian 800D!
What fan bracket did they send for the 5.25 bay because I need one?
Are you planning on running a server OS? I personally use Proxmox but there is also Unraid and others. There are a lot of options within these OS's to optimize your disks. I look forward to seeing what you come up with.
Im with you Greg. Im a computer guy and I love it but I don't know much about a server. I've considered trying it before but with the cost and the fact that I don't really need one I have stayed away from it.
I've thought about building a server loads of times over the years, but I never did because I just never needed it to do anything I couldn't do on my main PC, so I couldn't justify it to myself, no matter how I tried..
Okay, starting off, you went with an 18" deep chassis. You really should've gone with a 24" or 25" chassis. As an example, Rosewill has the RSV-L4000U and RSV-L4500U. It'll give you a LOT more room for what you wanted to install without things being so tightly packed for cable management. And for less than the SiverStone chassis you selected. Yes you would need to source hot-swap bays (unless you went with the RSV-L4412U, which is what I use for my NAS) if that was important for you. But it comes without you having to make a lot of compromises because of the depth of the chassis.
Like with building a PC, the chassis for a server is supremely important. Probably even more so with a server, to be honest, especially when it comes to cooling since servers tend to live in closets. And speaking of cooling, you're looking to game on this but have only one 80mm intake at the front and two 80mm exhaust at the rear…. And you're not adding additional cooling?!? Oh man…
In all seriousness, consider swapping out the chassis on this. The SilverStone chassis you selected is not adequate for what you intend to do. The Rosewill chassis I mentioned above have three 120mm fans across the front, and an additional three 120mm fans across the middle, along with, again, being 25" deep to give you plenty of room inside.
I hope you have a custom router built for openwrt for the benefit of your servers and net porting.
I'm wanting to turn an old PC into a home server as well. do you have a low profile/not so large, not bulky case that would fit an ATX mobo and 1 1080ti but also has several drive bays recommendation? I want some slim and sleek. rack mounted a plus but not necessary
That is a nice case!
Super keen on this series! I love how open you are about 'winging it' with this process and taking us along for the ride. Looking to do something similar in the next few years so am looking forward to learning alongside you, Greg!
Attack the D point!
never do raid 5 unless you want to lose data. do raid 6
Top tip – Never let the door do the work. If the drive does not seat, you break the door. I know this from experience.
I appreciate your videos, and I love the case. Personally I'm thinking about the Asrock Rack ROMED6-2xxx. Either 16 or 24 core EPYC. I don't game, but I'm interested in tinkering with Proxmox and VM's. I could create a NAS for video storage, but i don't have any reason for it right now. The EPYC platform ensures that I have pci-e lanes in abundance for whatever I'd like to experiment with. Thank you AMD!!!