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DIY NAS: 2026 Edition

blog.briancmoses.com

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Re: DIY NAS: 2026 Edition

#71

Post by cm2187 »

HDD have to be bought new, as well as anything mechanical (eg fans). But for motherboards, CPU, RAM and SSD, there is great value in buying used enterprise hardware on ebay. It is generally durable hardware that spent a quiet life in a temperature controlled datacentre, server motherboards from 5 years ago are absolute aircraft carriers in term of PCIe lanes and functionalities. Used enterprise SSDs are probably more durable than a new retail SSD, plus power loss protection and better performance.

The only downside is slightly higher power consumption. But just bought a 32 core 3rd gen Xeon CPU + motherboard, 128GB RAM, it idles at 75w without disks which isn't terrible. And you can build a more powerful NAS for a third of the price of a high end Synology. Unlikely that the additional 20-30w idle power consumption will cost you more than that.

Re: DIY NAS: 2026 Edition

#72

Post by nicolaslem »

no_time wrote: post #35
dbalatero wrote: post #15

I researched a bunch of cases recently and the Jonsbo, while it looked good, came up as having a ton of issues with airflow to cool the drives. Because of this, I ended up buying the Fractal Node 804 case, which seemed to have a better overall quality level and didn't require digging around AliExpress for a vendor.

lol same. All my parts arrived except the 804. The supply chain for these cases appears to be imploding where I live (Hungary). The day after I ordered it either went out of stock or went up by +50% in all webshops that are reputable here. I’m still a bit torn on whether I made the good call of getting 804 or the 304 wouldve been a enough for a significantly smaller footprint and -2 bays. Hard to tell without seeing…

I have been running my NAS on the 304 for 5 years. It fits natively 6 HDDs but I think it is possible to cram two more with a bit of ingenuity. It is tucked away in an Ikea cabinet that I have drilled the back of for airflow.

Re: DIY NAS: 2026 Edition

#73

Post by Helmut10001 »

cm2187 wrote: post #71

HDD have to be bought new, as well as anything mechanical (eg fans). But for motherboards, CPU, RAM and SSD, there is great value in buying used enterprise hardware on ebay. It is generally durable hardware that spent a quiet life in a temperature controlled datacentre, server motherboards from 5 years ago are absolute aircraft carriers in term of PCIe lanes and functionalities. Used enterprise SSDs are probably more…

I wouldn't say that being new is an absolute requirement. I recently upgraded my ZFS pool from SATA to SAS HDDs. Since SAS HDDs have much better firmware for early error detection and monitoring, I decided to buy 50% refurbished. Even if I lost half of them, I would still be safe. I also have offsite backups. This setup worked really well for me, and I feel completely confident that my data is safe while not wasting unnecessary resources. Whether to use new or used equipment therefore depends on the setup.

Re: DIY NAS: 2026 Edition

#74

Post by nicolaslem »

pSYoniK wrote: post #61

TL;DR - please stop wasting tons of resources putting together new servers every year and turning this into yet another outlet for "I have more money than sense and hopefully I can buy myself into happiness". Just get old random hardware and play around with it and you'll learn so much that you will be able to truly appreciate the difference between consumer and enterprise hardware. This seems awfully wasteful. One o…

The author is not suggesting anyone should rebuild their NAS every year. Instead he is investigating which options make sense in year X. I remember reading his recommendations back when I built my NAS in 2021 but that doesn't mean I bought new hardware since then.

Re: DIY NAS: 2026 Edition

#75

Post by gjvc »

imiric wrote: post #63
pSYoniK wrote: post #61

TL;DR - please stop wasting tons of resources putting together new servers every year and turning this into yet another outlet for "I have more money than sense and hopefully I can buy myself into happiness". Just get old random hardware and play around with it and you'll learn so much that you will be able to truly appreciate the difference between consumer and enterprise hardware. This seems awfully wasteful. One o…

It's a bit patronizing to tell people what to do with their money. If you care more about the environment than enjoying technology, then go ahead and do what you suggest. If you want to be really green, how about giving up technology altogether? Go full vegan, abandon all possessions, and all that? Or if you really want to help the planet, have you considered suicide? There's always more you can do. I'd rather enjoy…

It's a bit patronizing to tell people what to do

on this website?!

with their money

in this economy?!

Re: DIY NAS: 2026 Edition

#76

Post by SirFatty »

mvkel wrote: post #37

Wait. You build a new one every -year-?! How does one establish the reliability of the hardware (particularly the aliexpress motherboard), not to mention data retention, if its maximum life expectancy is 365 days?

How else is one to get the clicks?

Re: DIY NAS: 2026 Edition

#77

Post by cm2187 »

Helmut10001 wrote: post #73
cm2187 wrote: post #71

HDD have to be bought new, as well as anything mechanical (eg fans). But for motherboards, CPU, RAM and SSD, there is great value in buying used enterprise hardware on ebay. It is generally durable hardware that spent a quiet life in a temperature controlled datacentre, server motherboards from 5 years ago are absolute aircraft carriers in term of PCIe lanes and functionalities. Used enterprise SSDs are probably more…

I wouldn't say that being new is an absolute requirement. I recently upgraded my ZFS pool from SATA to SAS HDDs. Since SAS HDDs have much better firmware for early error detection and monitoring, I decided to buy 50% refurbished. Even if I lost half of them, I would still be safe. I also have offsite backups. This setup worked really well for me, and I feel completely confident that my data is safe while not wasting…

Agree, but that's taking a risk with your data (whereas if a MB fails, you likely just need to replace it but your data is fine), and HDD kind of have a finite number of hours in them. Where buying them used I think makes sense is for a backup server, that you leave off except the few hours in a week where you do an incremental backup. Then it doesn't really matter that the drives have already been running for 3 or 4 years.

Re: DIY NAS: 2026 Edition

#78

Post by esskay »

> HDD have to be bought new

In A DC environment sure. In a home NAS not so much. I'm on Unraid and just throw WD recertified drives of varying sizes at it (plus some shucked external drives when I find them on offer), that's one of its strengths and makes it much cheaper to run.

Re: DIY NAS: 2026 Edition

#79

Post by nicolaslem »

cm2187 wrote: post #71

HDD have to be bought new, as well as anything mechanical (eg fans). But for motherboards, CPU, RAM and SSD, there is great value in buying used enterprise hardware on ebay. It is generally durable hardware that spent a quiet life in a temperature controlled datacentre, server motherboards from 5 years ago are absolute aircraft carriers in term of PCIe lanes and functionalities. Used enterprise SSDs are probably more…

75W idle is 650kWh a year, that's quite significant in the context of a home.

Re: DIY NAS: 2026 Edition

#80

Post by pmontra »

cm2187 wrote: post #71

HDD have to be bought new, as well as anything mechanical (eg fans). But for motherboards, CPU, RAM and SSD, there is great value in buying used enterprise hardware on ebay. It is generally durable hardware that spent a quiet life in a temperature controlled datacentre, server motherboards from 5 years ago are absolute aircraft carriers in term of PCIe lanes and functionalities. Used enterprise SSDs are probably more…

Maybe 75 W without disk is not terrible but it's not good. My unoptimized ARM servers idle at about 3 or 4 W and add another 1 or 10 W when their SSDs or HDDs are switched on.

75 W probably need active cooling. 4 W do not.

Anyway you can probably do many more things with that 75 W server.

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