<30w NAS build recommends (1 Viewer)

[JediFonger]

so i got meself a kill a watt and started to realize my primary NAS (Dell PowerEdge t610) is costing me roughly $300+/year! and yes it's on 24/7. it's currently got roughly 6+TB storage on there out of 12.6TB of usable space.

the only thing i do with it is:
-file-share storage
-make local backups
-stream video/music off of it

been out of DIY builds for quite a long time... maybe almost more than 10yrs+.

i have been investigating all sorts of options out there, but need some recommends. i do like syncology/qnap/etc. any or all of those variations are great... but it is still >30w idle i think 30-60+. while that is great.... i'm looking for some ultimate savings and take some of that $300/year cost in electricity into a system that'll pay for itself in the LONG haul.

in the long ago past, VIA mini/nano itx used to dominate and used to be king. but nowadays there are obviously raspberry pi and stuff like that.

i've been vacillating between pi and a intel atom or super lower powered platform variant.

what i'm looking for:
-less than 30w total draw (complete system including HDDs)
-@least 4HDD (8+TB) if not more
-stream to more than 3 devices in the hosue
-dont care about the rest of the spex


i guess my biggest question is:
Q1: Should I build all of this into a single box: low powered board+all the HDD
or
build a lower powered system that'll seed off of a separate NAS box?

Q2: I've been searching for custom NAS boxes... but they appear to not really exist too much... or am i looking in the wrong places?

Q3: Is it possible to just power all the HDDs using AC adapter->4pin molex straight up? (Yes i am willing to go at this length to save $). This way, I can just get have the power from the RAID card run itself.

any thoughts would be much appreciated!

 

[DaveF]

https://www.synology.com/en-us/products/DS416play

Synology DS416play claims 29W in use.

 

[DaveF]

As for custom NAS boxes, they're popular in the HTPC world. Build a box with a bunch of drives and install a dedicated RAID OS like unRaid (http://lime-technology.com) or freeNAS (http://www.freenas.org). Or build a dedicated windows or linux box and run software like snapRAID or flexRAID and use it as a network media server.

You can play with this to get a ballpark on power consumption for a PC
http://outervision.com/power-supply-calculator

I suspect this is all familiar to you, since you're doing something along these lines right now. But the low-power options have greatly increased in the past decade, I understand. This is a decent website for (re) learning the basics and getting up to speed on contemporary builds. The website seems to have been re-designed since I was reading it just a few months ago, so you may have to make an account and search bit to find the low-power build descriptions.
http://mymediaexperience.com/updated-htpc-recommendations/

 

[DaveF]

I'll try to Kill-a-Watt my HTPC this weekend for comparison..

 

[DaveF]

I've got my HTPC on the Kill a Watt. I've not done any streaming from it or transcoding. But I have a sense of its power consumption.

This is a brand new PC, based on a 3.2GHz i5. It's idling around 30W. Currently, idle but with one of three drives at 100% (disk-health scan running), it's using <38W. Playing an HD 1080p movie, it spikes to 60W at start and then idles back at 35W.

No streaming tested.

So, new, high-power PC, no particular effort made for low power use, and it's running under 40W.

You should be able to build a low-power media server that uses under 30W with a little research.