hardware for home use large storage

[Dan Langille]

Dan Naumov wrote:
> On Mon, Feb 15, 2010 at 12:42 AM, Dan Naumov <dan.naumov at gmail.com> wrote:
>> On Sun, Feb 14, 2010 at 11:38 PM, Dan Langille <dan at langille.org> wrote:
>>> Dan Naumov wrote:
>>>>> On Sun, 14 Feb 2010, Dan Langille wrote:
>>>>>> After creating three different system configurations (Athena,
>>>>>> Supermicro, and HP), my configuration of choice is this Supermicro
>>>>>> setup:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>    1. Samsung SATA CD/DVD Burner $20 (+ $8 shipping)
>>>>>>    2. SuperMicro 5046A $750 (+$43 shipping)
>>>>>>    3. LSI SAS 3081E-R $235
>>>>>>    4. SATA cables $60
>>>>>>    5. Crucial 3×2G ECC DDR3-1333 $191 (+ $6 shipping)
>>>>>>    6. Xeon W3520 $310
>>>> You do realise how much of a massive overkill this is and how much you
>>>> are overspending?
>>>
>>> I appreciate the comments and feedback.  I'd also appreciate alternative
>>> suggestions in addition to what you have contributed so far.  Spec out the
>>> box you would build.
>> ======================
>> Case: Fractal Design Define R2 - 89 euro:
>> http://www.fractal-design.com/?view=product&prod=32
>>
>> Mobo/CPU: Supermicro X7SPA-H / Atom D510 - 180-220 euro:
>> http://www.supermicro.com/products/motherboard/ATOM/ICH9/X7SPA.cfm?typ=H
>>
>> PSU: Corsair 400CX 80+ - 59 euro:
>> http://www.corsair.com/products/cx/default.aspx
>>
>> RAM: Corsair 2x2GB, DDR2 800MHz SO-DIMM, CL5 - 85 euro
>> ======================
>> Total: ~435 euro
>>
>> The motherboard has 6 native AHCI-capable ports on ICH9R controller
>> and you have a PCI-E slot free if you want to add an additional
>> controller card. Feel free to blow the money you've saved on crazy
>> fast SATA disks and if your system workload is going to have a lot of
>> random reads, then spend 200 euro on a 80gb Intel X25-M for use as a
>> dedicated L2ARC device for your pool.
> 
> And to expand a bit, if you want that crazy performance without
> blowing silly amounts of money:
> 
> Get a dock for holding 2 x 2,5" disks in a single 5,25" slot and put
> it at the top, in the only 5,25" bay of the case.

That sounds very interesting.  I just looking around for such a thing, 
and could not find it.  Is there a more specific name? URL?

> Now add an
> additional PCI-E SATA controller card, like the often mentioned PCIE
> SIL3124. 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816124026 for $35

> Now you have 2 x 2,5" disk slots and 8 x 3,5" disk slots,
> with 6 native SATA ports on the motherboard and more ports on the
> controller card. Now get 2 x 80gb Intel SSDs and put them into the
> dock. Now partition each of them in the following fashion:
> 
> 1: swap: 4-5gb
> 2: freebsd-zfs: ~10-15gb for root filesystem
> 3: freebsd-zfs: rest of the disk: dedicated L2ARC vdev
> 
> GMirror your SSD swap partitions.
> Make a ZFS mirror pool out of your SSD root filesystem partitions
> Build your big ZFS pool however you like out of the mechanical disks you have.
> Add the 2 x ~60gb partitions as dedicated independant L2ARC devices
> for your SATA disk ZFS pool.
> 
> Now you have redundant swap, redundant and FAST root filesystem and
> your ZFS pool of SATA disks has 120gb worth of L2ARC space on the
> SSDs. The L2ARC vdevs dont need to be redundant, because should an IO
> error occur while reading off L2ARC, the IO is deferred to the "real"
> data location on the pool of your SATA disks. You can also remove your
> L2ARC vdevs from your pool at will, on a live pool.

That is nice.

Thank you.