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I've been using a Helios4 for this; it's tiny, has ECC, and plenty of speed for a NAS. Their new board, the helios64, is bigger, and ECC support was in-progres

I've been using a Helios4 for this; it's tiny, has ECC, and plenty of speed for a NAS. Their new board, the helios64, is bigger, and ECC support was in-progress last time I checked.

sbierwagen 6y ago
Doh, wish I knew this existed last month. Just built a NAS around an ITX board.
vladvasiliu 6y ago
The Helios64 "Full Bundle" looks nice, but only 4 GB RAM seems limited for ZFS. Plus, for 300 USD, there should be a way to set up a similar x86 system, possibly from second-hand parts. I'm thinking some older AMD Zen with 8-16 GB RAM and a Fractal Design Node or similar case. Yes, I know that would likely use more electricity, but in my particular case (France), electricity isn't that big of a cost, plus I wouldn't be running this 24/7. More like one or two evenings a week. The only reason why I'm not running recycled "enterprise" servers at home is that my apartment is small and I absolutely cannot stand the noise they make.
- MivLives 6y ago
  I've had good luck buying old gaming pc parts off my friends. If they're upgrading their cpu, they normally have a mobo/ram/cpu to sell.
  - vladvasiliu 6y ago
    But those are usually "consumer" parts (in the broad sense). In particular, they won't take ECC RAM. I'm hoping this will change now that AMD has a believable "enthusiast" offering that has ECC. This to me is the main issue. Usually, manufacturers think ECC = Enterprise = Running in a computer room = Doesn't need to be quiet. Of course, usually clients looking for thin, least-possible-U systems doesn't help either. I've actually gotten my hands on a Lenovo tower server my client wasn't needing anymore which is really pretty quiet. But it's "huge" by rack standards. It's basically a full PC tower in height, but longer. I could see myself running it in the kitchen or something once I get it home after the lockdowns. The issue is it only takes 2.5" drives, which are still quite expensive if SSDs or use SMR if HDDs.
mey 6y ago
Looking on their site, it seems that Helios64 still doesn't have ECC support (isn't advertised).
dtx1 6y ago
I too have a helios4 and i like it for it's ECC Support but it has a plethora of drawbacks. * 32bit OS means maximum 16TB Partition Size * it's not fast at all. It can barely saturate a Gbit connection without any encryption using HTTP. Even with the Crypto Engine enabled, any encryption and the connection drops significantly * Depending on which version you got, the fans are quite annoying, no matter which version you got, the fans are quite ineffective * it has at least one known hardware bug concerning SATA and the internal Flash. * WOL and the internal Watchdog are hit or miss at best On the other hand the linux support and documentation is top notch so i dont want to complain too much but i am kinda disappointed with the speed i got from it
- Scene_Cast2 6y ago
  Ah. I haven't run into speed or capacity issues (different use cases & preferences, I suppose). For the fans - I am not using the included case. I have one stock fan on top of the SOC and one 120mm fan for the disks. The stock fan is decently loud on bootup, but it stops or low-speed during regular operation.

I've been using a Helios4 for this; it's tiny, has ECC, and plenty of speed for a NAS. Their new board, the helios64, is bigger, and ECC support was in-progress last time I checked.

sbierwagen 6y ago

Doh, wish I knew this existed last month. Just built a NAS around an ITX board.

vladvasiliu 6y ago

The Helios64 "Full Bundle" looks nice, but only 4 GB RAM seems limited for ZFS. Plus, for 300 USD, there should be a way to set up a similar x86 system, possibly from second-hand parts. I'm thinking some older AMD Zen with 8-16 GB RAM and a Fractal Design Node or similar case. Yes, I know that would likely use more electricity, but in my particular case (France), electricity isn't that big of a cost, plus I wouldn't be running this 24/7. More like one or two evenings a week. The only reason why I'm not running recycled "enterprise" servers at home is that my apartment is small and I absolutely cannot stand the noise they make.

MivLives 6y ago
I've had good luck buying old gaming pc parts off my friends. If they're upgrading their cpu, they normally have a mobo/ram/cpu to sell.
- vladvasiliu 6y ago
  But those are usually "consumer" parts (in the broad sense). In particular, they won't take ECC RAM. I'm hoping this will change now that AMD has a believable "enthusiast" offering that has ECC. This to me is the main issue. Usually, manufacturers think ECC = Enterprise = Running in a computer room = Doesn't need to be quiet. Of course, usually clients looking for thin, least-possible-U systems doesn't help either. I've actually gotten my hands on a Lenovo tower server my client wasn't needing anymore which is really pretty quiet. But it's "huge" by rack standards. It's basically a full PC tower in height, but longer. I could see myself running it in the kitchen or something once I get it home after the lockdowns. The issue is it only takes 2.5" drives, which are still quite expensive if SSDs or use SMR if HDDs.

mey 6y ago

Looking on their site, it seems that Helios64 still doesn't have ECC support (isn't advertised).

dtx1 6y ago

I too have a helios4 and i like it for it's ECC Support but it has a plethora of drawbacks. * 32bit OS means maximum 16TB Partition Size * it's not fast at all. It can barely saturate a Gbit connection without any encryption using HTTP. Even with the Crypto Engine enabled, any encryption and the connection drops significantly * Depending on which version you got, the fans are quite annoying, no matter which version you got, the fans are quite ineffective * it has at least one known hardware bug concerning SATA and the internal Flash. * WOL and the internal Watchdog are hit or miss at best On the other hand the linux support and documentation is top notch so i dont want to complain too much but i am kinda disappointed with the speed i got from it

Scene_Cast2 6y ago
Ah. I haven't run into speed or capacity issues (different use cases & preferences, I suppose). For the fans - I am not using the included case. I have one stock fan on top of the SOC and one 120mm fan for the disks. The stock fan is decently loud on bootup, but it stops or low-speed during regular operation.