Sorry if I have posted this in the wrong section but this seemed like the most logical place to post.
I posted a few days ago about either building or buying a NAS for home use to hold all our family photos, documents, music etc. in one place and backing up all of the computers in our house to a central location. I have decided to go down the route of building a NAS since I think I will have more flexibility in what I can do with it whereas if I bought a NAS enclosure e.g. Synology Diskstation, I think am more limited in terms of what I can do with it. However I have a few questions.
1 .OS Choice - I have a few options that I am considering. FreeNAS was my original choice since it is relatively simple to set and you control it from a web browser. It also allows you to schedule when to spin down the hard drives and with some scripting (not too sure if it built into FreeNAS) I can shutdown and power up the FreeNAS when needed. I do not really want to leave it on 24/7, I rather it be scheduled to come on when I get back from college at about 4pm and turn off at about 10pm on weekdays and on weekends come on in the morning at about 10am and go off at about 10pm However the recommend hardware for a FreeNAS box is server grade parts like ECC RAM which tend to cost a little bit more.
Another option is Windows Server 2012 R2 Essentials. Since I am a full time student I am able to get it for free through DreamSpark. I have never used it but apparently it is a good alternative to Windows Home Server 2011 which Microsoft discounted. Not sure if this allows you to schedule when to turn on or off the computer but (correct me if I am wrong) I think it comes Task Scheduler to perform shutdown tasks like Windows 7 and 8.1 does. I could then possibly use Wake On LAN in the BIOS to power it up.
My Final option is just Windows 7 Home Premium. Since I upgraded to Windows 8.1, I have a spare retail copy of Windows 7 Home Premium sitting around which I could use. Although it doesn't have fancy server software/features, I don't think I really the server features since all the computer is doing is sharing files and acting as a backup server.
2. Part Choices - I am undecided on what parts to choose for the build. I have a 3TB Western Digital Green in my desktop now which is only acting as a backup drive for my desktop so I will use that in the build as the backup drive. I would then probably buy a 1TB Western Digital for main file storage. I want it to low power and quiet enough since it is going to be sitting in my bedroom. I don't have alot of money to spend and that is mainly why all of my OS choices are free (I am a student and money's kinda scarce) but I do have a bit saved up ~£250. I have a couple of build options made up (this is probably not the right place to post builds but I didn't really want to make several posts).
Option 1 - FreeNAS
PCPartPicker part list: http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/MMCfGX
Price breakdown by merchant: http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/MMCfGX/by_merchant/
CPU: Intel Celeron G1820 2.7GHz Dual-Core Processor (£26.36 @ CCL Computers)
Motherboard: MSI H87M-G43 Micro ATX LGA1150 Motherboard (£64.90 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Green 3TB 3.5" 5400RPM Internal Hard Drive (Purchased For £0.00)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (£40.39 @ Aria PC)
Case: Fractal Design Core 1000 MicroATX Mini Tower Case (£19.97 @ Scan.co.uk)
Other: Kingston 4GB 1600MHz ECC RAM X2 (£72.96)
Total: £224.58
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-01-31 12:20 GMT+0000
Option 2 - Windows 2012 Server / Windows 7
PCPartPicker part list: http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/zxZYhM
Price breakdown by merchant: http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/zxZYhM/by_merchant/
Memory: Corsair 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1333 Memory (£58.53 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Green 3TB 3.5" 5400RPM Internal Hard Drive (Purchased For £0.00)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (£40.39 @ Aria PC)
Other: Asrock Q1900 Mini ITX Motherboard (£64.21)
Other: Powercool Q5 Mini ITX 120w Chassis (£40.99)
Total: £204.12
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-01-31 12:22 GMT+0000
3. Backup Software - The final question is what backup software to use. I currently use AOMEI Backupper on my desktop and never have a had a problem with. I was wondering if I went down the route of FreeNAS, what would I use?. Is there any other good free backup software that you would recommend?
Sorry for the kinda long post and sorry if some of the questions I have asked have been answered before, I just wanted to make sure I get definite answers for everything
I posted a few days ago about either building or buying a NAS for home use to hold all our family photos, documents, music etc. in one place and backing up all of the computers in our house to a central location. I have decided to go down the route of building a NAS since I think I will have more flexibility in what I can do with it whereas if I bought a NAS enclosure e.g. Synology Diskstation, I think am more limited in terms of what I can do with it. However I have a few questions.
1 .OS Choice - I have a few options that I am considering. FreeNAS was my original choice since it is relatively simple to set and you control it from a web browser. It also allows you to schedule when to spin down the hard drives and with some scripting (not too sure if it built into FreeNAS) I can shutdown and power up the FreeNAS when needed. I do not really want to leave it on 24/7, I rather it be scheduled to come on when I get back from college at about 4pm and turn off at about 10pm on weekdays and on weekends come on in the morning at about 10am and go off at about 10pm However the recommend hardware for a FreeNAS box is server grade parts like ECC RAM which tend to cost a little bit more.
Another option is Windows Server 2012 R2 Essentials. Since I am a full time student I am able to get it for free through DreamSpark. I have never used it but apparently it is a good alternative to Windows Home Server 2011 which Microsoft discounted. Not sure if this allows you to schedule when to turn on or off the computer but (correct me if I am wrong) I think it comes Task Scheduler to perform shutdown tasks like Windows 7 and 8.1 does. I could then possibly use Wake On LAN in the BIOS to power it up.
My Final option is just Windows 7 Home Premium. Since I upgraded to Windows 8.1, I have a spare retail copy of Windows 7 Home Premium sitting around which I could use. Although it doesn't have fancy server software/features, I don't think I really the server features since all the computer is doing is sharing files and acting as a backup server.
2. Part Choices - I am undecided on what parts to choose for the build. I have a 3TB Western Digital Green in my desktop now which is only acting as a backup drive for my desktop so I will use that in the build as the backup drive. I would then probably buy a 1TB Western Digital for main file storage. I want it to low power and quiet enough since it is going to be sitting in my bedroom. I don't have alot of money to spend and that is mainly why all of my OS choices are free (I am a student and money's kinda scarce) but I do have a bit saved up ~£250. I have a couple of build options made up (this is probably not the right place to post builds but I didn't really want to make several posts).
Option 1 - FreeNAS
PCPartPicker part list: http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/MMCfGX
Price breakdown by merchant: http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/MMCfGX/by_merchant/
CPU: Intel Celeron G1820 2.7GHz Dual-Core Processor (£26.36 @ CCL Computers)
Motherboard: MSI H87M-G43 Micro ATX LGA1150 Motherboard (£64.90 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Green 3TB 3.5" 5400RPM Internal Hard Drive (Purchased For £0.00)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (£40.39 @ Aria PC)
Case: Fractal Design Core 1000 MicroATX Mini Tower Case (£19.97 @ Scan.co.uk)
Other: Kingston 4GB 1600MHz ECC RAM X2 (£72.96)
Total: £224.58
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-01-31 12:20 GMT+0000
Option 2 - Windows 2012 Server / Windows 7
PCPartPicker part list: http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/zxZYhM
Price breakdown by merchant: http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/zxZYhM/by_merchant/
Memory: Corsair 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1333 Memory (£58.53 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Green 3TB 3.5" 5400RPM Internal Hard Drive (Purchased For £0.00)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (£40.39 @ Aria PC)
Other: Asrock Q1900 Mini ITX Motherboard (£64.21)
Other: Powercool Q5 Mini ITX 120w Chassis (£40.99)
Total: £204.12
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-01-31 12:22 GMT+0000
3. Backup Software - The final question is what backup software to use. I currently use AOMEI Backupper on my desktop and never have a had a problem with. I was wondering if I went down the route of FreeNAS, what would I use?. Is there any other good free backup software that you would recommend?
Sorry for the kinda long post and sorry if some of the questions I have asked have been answered before, I just wanted to make sure I get definite answers for everything
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