drobo is no good… so I’m building my own NAS [updated]

After a few months work with the drobo and trying to give it NAS capabilities via TonidoPlug. I got it to work, and I’m getting same performance as the droboshare for half  the cost.

HOWEVER… I’m getting 3-5mb/s Write, and 3-20mb/s Read. The speed fluctuation is related to the limited CPU and I/O resource on the TonidoPlug. For a $550 setup (2.3TB) the speed just doesn’t make any sense. Even a 300mb file takaes 10min to write… this is clearly not a viable option for any power user.

After speaking to a friend, I was quite inspired by his ZFS rig that actually cost less and is capable of delivering 3x the speed I get. The rig’s 75W power consumption wasn’t too great in my books, but I’m sure by using something less powerful I can crank the wattage down.

My checklist for this rig:

• - Cheaper than the Drobo and TonidoPlug, in other words less than $400USD.
• - Efficient, low power consumption.
• - The rig must have at least 4 swappable drive bays. As it turns out, consumer grade swappable bays are prone to drive vibration. Especially when used with high speed drives 7200RPM+. Be warned.
• - Must be fault-tolerant like the Drobo.
• - Space must be easily upgradeable, again like the Drobo.
• - Must be faster than the Drobo, and is able to sustain read/write speed even for large files.

At first glance this looked to be a tough find, but the worry eased up after some research. It was clear that my rig will need to be in the mITX form-factor, and it will need an energy efficient CPU.

The slower Celeron chips caught my eye for a second, but it was the new Intel Dual Core Atom that shined. With a TDP (Thermal Design Power) of around 13W, the dual-core Atom D510 offers faster performance at a cooler temperate than the previous generation N330 it replaces. (FYI, TDP only measures the amount of thermal energy that need to be dissipated to keep it at an optimal temperature, it does not measure total power consumption). The D510 offers a fast front-side bus, and dual-core architecture clocked at 1.6GHZ. According to previous performance comparisons, a single core Atom running at 1.6GHZ is equivalent to a 900MHZ Celeron.

Therefore, I’m assuming the dual-core will performance similar to 1.2GHZ Celeron M chips. For the purose it is going to serve, it got a gold star in my books. Lastly, since Intel does not sell the Atom chip as  a standalone product, I was looking for a bundle with a motherboard.

Due to the low cost of these parts, most motherboards offered will only carry 2 SATA ports. That is a big NO NO for a NAS box! The good thing is that most of these boards do have a PCI slot for expansion, so you can put a SATA controller card in there to expand its ports. (Note that in order to have Sata II  3Gbit/s , you will need a PCI-Express based controller).

I eventually nailed my choice down to the Intel Atom D510MO bundle. It has 2 SATA, 7 USB, 1 PCI and 1 PCI-E mini slot. The board isn’t the most full-featured product, but it was cheap and made by the mighty Intel itself. Other alternatives from ASUS and Supermicro offer similar specifications for a higher price, and to be quite frank I don’t trust those vendors as much as I do with Intel. (Supermicro does offer a board for the D510 chip with 6 onboard SATA ports, but costs more than twice the Intel board). Price $80 CAD

The D510 uses DDR2 memory, but I already have 1GB sticks laying around. so no need to buy more. but they go for $30 nowadays.

Along with my Intel D510MO I ordered a PCI SATA II controller. The model number is Syba SD-SATA2-2E2I, and it was the only SATA II controller I could find with a PCI interface. I know I won’t be able to get full SATA II speeds, but I’d rather not play around with the jumpers on my older SATA II drives to get it to work. Price $36 CAD.

Lastly, I needed a small yet stylish case to house everything. I know my budget allowed me to have a case with at least 2 hot-swappable bays, but I really need 4 of them. The obvious choice was the CHENBRO ES34069. It comes with 4 hot-swappable SATA drive bays and either 120W or 180W power supply. The package I ordered from NCIX also included a riser card and a camera card reader. For more than $200 it wasn’t the cheapest option, but it certainly looked worthy and it had exactly what I needed. Price $ 207 CAD.

CHENBRO ES34069

Antec NSK2400

After testing the Chenbro case for a week, I must say that the swappable bays are not exactly what I expected them to be. They share the same flaws as many consumer grade screw-less systems… DRIVE VIBRATION and NOISE! Since each swappable slot was not held tightly enough, drive vibration can be heard quite clearly. (Same problem we have with the Drobo actually…) The two fans in the back of the chassis were also inaccessible by the user, and there was no speed controller connector to allow the user to adjust their speed. Therefore, you end up with a system that spins 100% RPM at all times – something the Drobo solved by adding thermal sensitive cooling fans. Lastly, the external power supply is proprietary! The cable that plugs into the chassis looks more like a PS/2 port… rather than a standard PSU connector. You know what this means… if your PSU on the Chenbro ever give out on you… you are going to have fun finding a replacement… then burn a hole in your wallet to pay for it.

So without anymore ranting… I introduce to you the final piece of the puzzle – Antec NSK2400. It costs half as much as the Chenbro, it has 4 drive bays – two 3.5 inch and two 5.25 inch. Click here for a thorough review from slientpcreview.com
I bought two 3.5 – 5.25 drive bay adapters to fit all four of my 3.5 inch SATA drives. Obviously the bays are swappable, but I don’t plan on having multiple drive failures everyday that I need to be swapping drives. =p

This case can accommodate up to mATX form factor, so it will make a good media center chassis as well. – Price $101.91CAD

Finally, the total came to $230 after shipping and taxes - That’s almost half the price of the Drobo, even after you add the cost of RAM.

As you can see, the case I decided to get was a bit more expensive than most. There are a lot of cheaper options out there, especially if you don’t need hot-swappable bays. Secondly, if you are adventurous DIY is another way to go. Check out the DIY project here: http://paulstamatiou.com/diy-200-dollar-pc-part-3 to build an awesome looking acrylic case for your NAS!

Please check back for Part 2 of this NAS adventure. My parts should be in next week, but since the case was re-ordered it might take some time before I can post updates. Please stay tuned! and big thank yous go out to all the people who tweeted and commented on this thread. Thank you for the interest. I won’t let you down!  =p

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