this post was submitted on 24 Aug 2023
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I use my desktop PC for Jellyfin and torrenting, but I'm looking for something that I can keep on 24/7 that draws less power and run other self-hosted services on Linux. I would like to have at least 2x 14 TB 3.5" hard drives in or attached to it with the possibility of expanding in the future.

From my research, these seem to be some good options:

  1. Mini PC like this Beelink S12 Pro + USB hard drive enclosure. The price seems reasonable for the specs and low power consumption. Not sure if USB will limit transfer speeds.
  2. ODROID HC-4 or similar SBCs. I feel like these have much lower performance for not much price savings, and it's harder to get software running up because of ARM. But it seems like they don't use too much power.
  3. Used enterprise PCs/servers. I know they can be found cheap used, but I'm a little lost at comparing the performance and power draw to other options.
  4. DIY build. I'm interested in getting a Mini-ITX case like this Jonsbo N2 and getting parts for it, but it seems like it will be the most expensive option. It does seem like the most modular and upgradable.
  5. Classic NAS products like Synology. It seems like these are falling out of favor because they are pretty under powered for the price.

What does selfhosted think about these options, and what would you recommend?

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I recently got the Beelink Mini S12 Pro. I'm completely impressed with its capabilities, especially for that price. I got the 16GB Ram N100 version. Great piece of hardware.

I'm running 27 different services, including the *Arrs, Jellyfin, paperless-ngx, home assistant, and even stuff like Kasm workspaces and emulatorjs.

[–] drudoo 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I’m seriously thinking of getting this. Maybe the Firebat brand though as it has two Ethernet ports and it’s cheaper for me.

Have you had Pi’s? I’m currently using a pi4 4gb and wondering how it compares.

I’m also frustrated with arm as a lot of docker images aren’t working. Recently had issues with Hugo and Jekyll which needs node.js that doesn’t support arm at this version.

Have to tried Immich on it?

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[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Yeah, the mini PCs look great. How do you have your storage set up?

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I have a DIY NAS... Not sure of specs any more. Some micro-atx board with a cheaper AMD CPU. All it's for is an NFS share and I use almost no resources on it.

I have a bunch of PI4 8GB and lenovo m92p tinys that I use for the compute. Their storage is the DIY NAS.

If I was starting out and planned on growing m'y setup, id go option 4. Just do an all in one thing, run everything on it. When you run out of ram/CPU consider a pi or mini like I have. When you need more disk, add it into the NAS.

If you just want something simple option 1. USB will 100% limit transfer speed but what kind of speed do you actually need? What will you run?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Is your NAS in an old tower PC?

I think I had the misconception that USB was slower than SATA, but USB-C is actually just as fast. And anything USB 3.0+ should be faster than 1 gigabit ethernet I guess?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

Theoretically, USBC 3.1 has 10Gbit/s from what I'm reading so it sounds like you're right. My concern is the chipset on the MoBo, how many lanes it has, and what it supports. I haven't looked into it but I bet this is the limiting factor. Especially if you're adding a lot of USB devices.

Yep, just an old PC that I moved into a case with hotswap hard drive bays. I also bought a LSI 9300-8i to support the hard drives.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Do you have a NAS? It can be a good way to get decent functionality without extra hardware, especially if you're doing proof of concept or temporary stuff.

My self-hosting Docker setup is split between 12 permanent stacks on a Synology DS920+ NAS (with upgraded RAM) and 4 on a Raspberry Pi 4B, using Portainer and its agent on the Pi to manage them. The NAS is also using Synology's Drive (like Dropbox or GDrive) and Photos (like Google Photos).

I've had the NAS running servers for Valheim and VRising in the past, but they require that fewer containers be running, as game servers running on Linux usually have no optimisation and/or are emulating Windows.

If I decide to host a game server again, I'll probably look at a NUC. I've done the DIY mini-ITX route in the past (for an XBMC-based media centre with HDMI output) and it was great, so that's another option.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

Is there some low-power hardware that takes ECC RAM? I want something to replace my Atom mini-ITX board, but I also want ECC.

[–] mint_tamas 1 points 1 year ago

It’s up to you how much you want to pay vs. how much time you are willing to sink into it. A synology is overpriced and underpowered, but you get a nice plug and play solution eith sane defaults. I went with that, fully knowing that price-wise, it’s not optimal. But I don’t enjoy tinkering as much as I used to.

[–] hydrian 1 points 1 year ago

If you want x86-64 support in fanless, take a look at Celeron (low powered) based industrial PCs. Qotom comes to mind. You can get a passively cooled machine. Most come with a NVMe and 2.5 slot for storage, do doing raid 1 is possible without external storage. I've bern running my J1900 based one for nearly 5 years and haven't had an issue with hardware at all.

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