NAS-Curious turned NAS-Completionist!

[binger]

First time computer builder, and first time NAS owner here! I have long wanted to stop paying Apple and Dropbox for storing my pics and files. I have been hanging on to my 2013 Dell Optiplex 3010 since wet stopped using it years ago, just in case I could re-purpose it. I’ve periodically searched around for how to turn it in to a server, but was always discouraged by how tedious and involved the setup looked. I have no computer education other than what I’ve gathered using them.

I watched the LTT video and thought “if I ever do this, $99 is a good price to pay to get in on the ground floor”. Decided to buy the license even though I didn’t really have the hardware. My Dell met the minimum specs (just barely), so I started shopping around for the other parts I’d need.

I bought a 250GB SATA SSD (overkill for the boot drive I know, but can be used down the road too). I got 3 8TB HDDs on Amazon during an extended Black Friday deal. I then had to figure out how to mount them in the case. I needed a 2.5” to 3.5” adapter tray to get the SSD in to one of the bays. I took out the DVD drive and I found two 3.5” to 5.25” adapter trays to get the other HDDs in to the remaining bays originally meant for optical drives. Needed some SATA data cables, but there were 4 SATA power connectors already hooked up, so was good to go with drives.

i didn’t have peripherals to set the machine up and do the initial boot and stuff like that, and instead of buying cheap crap on Amazon, I decided to buy cheap crap locally at a computer store that takes electronic recycling and refurbishes and sells some of it. Got a keyboard and mouse, and decided to see if they could upgrade the 8GB RAM that was in the Dell. They had a nearly-matching 16GB upgrade kit for me, so I decided to pull the trigger on the $17 for that.

 Returned home, plugged everything in, got to bios and everything was recognized!! Huzzah!! I felt like an absolute pro!😂

I had a great spot in the house for the server: custom cabinet built in the 90’s for tower PC, conduit in the back running to power, and ventilation up top to keep thermals under control. Only problem is it is far away from router. I elected to plug in one of my Xfinity Xfi Pods nearby. It has an Ethernet port on the bottom, and I thought maybe I could wire it up to the server.

Followed the installation guide for HexOS, and got things loaded up on the system. Had a bit of a hiccup with deck.hexos not finding the server. I was nervous about the internet connection that I jerry-rigged, but the Xfinity app saw the machine.

 Being a total Noob, I just clicked around and followed forum advice, and eventually got to TrueNAS Scale on my laptop and connected to the system. Did an update there, a series of restarts, and low-and-behold, deck.hexos suddenly recognized the system!!

 After that, setup was totally a breeze! I’m super happy with the interface and how easy it was to set up folders for all my family members. Everybody is going to back their stuff up at my house now! Don’t know of I’ll ever fill up 16GB of storage, but I’ll try!

 Some system details:

2013 Dell Optiplex,

CPU: i3-4160

GPU: none, integrated graphics

 RAM: 16GB-ish, not matched, but very close😃

 Storage: SATA SSD boot drive and 3 8TB HDDs (the pool automatically set up for 16TB)

 couple photos attached.

 Thanks Hexos team for making EXACTLY the product I needed!!!

[binger]

can’t figure out how to edit the post, but:

13 minutes ago, binger said:

I bought a 250GB SATA SSD (overkill for the boot drive I know, but can be used down the road too)

It’s actually a 500GB drive

13 minutes ago, binger said:

Xfinity Xfi Pods nearby

I think this is just a WiFi repeater, mesh network kind of thing. Came with my router.

14 minutes ago, binger said:

Don’t know of I’ll ever fill up 16GB of storage, but I’ll try

Meant to say 16TB, what the pool automatically set up as. Would kinda rather have 8TB with the ability for 2 drives to fail, but I don’t know if that’s overkill, and i don’t know how to set it up.
 

[arvinpw]

great job.
Welcome to the club of NAS owner and Custom Built PC (although with Dell's shenanigan pre-built PC) but nonetheless great start point.

[binger]

5 hours ago, arvinpw said:

nonetheless great start point.

So I’ve been wondering, What can I replace and still keep the license I paid for?

Can I build a new(er) computer and bring in a GPU for Plex? Can I change everything but the boot drive? What if I want to change the boot drive to something smaller and expand the pool with other drives?

 Basically, where can I go from here?

[arvinpw]

Your license is tied to your account. You can move your license to another PC by disconnecting your previous PC. (In case you want entirely new build of server)

But for upgrade path, please keep all your boot drive and pool drives. You can change the CPU, motherboard, RAM, GPU, except drives.

As right now, HexOS doesn't recognize existing pool and configs, but hopefully in v1.0, you will be able to import existing pool so you can change your boot drive.

If you want to increase your storage, you can expand by adding dditional drive to your pool. Or if you want upgrade/replacing drives, you can pull out the ONE drive and put in the new drive and let the OS rebuild your data, wait until it finished and then do it again to another drive (one by one).

There will be a documentation that will explain everything and step-by-step to do it.

[Dylan]

8 hours ago, binger said:

So I’ve been wondering, What can I replace and still keep the license I paid for?

Can I build a new(er) computer and bring in a GPU for Plex? Can I change everything but the boot drive? What if I want to change the boot drive to something smaller and expand the pool with other drives?

 Basically, where can I go from here?

Yeah, I'd spend some time reading the forums and playing with your new system (great job BTW!!). This will help you better identify where you might want to spend some money on a future upgrade as well as grow your knowledge of ZFS, the filesystem used by HexOS.

Hope that make sense as was helpful!

[perplexed3006]

On 12/13/2024 at 5:13 PM, binger said:

i didn’t have peripherals to set the machine up and do the initial boot and stuff like that, and instead of buying cheap crap on Amazon, I decided to buy cheap crap locally at a computer store that takes electronic recycling and refurbishes and sells some of it. Got a keyboard and mouse, and decided to see if they could upgrade the 8GB RAM that was in the Dell. They had a nearly-matching 16GB upgrade kit for me, so I decided to pull the trigger on the $17 for that.

I love that!

On 12/14/2024 at 12:03 AM, binger said:

So I’ve been wondering, What can I replace and still keep the license I paid for?

Can I build a new(er) computer and bring in a GPU for Plex? Can I change everything but the boot drive? What if I want to change the boot drive to something smaller and expand the pool with other drives?

 Basically, where can I go from here?

TO THE MOON!