The Perfect Home Server 2023 - 48TB, 4x 2.5Gbit LAN, 18W, Quiet & Compact

[@WolfgangsChannel]

To try everything Brilliant has to offer-free-for a full 30 days, visit brilliant.org/Wolfgang/ . The first 200 of you will get 20% off Brilliant’s annual premium subscription. CORRECTION: Wireguard doesn't utilize AES, so it won't benefit from AES-NI. However, other VPN technologies like OpenVPN and IPSEC will benefit from it. ✅ PARTS LIST: Motherboard www.aliexpress.com/w/wholesale-n5105-nas-motherboard.html NOTE: The version with a green PCB and a PCIe x2 slot comes with a different, more efficient SATA controller that supports ASPM Example: aliexpress.com/item/1005006412213295.html Pay attention to the SATA chip, it should say "ASMedia": share.goose.party/api/shares/g5MjM1N/files/b6108f3f-26d5-4e97-be7c-c3270654d8d2?download=false RAM geni.us/6iSd1 (Amazon) Case geni.us/YzL4S (Amazon) PSU geni.us/MzBSV (Amazon) Hard drives geni.us/BcSW (Amazon) SSDs geni.us/kQa8pH (Amazon) Boot SSDs geni.us/DLg36k (Amazon) M.2 to SATA adapter: www.aliexpress.com/item/1005005669800665.html SATA cables www.aliexpress.com/item/1005001488421222.html ✅ OTHER LINKS: "Power consumption of Ryzen 5000 Series CPUs" hattedsquirrel.net/2020/12/power-consumption-of-ryzen-5000-series-cpus/ Noctua NF-A20 geni.us/Jss7 (Amazon) Power button geni.us/wbYoCBu (Amazon) 200mm Fan mod by pixelwave www.printables.com/model/137181-200mm-fan-front-for-fractal-node-304/files 6x SSD Mount by diofantino: www.thingiverse.com/thing:5243073

[@smorrow]

1:12 Those were the real numbers only.

[@Gamer4Eire]

Hey Wolfgang, could explain more how you fitted the new fan and grill? i got the same grill 3D printed but then realized there is a fair bit if metal to be cut and cables redundant.

[@WolfgangsChannel]

@@Gamer4Eire Check out the separate video about this case mod that I've made

[@Gamer4Eire]

@@WolfgangsChannel thanks Wolfgang. I have the angle grinder ready :)

[@hireconor]

The Corsair RM550x (2021) PCU is scarce in the US. Are there any comps available in the US? I got the new N100 board, but can't find a PCU for it. Great channel Wolfgang!

[@marklewus5468]

9 month update. You can now get i3-n305 eight core motherboards similar to the one you bought. The i3 has 2 1/2 times the performance of the N5105 at the cost of another 3-5 W (idle). Still no ECC (thanks, Intel). A choice with ecc and graphics is an AMD ryzen 7 pro 4750G w/ B550 motherboard. The motherboards are under $100 but used 4750G chips are around US $100 because they were sold only into the OEM market.

[@menoslinks8923]

Do you have an update for this video one year after?

[@dlosspain98]

Get a Mac mini

[@FlashGamer521]

@@dlosspain98 An old Mac Mini as a NAS to expand the storage of a new Mac mini?

[@jukelyn]

@@FlashGamer521 Lol that's what I did!

[@WolfgangsChannel]

UPD: A new version of this motherboard based on N100/N305 is now for sale on Aliexpress: de.aliexpress.com/item/1005006308606282.html Unfortunately, it still uses the JMB585 SATA controller, which doesn't support PCIe ASPM.

[@HarvinderSingh_steelpony11]

Please make a update or follow up video with this new upgraded hardware, If possible 🙏🏻

[@stanleyhopcroft868]

Is this why in the inventory, there is specified the PCIe to SATA adapter: it provides a better SATA controller than the onboard controller ?

[@WolfgangsChannel]

@@stanleyhopcroft868 No, that's purely to get more SATA ports. The internal SATA controller cannot be disabled in the BIOS. However, there is a version of this motherboard that has a better SATA controller. It has a green PCB and a PCIe slot instead of an M.2 slot. Pay attention to the chip near the SATA ports, the text on it should say "ASMedia", like here: share.goose.party/api/shares/g5MjM1N/files/b6108f3f-26d5-4e97-be7c-c3270654d8d2?download=false

[@gittin_funky]

@@WolfgangsChannel would you recommend getting this N100 board over the N5105 you reviwed? I'm building small storage but want to run promox for pfsense and some docker containers

[@johnhumbug5199]

@@gittin_funkywell the only thing wolfgang's saying is that you'll be having more power draw since the sata controller doesn't have aspm, i guess. so i've you're willing to pay for that you're good to go. Hard to tell whether you'll be ending up with way more power draw then the n5105 board. It all comes down to everything you add to your board.

[@marcinneuman8283]

Great video! The only thing I'd like to hear more is the C-states problem and ASPM support. How to check it, how to hunt for problematic components, how to set up BIOS, etc. I've watched this one and the previous (23W server) one looking for the answers. It looks like you know more about this than you share in those videos. Maybe you think it's not interesting/boring for us - but it's is an interesting topic! I'd love to see a separate video about it. I know every system is different and it's hard to show something really universal - but something to show us where to start would be awesome!

[@lcdo]

Make +1 for this. Not boring and yes definitively interresting !

[@baswazz]

I agree would be nice if you could make a video on this topic.

[@dennis9322]

I totally agree, struggling with unraid at said topic

[@1337kaas]

Try installing latest microcode for the n5105. It helped me with a similar cstates issue

[@kevinhu196]

@@dennis9322 I believe there is a very detailed Unraid guide on their forum about tweaking power consumption. I would also want a video about C state and ASPM, but not limited to Unraid, as a lot of people includng me use Proxmox, or bare Debian/Ubuntu linux for their home server. I was able to figure out C state by unplugging and disabling things in the BIOS, a lot of trial and error, and I came to the conclusion that my SATA controller is causing problem when CPU tries to enter more than C7s, so I set the max-c-state to C7

[@Khoukharev]

What do you think would be the best replacement for Corsair rm550x (PSU)? These aren't available at all in my region

[@petermarin]

This is great. Can you make a video and continue this with the OS/ software/ configuration side of this build? It’d be so helpful to see an end to end, replicable process. You’re a great educator.

[@finlaymartins272]

Ditto!

[@paulbckr]

would be cool

[@NaRCSalty]

That would be great, this is my first NAS and i am just replicating as best i can I am just so lost right now.

[@timeltdme4355]

there are guides for that already, installing proxmox allows you to install whatever you want in virtual machines

[@M4XD4B0ZZ]

I wanted to buy this board but someone said it's not really beginner friendly. I have nothing against a steep learning curve but i am scared this board will not be supported and i can not find a community to talk to when i have problems with it

[@gabbieblue]

i have very limited supplies for my homelab, so seeing someone who actually knows what theyre doing run it all on one machine would be super helpful :D

[@1337kaas]

He's running it on one machine. What more do you want?

[@gabbieblue]

@@1337kaas to see things actually run on the server? this video does not at any point say that he is running everything on one machine, its just a build video i commented because i only have one machine available to me, and would like to see someone run an entire homelab from one machine because it would be an interesting option for me

[@1337kaas]

@@gabbieblue Ah like thay. At 5:53 you can see he's running unRAID with all his Docker containers. You could actually do everything with one box, look for proxmox. It's basically a management layer over KVM (+Qemu). I have it running with opnsense as a router as VM on the same board as this (n5105 cpu). You can do pci passthrough to passthrough the network interfaces individually to the proxmox VM. You could run multiple other containers with pihole and such as you like. And maybe add a VM as a docker host. The downside of doing everything on one host is that everything goes down when you have hardware issues or need to reboot for maintenance. If you have more questions, go ahead and ask

[@gabbieblue]

@@1337kaas i do know that its possible, i just think an in-depth video showcase would be neat i am working on all that myself but im using snapraid and mergerfs since i dont have enough of similar sized drives for an actual raid array, and yeah the downside isnt great and i would like a separate machine for at least the router, but ill see what i can get

[@1337kaas]

@@gabbieblue I definitely agree, that would be very nice. However, there are so many solutions for that problem. But an insight in how someone else solved it would be nice for sure 😃

[@jakebezzina6729]

Awesome video! I just built my first NAS (Unraid) this week out of a free used i3-8100 m-ITX PC after watching a few of your videos. It would be super helpful if you were to make a video about the initial set up of containers, VMs, and cache configs for both beginners and experienced hobbyists.

[@RealAndyOriginal]

What mini itx board did you use?

[@jakebezzina6729]

@@RealAndyOriginal Gigabyte B360N WIFI-CF m-ITX. It came with the system I got, but it serves me well enough... you don't need ECC ram anyways.

[@ovalsquare]

7 months later, how are you liking unraid? I’m looking into making an unraid server ( nas, plex, game servers )

[@bamx23]

That moment when a youtuber who inspired you on (re)building the home server and use Ansible actually uses the motherboard that you've bought for a new server several weeks ago!

[@vanhoeppen]

Hello-hello-hello! :-) May I ask something? I have tried to find the MoBo brand Wolfgang mentions at 1:33 but l only was able to find sources like Aliexpress or the likes... Truth be told, I'm a little conflicted about those... Is there no other way to purchase those boards?

[@NoxSayin]

It is so amazing to have power consumption mate. My NAS and multi-purpose Home Lab Server is NUC12 Wall Street Canyon with i5-1240P 12cores 16 threads. 64GB Ram and 1x4TB M.2 SSD + 1x 4TB SATA SSD. It runs ESXi at around 10W avg. Power consumption only. The ESXi runs DSM, 3 Windows Desktops for my Mac remote usage and 2 Ubuntu Test Labs as I am a cybersecurity researcher. And it still has room for an M.2 Key B NGFF for me to expand one more SATA 2.5" SSD. It also comes with 2 Thunderbolt 4 ports which I can use for a 4x M.2 SSD enclosure and another for 10GbE Ethernet in the future. I really love your video :)

[@ThaLiquidEdit]

Hi, I also want to create something like this for pentesting. Are you still satisfied with your pick or would you pick a different one in the mean time? How much did you spend in total? How many of those VMs you run at the same time?

[@NoxSayin]

@@ThaLiquidEdit yes, I still really love my build! I was spending around £700 for the hardware, ram and m.2 ssd back in the day, but I think it will be lot cheaper today since both nuc12, ram and ssd price is cheaper now, since it got 64GB of ram, I really don’t have big limitations on how many vm I could run at the same time.The max I run will be around 12VMs all at once with no noticeable performance wall. If you mostly run Linux vm, you could expect even more.

[@ThaLiquidEdit]

@@NoxSayin Wow that's amazing. I'm really considering to buy this now :D Thanks a lot! Have a great weekend.

[@woutvergauwen8699]

Hello, if you did need to chose between what you have and what is here in the video explained. What is then for you the best homelab? I'm also looking to build something to run ESXI on with several windows server's 2022 and SQL servers on it as study machine. And then also transfer my homecontrol VM's from synology to the new machine.

[@NoxSayin]

@@woutvergauwen8699 I will still go for NUC build, the CPU is way more powerful. I also have a Syno 1621+ NAS but it is just eat up too much power (esp. I live in UK, the energy cost is sooooo high here), so I am now using my NUC as my main multi purpose server, and my "real" Syno NAS only turn on one day per month for cold backup.

[@millomaker]

Very impressive the low power consumption ! Nice video, a lot of good information, thanks man :)

[@FaceAndSurface]

Topton is due to release a version with the i3-N305 soon, so if anyone is thinking of buying it might be worth waiting a while.

[@GogozRule]

Any source? (that would be one killer board, may be tempted to upgrade) 🤤

[@kenyakking]

Any link to info?

[@NicodemPL]

How to track it down?

[@theglowcloud2215]

BUT WILL IT HAVE A GORGE CONNECTOR?!

[@WolfgangsChannel]

@theglowcloud2215 I mean it's still gonna be an Aliexpress special, so probably yeah

[@otter-pro]

This is such a thorough and well-researched video... I could tell that a lot of work went to making this video. That motherboard is now on my to-buy list. Thanks

[@ApxuBbI]

Would be cool to see video from you, how you do your backups, advices, specifics. And how you verify these as well

[@GogozRule]

I have a build with the Topton/CWWK N6005 board since around January, (wrote a review on Ali, specced it with HyperX Impact kit, Jonsbo N1 and Open Media Vault.) welcome to the club! I inspired myself around your video talking about power efficiency, looked at J4105 but wanted something beefier and with the newest Intel QSV. This board is magical, much love. ❤

[@WolfgangsChannel]

Yep, it's a great board! I initially wanted to make 'the forbidden router' machine out of it, but that kind of fell apart because of the infamous Jasper Lake QEMU bug. Thankfully it got fixed, so now I might revisit the project

[@arturwegrzyn5277]

@@WolfgangsChannel guys could you both share link to theses boards? I cant find it

[@WolfgangsChannel]

@arturwegrzyn5277 pinned comment

[@zackzeed]

@@WolfgangsChannel Please do! =)

[@matthewthomas9312]

have you updated firmware? I've read that there's no support from the manufacturer. I've recently purchased the n6005 board and am building something similar to what's in the video, I'm just curious abouut support/firmware upgrades. thanks man!

[@davepubliday6410]

Thanks for not lying about the ado. So many youtubers say there will be no more ado and then they do a lot of ado. I can’t figure out why!

[@mebeingme947]

Great video!! I went like 2 month ago with a smilar board...having 1 nvme and slightly cheaper, also with 32Gb ram :). The only thing I modded was cpu cooler, didn't like that one and went with a aluminium coolingblock which I had to modify, but runs now completely passive. from what I've seen is that WD drives generally are better at powerconsumption ...so went with those just the 5400 rpm's red plus. Over the moon with it, it handles everything I throw at it. For PSU Sharkoon Silent Storm 500 , which is also quiet power efficient at low power. Currently with 4 drives and possibilities to expand.

[@fredform]

Can you share some details of the cooling block mod? Thinking along those lines myself

[@kevinhu196]

I wish there is a same board but with N100. Which has better performance, both CPU and iGPU transcoding than the N5095/5105. Fast alder lake CPU, 6 SATA ports, power efficient, this would be a dream build.

[@pinguin3084]

Like the Asrock N100DC-ITX?

[@vojtas_cz]

@@pinguin3084 N100DC-ITX have only 1x 1gbps NIC, single channel RAM and 2xSata. Indeed if they put the N100 to similar board, it will be no brainier.

[@diotough]

@@vojtas_cz Go for the mATX board, throw in a SATA Controller (or even HBA) and a 10G Fibre Card. Done. It's not ideal, yes, but you'll have the N100 solution.

[@vojtas_cz]

@@diotough for that you need to have 2x PCIE or m2 slot.

[@diotough]

@@vojtas_cz The N100m does offer all of that: 1x PCIe 3.0 16x/2x and 1x PCIe 3.0 1x/1x. With an HBA I'd put that in the 16x slot. That'd give you still ~6-7Gbps Ethernet. With a SATA Controller I'd swap that and put a Connex-4 in the 16x slot. PCIe 3.0 2x is fast enough with a raw bandwidth of 1.969 GBps, so ~15.5Gbps after PCIe 128b/130b line code. A 4x SATA Controller is cheap and efficient as well. So the question is: Do we need more than 4 (or max 5) drives? If not than M.2 as cache drive and the last SATA port for a small 250GB SSD as system drive. Throw in a PicoPSU with custom SATA power cables and it's peak efficiency.

[@Blond501]

In regards of Memory: Please be aware that higher Memory can lead into instability! I had really to struggle with two N5105 Boards which crashed a lot of times until I went down from 64 GB RAM to 16 GB RAM. And the DIMM Modules weren't the issues! I swapped them completely

[@szaszm_]

You could also try to slightly increase the memory voltage, or decrease the clock speed, if the memory is not stable. The advertised XMP speeds are often not achievable or not stable on some CPUs or motherboards, especially at higher capacities. Recent Intel CPUs are usually better in this regard than AMD ones.

[@Blond501]

@@szaszm_ it was running at 2866 MHz, so no xmp etc

[@szaszm_]

@@Blond501 You could try XMP voltage with JEDEC clocks for maximum stability. It's typically 1.1V by default (JEDEC), and 1.35V in XMP mode, but some DIMMs are different. I'm pretty sure 1.35V is not enough to damage any DDR4 chips.

[@denvera1g1]

One note i would like to make for people new to the game of home built NAS. Avoid using NAND based SSDs for caching, especially write caching. While NAND SSDs are fine for most use cases of read caching, write caching will often see even high end SSDs die within a year(ask me how i lost 4 in one year) If you're just storing a few files here and there thats fine. But if like me, you record TV worth of video, then transcode that video, and TB worth of security camera footage, well, all of that writing, and re-writing is murder on SSDs. I reccomend at least avoiding a write cache, and if you do want a write cache, those 120GB Optane drives have really come down in price. Yes they're small and still expensive at around 4x the price of a 256GB NAND SSD, but i've had a pair working as write cache for close to 4 years now without any signs of wear, impressive seeing as they're close to 1/8th the capacity of my old 950 Pros that died at around 18 months. If you're getting Optane, another option would be to use a pair of those 120GB drives for 'special metadata' or basically the file directory information. This can speed up a RAID array of HDDs even more than a read cache in some use cases, but only when the file you're looking for is not on the read cache disks, really in a best case scenario you'd have 2x120GB optane for special metadata, 2x120 for a write cache, and maybe 2x2TB TLC NAND for read cache, but remember, if you're pulling many diverse files off of the server, this can kill a read cache just as quickly as a write cache.. One thing i've done with my server is take 3x16TB HDDs, and 2x2TB 870 EVO(SATA) and used the SATA as a read cache, then used this share for my games install folder, so far it has gone over 2 years without issue, and it feels as fast as a SATA SSD, sometimes faster thanks to the RAM caching, just with the added latency of running through a 10+gbit switch

[@fredform]

When you say to use '2x120GB for special metadata', do you mean RAID1 for these disks?

[@denvera1g1]

@@fredform basically, i dont think truenas calls it raid1 but yes

[@denvera1g1]

@@fredform if you want to be extra safe, you can run 3 of them in raid1/mirror

[@servalous]

Thats why you dont use read intensive SSD's for write intensive tasks... Nearly all vendors specify what kind of use case the SSD model has in their datasheets. Write/Read/Mix. Intel Optane SSD's are designed to last under high write operation in datacenters or workstations. If you have constant video streams on to drives, its better for your wallet and drives if you only use HDD. Take more smaller ones then fewer big ones if you need the performance. More disk more performance balanced over all drives.

[@IMDee]

@WolfgangsChannel. Thank you very much for the video. I've been waiting for a video like this for a long time. I am going to try the build you're suggesting and see how it goes :). I have, however, ran into a roadblock. I can't find the PSU anywhere. Do you have any alternatives that have a similar IDLE load efficiency ? Power consumption is really important to me too Thanks again for all your work

[@whitepawrolls]

Looking to get this case myself and was wondering if their is a premade source for that printed front as I don't own a 3d printer. Great video by the way. Thank you.

[@Akshun82]

Great video! I had been eyeing off the Topton NAS board and Jonsbo N2 but ended up going with an Asustor AS6704T with 10Gb NIC and TrueNAS SCALE.

[@Buddinski88]

Thanks for the suggestion Wolfgang! I was not quite satisfied with the solution regarding the front, so I drew something of my own. Can also be found on printables "Fractal Node 304 better cooling front cover Mod" 🙂

[@MasterCommander3]

Hahaha thanks for including the ECC disclaimer. Awesome work as always! Love this type of content even if I have a full rack with enterprise gear.

[@REGameFly]

Is ECC not that important anymore?

[@REGameFly]

I might get a MS-01 as a server then.

[@JasperK1988]

What is an alternative for the Corsair RM550x, no shop has it anymore. Seasonic Prime Fanless PX-450?

[@laurikvo]

Would like to know also more options regarding this topic. Information about PSU idle power efficiency around 10-50W load is really hard to find.

[@walterk.6361]

I have the same question and am also stuck on the Seasonic Prime Fanless PX-450 - or the CoolerMaster V550 GOLD - V2. But I have not been able to find an efficiency curve for either at about 10% and lower power.

[@namesurname4666]

Seasonic G12 GC 650 W?

[@jordywauters4386]

Can we have an update on this topic .

[@namesurname4666]

do you have an alternative for the rm550x? i don't think picopsu is ideal, i'm scared for the hdd cables

[@Trains-With-Shane]

As somebody who has a trio of those big Dell Poweredge enterprise rack monsters I can definitely testify to the desire for more efficient, quiet, and most important for me, cooler running machines. I'm actually in the process of putting together parts for a new server build. Currently, and don't laugh, i'm running my home services on a second generation i7 laptop. It's running proxmox hosting a Ubuntu server VM with my docker stack as well as a lightweight file server using Cockpit in an LXC container on top of the proxmox host OS. The main reason i'm upgrading from that is to get more space for physical drives without having to rely on USB3 which doesn't offer the IO performance I need plus the laptop's limit of 16gb of ram. upgrading to a system that has 32 or in my case 64gb will give me the flexibility to do VM labs on that device without having to power up the dual xeon 288gb Dell that I normally use for that purpose. Also upgrading to 2.5gbt ethernet will also be a plus. I wish I had known about this motherboard a few weeks ago. I may have ordered it instead of the Mini ITX X99 motherboard and 14 core xeon i'm going with, lol. Unfortunately this isn't going to be a very energy efficient build due to that. But it will be a VM powerhouse when I need it to be.

[@magicmulder]

Haha, same, I haven't switched on my R420/620/820 trio in ages due to the high electricity costs...

[@Trains-With-Shane]

@@magicmulderYep. I LOVE the rackmount enterprise gear. But using it over the years, in combination with contrasting hardware like my aforementioned laptop, have thought me that you don't need a lot of horsepower at all to run most homelab services. My largest bottleneck these days is RAM for ZFS. So if I could find a nice low power unit that supported 128gb id be all over it. lol. But so far 64gb is serving me well enough, but I may upgrade later.

[@benjaminellison]

now I need to find a suitable rackmount chassis for the n5105.

[@Lann91]

Catching an incompatible memory stick early on with memtest is really a great suggestion. I learned it a hard way.

[@thekampfkeks9654]

I would take a look at the CS351 Case from Silverstone. I bought it for 160€ used in Germany. 5 Hot Swap Bays + 2x 3,5 inch HDD Bays + 6 SATA SSD Bays, Full Size Power Supply, microATX Support and room for many fans.

It looks super cool. I just whish Silverstone wasn't so protective of it. They have 2 cases in the sugo line based on the same frame, but they made sure you can't fit 7 HDDs into them.

[@JamesMyatt1]

Closest equivalent prebuilt is probably TERRAMASTER F4-423 4-Bay NAS which has N5095 CPU, 4GB DDR4 Memory upgradable, 2x 2.5GbE. And allows (unofficial) bring your own OS. So it's slightly lower spec but cheaper smaller, and lower power too (probably). Lots of youtubers, like Hardware Haven and apalrd have done Videos on this (or similar). But personally I'm waiting for the 12th versions (e.g. N100).

[@marcinneuman8283]

This is what I'm eyeing also, but in 2 bay version (F2-423). Perfect for me, because I can fit all my (important) data and docker containers on 2TB. So I can have relatively inexpensive 2TB NVME Raid 1 and supplement this with RAID 1 with 2.5" HDDs in that 2 bays for all other uninportant stuff. I'm currently on ASROCK j3455 and it's plenty of computing power (for my needs). For me RAM is more important - 16GB is ok for now, but just barely, so terramaster + 32GB would be perfect.

[@redge76]

@@marcinneuman8283 you can also choose the asustor AS6702T (or AS6704T) with a N5105 CPU. I'm currently running ADM (asustor NAS solution)on it, but it's is a complete mess. This soft is a shame. So I will now install unraid.

[@NickSale-q6y]

I keep coming back to this video to spec out my soon-to-be DIY NAS. One question I have is whether or not you can use 2 bigger M.2 NVME drives and partition them for boot AND cache drive? This way, you can save the 2 bays wasted on the SSD cache drive and use them for more 16+TB HDs.

[@WolfgangsChannel]

You could probably do it, but I prefer to have a separate boot drive and don't need more HDDs

[@anothersiguy]

That motherboard is actually awesome, first I’ve heard if it. I ended up going with a 4130, embedded H81 ITX board with free RAM from work and a H1110 HBA for ~$80 total.

[@aliancemd]

Getting 4x new Intel i226-V 2.5G for that price is insane, what to say about the rest on it.

[@mamborambo]

Perfect timing! I'm just about to start on my new NAS and this is exactly what I want. Please do one more video and focus only on the minuses, not to negate this project, but to fill out what someone owning this build needs to be know about that didn't work.

[@Thewickedjon]

i've come back and re-watched this video so many times..... every time I re-wach it, I understand something new lololol you did such a great job editing and explaining things.

[@Thewickedjon]

I would get this board and pair it with a jonsbo case. put truenas scale in it, and try to virtualize pfsense , do you think it's possible?

[@fynderde]

You could also take a look at the Asustor Flashstor 6 - similar Hardware (CPU), but SSD centric with 6 / 12 drive bays and very small.

[@chechsp]

It looks very cool. However it seems to have some issues, like limited read speed to 1000mbs, and for the price you can buy 3 of these boards and some extras. Still very cool, I'd probably buy it if it was a bit cheaper.

[@Itsfranklyfrank]

Keen on the next upload of this build. That last “what’s on my server” video was a year ago. Keep up the great content thankyou

[@TCOphox]

6:25 I've had a lot of issues with DDR4 when transferring over large files. I used to not believe in ECC until the day where my Windows partition BSOD'd a lot, and a lot of my games and files turned out to be corrupted. As it turns out, the data error rate for DDR4 is significantly higher than DDR3. Moreso than IBM's estimated 1 bit flip per GB written per year. Google reported 10 bit flips instead. This also explained why I was able to get away without ECC on DDR3. Another fun fact is that DDR5 sticks actually have their own "ECC" that's invisible to the system. But it is only to get their error rates down to DDR4 levels which is still bad.

[@WolfgangsChannel]

Those sound like bad sticks to me. Whether your memory is ECC or not, you should always run Memtest on your RAM regularly, if you care about your data. ECC might help you catch those errors earlier though, and that’s an advantage I’d reckon that most people wouldn’t want to use ECC memory on a desktop even if Intel didn’t gatekeep it. ECC memory doesn’t take well to overclocking, e.g. running faster than JEDEC speeds. AMD recommends 3200-3600 MT/s memory for optimal performance, and Intel CPUs also profit from faster memory. DDR5 does have some form of onboard memory checking but AFAIK, it’s not quite the same as ECC

[@ShaferHart]

bit rot is *very much a thing* Wolfgang didn't say it wasn't, he just said that for a home server it's not strictly necessary. Ymmv.

[@cameronfrye5514]

"I think the importance of ECC memory for a home use server is greatly exaggerated".. I wish I had heard more statements like this before building my current home server. It is primarily used for backups, a few containerized apps and Jellyfin. Nothing on it doesn't exist in at least one other location and it does nothing mission critical. Had I left ECC memory off the list of "must haves" my budget would have allowed for greater storage capacity and faster networking.. things of greater use to me. It's good to see people separating home servers and home labs from corporate and mission critical systems. Up until just a few years ago the only people talking about home use NAS or server systems were pearl clutchers working in IT for 35 years who would immediately bounce you out of a forum if you were found to be using (gasp!!) NON - ECC memory and had the sheer audacity to ask THEM a question.

[@xPakrikx]

Its more important for ZFS because of ARC in memory. But yeah for home use NAS with backup ... if price is same as non-ecc go for it, but usually unbuffered ram are even more expensive than buffered so if you are on budget i dont think its worth it.

[@OloDeepdelver]

Thanks a lot for the video, it got me to start my own DIY server. I'm really keen to see you dive into the tough stuff, especially the indepth bios setup side and how it works as a home server.

[@vali20vali20vali20]

Well, someone at work bought a couple of these 4-bay Synology NAS thingies without consulting at first, so of course I was pissed off when I wanted to build Proxmox Backup Servers for the main server rigs and found out we had all these hardware sitting unused because of the OS they shipped with. How it went down: I soldered an HDMI connector to the pads on the board, that way you get video out and can actually install an OS. The UEFI program on the thing is crippled, not all settings in the menu map to the correct place in the NVRAM, so first I recommend firing up DSM and making the settings in there, like auto power on etc. As far as I remember from doing this mod, the UEFI has Secure Boot forced and only boots Synology images. I had to set it to “Legacy” first, and that allowed booting up things in BIOS mode. Unfortunately, it can only boot things connected to the internal USB port where the Synology DOM is attached. The Symology DOM is just a 120MB USB 2.0 pen drive with a different connector. So you can boot things using that port, install to drives connected to the NVMe ports, but can only boot again from USB. I got around that by installing Proxmox Backup Server this way, and then backing up their DOM and flashing it with a custom buildroot image I made which boots up a minimal Linux with LVM support that then mounts the NVMe drive where Proxmox is installed and kexecs it (thank God this facility exists). At first, I tried chainloading using a couple of traditional bootloaders, like grub, but none of them worked, none could ‘see’ the NVMe drives at that stage. It was strange, because booting full Linux, as I said, that ‘sees’ the drives and can work with them just fine, so yeah, in the end I boot Linux and from there boot again another Linux basically. Linux (unlike Windows) doesn’t complain if the boot disk is formatted GPT and you boot in BIOS mode, it just works, so the Proxmox main NVMe drives are of course GPT formatted. In the end, the USB DOM acts as a bootloader. To have the hard drives spin up, I soldered resistances across the power supplies ICs on the daughter board, and similarly for the USB ports. These ICs probably allow for fine grained control of the ports from DSM, but for my use case I want them always on. The control is connected to GPIO as far as I remember, so theoretically one could write scripts to power on/off stuff in there, but I did not bother. In the end, you have to desolder the HDMI port in order to fit the thing back in the case. It was a fun project, definitely a hacking vibe. I run 2 of these in production, zero issues, one as a backup located closely to the main server, one off site. I can even do Proxmox updates, as my boot script in buildroot sorts Linux kernel images and always boots the newest one, basically allowing for updates. The hardware is aesthetically pleasant and takes few space and makes low noise, so I think going through the effort was well worth the outcome, if not only for the challenge of figuring out a way around it. But yeah, pretty locked down, as you mentioned in the video.

[@TokyoTransit]

what do you use for reliable storage of your files? just specific file system or some raid5 approach? or do you use a separate NAS?

Great video! I was waiting for a review for this boar, as the N5095 seems really good on paper, and much better than the J series ones used by the big name brands. Also this board has an ATX power connector. The ecc part was funny, but I was surprised by the recommendation of the M.2 sata adapter, as those are usually hated in the community in favor of used HBA cards with special firmware on them. My server uses an AM1 board in a Node 304. For the cooling a closed up the side wentsand reversed the airflow, so it's from the back to the front, with a Silverstone magnetic filer at the back. The node 304 is a really nice ITX case for this usecase. A slightly wider variant with matx support would be nice. Something like the Silverstone CS351, but it's rather expensive unfortunately. For the PSU I went with a 400W SFX unit, which gives me a bit of extra space.

[@WolfgangsChannel]

The PCIe/M.2 SATA cards literally use the same kinds of controllers that you'd see installed on motherboards (ASMedia and JMicron). HBAs on the other hand are a bit more complex and are mostly useful for hardware RAID (which you shouldn't do in this day and age). Because of that, they are way more power hungry compared to more 'simple' SATA controllers. That being said, avoid cards from Marvell and adapters that use SATA port multiplication. Here's a forum post with recommended controllers: forums.unraid.net/topic/102010-recommended-controllers-for-unraid/

@@WolfgangsChannel Thanks for the info! I've been using one of the recommended Asmedia cards with windows server for the past 3 years without issues. I originally went this route, as I looked at the Raid cards and was put off by the power figures.

[@WolffyLP]

Nice video! I build a similar Nas on my own. But I have problems to find an efficient PSU. The RM550 is nowhere available. Any tips for an alternate PSU?

[@nagi603]

Node 304: Unfortunately cable management is a nightmare with it. So modular is a must. And my first one had some paint in the tray standoff holes. Regarding enterprise drives: I'm still a bit uneasy with helium, after leakage stories of the first gens mostly. Shucked drives may require some modification to work. So beware.

[@l33t00r]

I never understand how people like the Node case so much, its just average. On the other hand, a real good mini NAS enclosure for 8-10 drives still doesn't exists.

[@PatrikKron]

@@l33t00rI haven’t seen anything like it. I went with the Node 804 (much larger). It’s okay, but I would have liked the drives to be dampend a bit more. And the fan filters to be accessable without putting the computer on a table with the front hanging over the edge.

[@konrad129]

12:29 what does it mean "to sleep on refubrished drives", I have never seen this saying. Is it recomendation to the refubrished enterprise drives or new customer drives? I don't get it.

[@wiegraf9009]

Sleeping on something means ignoring its potential value and losing out

[@konrad129]

@@wiegraf9009 makes sense now, thak you

[@Ilost11]

It's a shame you went with the Celeron 5105 just as the new intel N95. N100, N200 and N300 released. The N100 has up to a 50% performance uplift over the 5105 depending on the workload while using the same amount of power, DDR5, has AV1 decode support and AVX support (5105 doesn't) while having around the same MSRP. The only advantage the 5105 has is dual channel memory while the N100 is locked to single channel DDR5 only to a current max of a single 32gb DDR5 SODIMM (potentially now a single 48gbs but this configuration needs to be tested). With some tuning some users were able to squeak out another 5% - 15% in performance. Despite being released in Q1 2023, we're only now seeing some OEMs release embedded motherboards, but mini pcs and fanless x86 router PCs are already on market. It's the huge upgrade in lower power x86 computing other than being limited to single channel only which I suspect will be lifted with newer iterations of this design.

[@WolfgangsChannel]

That's actually amazing! As @FaceAndSurface mentioned in another comment, Topton is allegedly going to release an N300 version soon, so I'll definitely review that when it comes out

[@NicodemPL]

But when and where to find motherboard only with N200/300? Also price - N300 is like 130$ alone.

[@ali8essam]

​@@WolfgangsChannelThey released N100 and N305 motherboards already, but a bit more pricey

[@maigork]

What is the difference between Topton nas board and industrial board with similar layout that is cheaper at AliExpress if anyone can explain me please

[@tommeier1888]

Hey man love this video and the contrapoints references are huge green flags ❤ keep it coming!

[@krekas]

So the PSU rm550x can't be find, at least in my country, to be bought. Any alternatives to it?

[@clomads]

What an unexpected crossover with the Contrapoints refs.

[@sgoolgekonto5015]

any good to go alternative for the Corsair RM550x 550 (2021)?

[@sgoolgekonto5015]

Seasonic Focus PX 550W ATX 2.4 ?

[@mevans4953]

Ever since Linus’s channel died, I’ve been getting recommended quality content like yours. Glad to see it and keep up the great work!

[@asineth832]

Tailscale/WireGuard don't use AES/AES-NI, instead they use ChaCha20/Poly1305 for encryption instead. I think the reasoning behind it is that it's faster when there's no acceleration (like ARM devices for example).

[@Kadranos]

No ECC for my storage is a deal breaker. My literal autism just can't cope with that scenario.

[@Silentguy_]

Lmao it’s the opposite for me because my wallet can’t cope with the price of ECC memory

[@Kadranos]

@@Silentguy_ I picked up a 4 UDIMM 32gb ECC 2400MHz DDR4 kit for $64 in May 2022. Deals are out there if you're patient and look.

[@pablo15sc]

Hello, I have the same build, how did you solve the cpu temperature? Simply changing the thermal paste? Thanks!

[@jbxrm]

How many people running a small personal use server for themselves fall into massive regret over not having ECC memory? Hard agree I really dont think its that common an issue. Been running plex for 15 years with basic #gamer™ RAM recycled from other builds and have never had an issue. If youre running your business and livelihood off the box, sure, but a DIY NAS like this is probably more likely to be a fun hobbyist project for pihole, automating the kitchen lights and streaming some linux isos.

[@ulqi]

that joke about streaming and seeding linux isos always gets me

[@Cynyr]

Been running the "old build" as a Nas/server for about 20 years now. Never had ECC, never seemed to cause an issue. I've migrated data across about 4 or so different pools of drives now.

[@cd9954]

That power supply is pretty impossible to find now. Is the 650w RXM corsair as efficient? What about the 550 CXM from them? Thanks

[@blablagal94]

Never did I expect to see a contrapoints referencce here lmao

[@brianwilliams108]

Is this build still viable without access to a 3-D printer? The front face panel (with fan mount) as well as the HDD enclosure pieces wouldn't be accessible to me since I can't print those out. I wanted to attempt the same build, but just wanted to check that I can get by without those printed items. Thanks!

[@WolfgangsChannel]

The 3D printed parts are entirely optional 😉

[@laurentlafayette]

Hey @WolfgangsChannel, Wireguard does not use AES so AES-NI is of no use to it. Wireguard uses ChaCha20-Poly1305 which is faster than AES even in processors that support AES-NI.

[@mxie108]

Thanks for putting this video together! I'm thinking of building a similar system using the newer-gen CPU/motherboard, and I'm not sure if I should pick the N100 or N305 CPU. Also, would the single-slot memory really matter for similar home server use cases?

[@davegrg123]

Can you use the front panel USB 3 ports from this case with the Topton motherboard via an adapter? From what I can see - this would result in the front panel ports being usb 2?

[@MrGasPro]

A question: the JMicron JMB585 SATA controller should manage 5 of 6 SATA ports, so there is a "native" SATA port, controlled by the chipset I believe. Can the extra controller be disabled via BIOS or by other means? I'm thinking of having a sata as main drive on the native port, disable the JMB585, and use M2 for raid disks for NAS. Or maybe just find a motherboard version without the JMB585

[@WolfgangsChannel]

Unfortunately it can’t be disabled in the bios.

[@OnLyStrahl]

This motherboard comes in a green and a black variant. I bought the green one (unaware there is a difference). As far as I was able to find out the green one has a i225 network adapter instead of a i226 and also an older bios with more bugs and less features. Is that a noticable difference so that I should change the green one for a black one?

[@JAFOpty]

I ran into an issue with a Shucked drive. The disk wouldn't start when using a regular power supply SATA cable. I had to use a Molex output of the PSU, with a Molex to SATA converter, then it started spinning. This is because the HDDs used on USB drives are different from the OEM ones, specifically the power pins of the drive itself. So just keep this in mind! :)

[@WolfgangsChannel]

Be careful about molex to SATA cables - the ones that have cables go directly into the plastic molding are dangerous. Instead, you can cover certain pins on the drive with a kapton tape

[@christianlink1817]

Molex to sata lose all your data

[@timeltdme4355]

fun to see, i had computer in the same case with Ryzen 5 1600, 16GB ram, WD Gold 6TB and Samsung 980 PRO, Seasonic Core GM-500, unfortunately the MB was some Asus with just one M2, one gigabit and one pcie16, which also led to selling it, however the faster processor speed was very useful, power consumption idle was higher, great to see this segment evolving, wishing many people will try Proxmox! was running Ubuntu server 2 thread (samba), Ubuntu server 8 thread (gcc) and 2 thread pfsense "on a stick" with vlans into 24port switch, was fun, but i switched to usbc T7 ssds and Jottacloud, due to larger media nature of my work curious how the file backup management evolves, might do another server in some years

[@trackerkan]

The CPU used in this build is not supported by MongoDB from version 5.0 on. If the Docker containers you plan on running on this server required it, you should go with a different motherboard/CPU.

[@Gingersnap155]

I know it’s been awhile but I’m pretty sure the reason unraid locks up with powertop auto tune is the intel 2.5g NIC. I have that issue with my Asus board but my asrock one with a Realtek Nic works fine. I put in a Realtek nic and disabled the Intel NIC and no more lockups with auto tune. There is also another version of the n5105 board that is green and it has the asmedia 1166. Though there’s report of the bios not supporting ASPM without mods. IDK I just ordered one to see if I can get lower idle draw vs my 10850k system. (Currently 67w with 14hdds and 4 SSD’s spundown)

[@maxirunpl]

I don't know much about the servers. What is the difference between making a server and just putting a lot od SSD storage to my existing pc and holding things there? Taking into consideration that my pc can run 24/7

[@WolfgangsChannel]

Conceptually - none. A home server is nothing but a computer that is on 24/7 and that runs services. The difference is in details

[@NLRevZ]

What a coincidence! I built a *very* similar machine a while ago but with a second revision of the other board you mentioned that has the separate PCIe slot. I'm running a 5-port SATA card off of that, combined with the six ports on the mainboard itself (across two SATA controllers) and an NVMe slot for a cache drive I stuffed all of that, a 120mm rear exit fan, a 2TB 3.5" parity drive and ten 2.5" 1TB unused old stock hard drives I had laying around all into a gutted-out HP MicroServer Gen8 case, utilizing the original four caddy bays with three dual 2.5"-to-3.5" caddy adapters and the 3.5" in the fourth slot. Three of the remaining four 2.5" drives hang off 3D-printed brackets on each of the sides (one on the left, two on the right) and one of them sits in a fake slimline CD drive-to-2.5" drive caddy in place of the original optical drive. I don't have any issues with power regulation while running Unraid, though that's only because I set all of the CPU power limit levels back to the Intel recommended settings. CPU power wise, the N5105 is perfectly adequate for running my Unifi controller, a one-way incremental backup, some read-only SMB shares for accessibility to part of the folders and a remote WOL tool. It's not on 24/7; Only when I plan on accessing the data, doing a backup (once weekly) or modifying anything about the Unifi settings do I boot it up so it's more than economical enough to me. File transfers are more than fine across a single 2.5GbE link to my local network; I frequently get near or just over 2Gbps while transferring large files which of course dumps into the 256GB NVMe cache drive before Unraid moves it into the slower permanent storage. I replaced the FlexATX proprietary server PSU in the machine with a 250W Seasonic FlexATX unit that dropped right in, runs semi-fanless and it's right in its sweet spot for efficiency while a backup runs. TL;DR I built a machine quite like this, very low-power, sparsely powered on but I'm in love with how compact it is and it serves (hah) all of the purposes I had for it. 🙂 Great video, I enjoyed seeing how differently a similar machine can be used!

[@l33t00r]

Can you tell me your SATA controller card model? Because I've tried 5 different ones so far and all sucked (failed, errors, etc.)

[@ra4design]

I built this using the Jonsbo N1 case. The case fan pinout is only 3 pins and the case fan runs at 100% all the time. The BIOS has settings for PWM, but it's confusing since there are only 3 pins on the motherboard. I tried to change the settings, but to no avail: The fan keeps running at 100% and quite loud. Are you able to control the RPM of the case fan?

[@aliancemd]

That motherboard is a steal. At ~100-150 euros, it's crazy that it has 4x new Intel I226-V 2.5G eth ports, besides having all the other stuff on it. Also, on a side note: love that it's all blacked out. I don't need any of this but at that price and power draw, makes you curious(could replace some things, even just a router).

[@pikaskew]

Just a heads up on shucking external drives, manufacturers are increasingly using USB integrated control boards instead USB to internal SATA adapters. Newer WD Elements/Passport drives, some Seagate Backup drives and Samsung portable SSDs. Always research the drive to make sure it can be shucked.

[@theskuffedknerd]

Thanks to this video, I started ordering parts my my home NAS. I have one problem though, the case. Either not available or inflated pricing everywhere. Does anyone else have a suggestion for a decent case like the one Wolfgang had in this video?

[@xr043]

The rm550x 2021 psu is hard to find, should i get a rm750x? Will that one be even efficient if i dont use all the extra watt? Are there other alternatives?

[@virtualnk5825]

I'm also interested in this, did you find an alternative?

[@xr043]

I went for the rm750x, rm550x is discontinued.

[@virtualnk5825]

@@xr043 Oh good to know, thanks!

[@4LO4LO]

I think you're totally misunderstanding the appeal of ECC memory. Once it becomes obsolete, companies dump that stuff for super cheap. I just upgraded my power edge server, and got an additional 256 GB of RAM for about $100. Not to mention, the higher density per dimm, due to ranking or load reduced memory.

[@WolfgangsChannel]

I do! The problem is that the kind of servers to take used DDR3 RDIMMs also usually consume loads of power

[@4LO4LO]

@@WolfgangsChannel I absolutely agree with you on the power consumption and noise arguments you brought up, and those issues make a good case against ECC builds for most people. I'm saying that I don't think reliability is what draws most consumers to ecc, as your video suggests. It's primarily the lower module cost (later) and higher dimm density (like 512gb per module). As the server gets older, you have more upgradability options. It still doesn't outweigh the power consumption issue you address for most consumers though.

[@chucksw1]

Great build video! I heard you mention 10Ge was added but I didnt see what you used, did you use a m.2 to 10GB or a PCIe 10Ge port and where did you get one? Thanks!

[@Schroinx]

I got this Seasonic PRIME Fanless PX 450 for my media server as it also has low end efficiency, as it will be ideling most of the time, as the case fan pushes air through. Seagate Exos and the other are loud as the case is in my living room. I got the new Toshiba MG10 20TB drives, as they are much quieter, close to the WD Red Plus. Also I got a SK Hynix P31 for system drive, as it is one of the most energy efficient as well and it will be on 24/7. I'll try at get hold of some of those cables.

[@youcaillou]

Given that this comes with QuickSync, how many transcodes do you think you can support on this machine? 1080p to whatever is needed…

[@gideonmilano3199]

thanks for the video. I am in the midle of upgrading my 2bay nas to a home lab or Synology 4 bay for increased capacity. your suggestion is compelling, however with Synology i get raid which means if a drives fail i pull it out and replace that drive which has happened in the pass. So what option do I have?

[@Iam2lazy2register]

Hi Wolfgang, I just received my board and the sound is okayish. Not sure how much I should expect. Can you tell us more about the washer mod? Also my washers look pretty thin - maybe they changed it on newer revisions?

[@gontranmacedoine9994]

I have the same question ! the fan keeps turning on and off, it's okay in a closet, but still...

[@NerderousRage]

So glad I came across your videos. Currently working on moving my personal use nas to a node 304 case. Just need to find a power efficient board with a pcie slot as I have sas drives.

[@KungFuKirbs]

So I've actually followed along and bought some of this. I've got two M.2s and two 2.5 SSDs. Should I be using the 2.5s for the cache and installing proxmox on the M2s? Where would I install VMs and Docker containers?

[@WolfgangsChannel]

whichever you prefer, tbh. I use the 2.5 drives for cache

[@ShcherbynaM]

17:20 I've ordered almost the same SATA cable from Aliexpress and after one week my drives went crazy. Signal interference in these are enormous, so system tries to read same segment over and over, until it reads it correctly.

[@WolfgangsChannel]

Weird. I've been using those for months, did multiple scrubs and parity calculations - no issues so far

[@ShcherbynaM]

@@WolfgangsChannel Strange. I suppose that either I've got defect cable or because I was using them in RAID10, therefore all 4 drives was reading and writing at the same time.

[@jackipiegg]

9:51 Guess you missed that this motherboard has staggered spin up feature on the bios, therefore you don't need to factor power startup for power supplies.

[@WolfgangsChannel]

You should never rely on that when choosing a power supply.

[@jonathankeay3411]

Great video, I was wondering could I add a VM to this to run Blue Iris and 8 Poe cameras? I’m wanting to build a small NAS that can also manage my home cctv.

[@SunnyDXi]

Hi, is there anything to watch out for when purchasing the board through Aliexpress? Obviously the CPU should be included, but the prices seem to vary a bit even with the same seller. Might be related to the weird discounts Aliexpress offers, but I'm not sure.

[@Gamer4Eire]

So to be clear the best approach is OS on a small NVME. A second larger NVME for cache and then up to 6 SATA drives?

[@1mouse3]

Im going a different route for a home server and using a lenovo ts440 case, it has 8x 3.5 hot swap bays. My old x79-up4 with a 4960x cpu and 48gb of ram will be used, can add 16gb more of ram for it. Main goal is to set it up to run more than one cnc using linuxcnc using a hypervisor, and have a small san network ran off it. I got a LSI MegaRAID 9361-8i card to run a raid 10 and 8 tested used HUS724030ALS641 3tb drives that are listed as compatible, this should give decent speed on a 10gb iscsi. Still need to decide on a few things before I assemble it, like a video card with low latency and 4 dvi or display port out.

[@cawrin]

For the front case mod, did you cut the excess metal off of the case for the fan to go in? I just got the 3D print from a friend and I'm curious if that's what I'll have to do as well

[@WolfgangsChannel]

I don’t remember anymore, but it was also to create a path for the airflow

[@giammi56]

How would one introduce backups for a 48TB unit??

[@Eihrister]

Regarding the RAM limit, it's the limit per module. Not total installed memory. That's why it supports 32GB. My CwwK board (very similar to this) with a J6413 supports 32GB per slot (64GB total).

[@Stoney_Eagle]

Bought 6 8TB WD red pro drives 3 weeks ago, still in the resilvering process to replace the old smr drives 😢 if only I knew back then to buy CMR drives. BUT I didn't loose a single file while the drives are on their way to heaven. Hooray for ZFS!

[@TheReising]

There are similar boards with an n100 and an extra pciexpress. Would you recommend this over the n5105 board?

[@vimvigour3327]

Do you have a video on which containers you run in you home lab, and what they do (or what you use them for)? If not, can you please make one?

[@DavidAlsh]

I have a home server but I am not sure how to use SSDs as cache drives. I just installed Debian on it and do everything with Docker/Portainer. Should I be using a home lab-specific distro to make this easier on myself?

[@cesarinleyva]

@Wolfgang Can you please share a link to the washers you used to reduce the cpu fan noise?