Looking to update/upgrade my microserver and build a media pc

[GeorgeStorm]

I'm leaning towards toshiba drives since they seem to be the same price as the seagate but offer a 2 year warranty compared to one.
The external hitachi drives are also tempting since it looks like they come with a 2 year warranty as well.. Don't really understand how they can be cheaper than most internal drives but ah well.

[aidanjt]

Red drives are basically a Black drive with different firmware. For home use perhaps the firmware isn't so important, but usually in a RAID array you don't want the something like 5 minute time-out that some consumer drives can go on for re-trying a sector that they will obviously never be able to read. The drive should quickly send back an error so that the controller/computer can grab a copy of that sector from elsewhere so the user gets their data and the controller can then write the correct data over the errored sector so the drive can re-write the data or reallocate a spare sector as it feels appropriate.

WD claim vibration protection, but I suspect that is just the fact that Black drives have decent dual bearing setups.

I went for Red drives for my server. I would avoid any "green" drive, raid arrays tend not to like them.

Just as a note, if you're using Linux MD (pure software) RAID, TLER status doesn't matter much at all. The kernel will allow the drive to attempt to recover the bad block, but will automatically reset the drive if it doesn't respond to commands within 30 seconds and mark the last sector it got stuck on as a bad block and write around it. So greens are fine in that context, if the better hardware and warranty doesn't justify the price difference in your estimation.

[GeorgeStorm]

I'm not planning on using RAID to start with at least, but it's something I'll bear in mind.

Had a bit more of a think over the weekend and I reckon I'll have a budget of around £200 for the cpu, cpu cooler, motherboard, psu, boot ssd/hdd and a wireless keyboard and mouse.

Recommendations?

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Just received one of the Toshiba/Hitachi 2TB drives. I already have a 2TB Samsung F4,and the new drive seems to be around 70% faster,although the F4 does have files on it.

I'm not planning on using RAID to start with at least, but it's something I'll bear in mind.

Had a bit more of a think over the weekend and I reckon I'll have a budget of around £200 for the cpu, cpu cooler, motherboard, psu, boot ssd/hdd and a wireless keyboard and mouse.

Recommendations?

RAM??

[herulach]

Thats very tight, you're going to be in an AMD APU system, or something prebuilt - you won't have anything too quiet for that price. My suspicion is something like this:
http://www.ebuyer.com/579786-zoostor...p-pc-7873-1214
will be as good as you'll get, although I won't speak for the quality of components they use, you'll struggle to build for that price.

Alternatively if its just media pc you could grab another microserver and a £20 gpu.

[GeorgeStorm]

As I said in my OP, I already own several components, hence the whole reason for thinking about a media pc.

I already have RAM, case, BR drive, some fans (gentle typhoons) and a fan controller.

it must also have the ability to game, nothing crazy, but would be nice to be abel to play things like the LEGO games, GRID, then fairly simple games like super meat boy, bit trip runner etc.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

I would look at the following:

http://www.cclonline.com/product/917...phics/CPU0150/
http://www.scan.co.uk/products/asus-...-dvi-hdmi-matx
http://www.cclonline.com/product/662...Drive/HDD1190/
http://www.cclonline.com/product/982...t-OEM/PSU0486/

That should be around £179 plus a keyboard and mouse. I assume you have 1600MHZ DDR3 RAM??

[GeorgeStorm]

I would look at the following:

http://www.cclonline.com/product/917...phics/CPU0150/
http://www.scan.co.uk/products/asus-...-dvi-hdmi-matx
http://www.cclonline.com/product/662...Drive/HDD1190/
http://www.cclonline.com/product/982...t-OEM/PSU0486/

That should be around £179 plus a keyboard and mouse. I assume you have 1600MHZ DDR3 RAM??

A friend from uni is looking to sell his 5800k boxed with stock cooler, used for about half a year for £60 so I'll probably pick that up. I won't commit to a PSU until I've confirmed I don't have one spare (I just can't remember )
It's only the HDD which seems pricey (since you can buy 3tb drives for £75 paying £35 for 0.5tb doesn't sit well with me )

My RAM is indeed 1600mhz.

[DanceswithUnix]

A friend from uni is looking to sell his 5800k boxed with stock cooler, used for about half a year for £60 so I'll probably pick that up. I won't commit to a PSU until I've confirmed I don't have one spare (I just can't remember )
It's only the HDD which seems pricey (since you can buy 3tb drives for £75 paying £35 for 0.5tb doesn't sit well with me )

My RAM is indeed 1600mhz.

3TB for £75 is only a bargain if you actually need 3TB

I find most PCs in our house use about 200 to 300GB of storage space and 500GB is plenty. As a bonus, less platters makes for a quieter, cooler and with less bits to fall off hopefully more reliable drive.

[GeorgeStorm]

3TB for £75 is only a bargain if you actually need 3TB

I find most PCs in our house use about 200 to 300GB of storage space and 500GB is plenty. As a bonus, less platters makes for a quieter, cooler and with less bits to fall off hopefully more reliable drive.

Haha I understand the theory
The idea of selling my current 2tb drives for £40-50 each and then buying a new 500gb for £35 is just a bit annoying

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

A friend from uni is looking to sell his 5800k boxed with stock cooler, used for about half a year for £60 so I'll probably pick that up. I won't commit to a PSU until I've confirmed I don't have one spare (I just can't remember )
It's only the HDD which seems pricey (since you can buy 3tb drives for £75 paying £35 for 0.5tb doesn't sit well with me )

My RAM is indeed 1600mhz.

That is the cheapest a 500GB hard drive has been for ages - they are usually around £40 to £45. My 2TB hard drive which I just got was £59.99 and that is relatively cheap for one.

[GeorgeStorm]

That is the cheapest a 500GB hard drive has been for ages - they are usually around £40 to £45. My 2TB hard drive which I just got was £59.99 and that is relatively cheap for one.

Yeah, just a bit annoying relative to the bigger drives.
Just agreed to get the 5800k for £55 which is nice
Now tempted to look for a FM2+ board so I can upgrade to Kaveri in the future maybe. (or I could get a mitx FM2+ board if they exist and put my current FM2 board in the media pc for the family....)

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Yeah, just a bit annoying relative to the bigger drives.
Just agreed to get the 5800k for £55 which is nice
Now tempted to look for a FM2+ board so I can upgrade to Kaveri in the future maybe. (or I could get a mitx FM2+ board if they exist and put my current FM2 board in the media pc for the family....)

£59.99 was more than what I paid for my 2TB drive in 2011!! Luckily I had some Amazon vouchers.

[DanceswithUnix]

Yeah, just a bit annoying relative to the bigger drives.
Just agreed to get the 5800k for £55 which is nice
Now tempted to look for a FM2+ board so I can upgrade to Kaveri in the future maybe. (or I could get a mitx FM2+ board if they exist and put my current FM2 board in the media pc for the family....)

They do exist:

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/gigab...-dvi-hdmi-mitx

If you are going for quiet rather than speed you might be best off with a 2.5in hard drive. I think that is where the low capacity market is going, ebuyer are selling hard drives in a usb3 case for £35 with retail packaging.

http://www.ebuyer.com/320101-hgst-50...-drive-0s03455

Might be hard to return the drive if it is out of the case though.

[GeorgeStorm]

They do exist:

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/gigab...-dvi-hdmi-mitx

If you are going for quiet rather than speed you might be best off with a 2.5in hard drive. I think that is where the low capacity market is going, ebuyer are selling hard drives in a usb3 case for £35 with retail packaging.

http://www.ebuyer.com/320101-hgst-50...-drive-0s03455

Might be hard to return the drive if it is out of the case though.

Nice, I've go the FM2 version of that exact board.
Would be quite a bit of hassle to swap my build around though, might just leave it, could always swap it around in the future if I just buy it for the media pc. Only potential issues being the lack of SATA ports and expansion slots.
I'll probably just get a half decent matx board and then keep my own PC separate from it and just sell my current board on in the future if I want to upgrade.

Not sure on the noise situation, since I've not worked out exactly where it will be located, I'm not sure how noisy it will be able to be before becoming an issue. I think warranty is sadly lost when drives are taken out of enclosures, but it may not be the case with all products.

Tempted to buy a 4tb drive today so I can get it tomorrow, transfer stuff off of two of my current 2tb drives tomorrow evening/night then be able to sell the two 2tb drives at a LAN this weekend.
Could get a Seagate 4tb for £125, or a Toshiba 3tb for £77. The 3tb might be more sensible, could probably still clear two 2tb drives with some shuffling.

[GeorgeStorm]

Just ordered a 3TB Toshiba PA4293E-1HN0 since I've got a friend interested in buying two of my 2tb drives at the weekend. Only went for one new drive since I've got another 2tb drive which isn't currently in my microserver due to the number of bays which is only half full, so even though I'm swapping two 2tb drives for a 3tb drive I'll still have more room in the end.

Went for the toshiba since it was the cheapest and comes with a 3 year warranty, which is pretty good (it's also a lower rpm drive which may help with noise/power consumption etc )

Should be picking up the 5800k this weekend as well

Slowly but surely on my way now, I'll probably end up buying another couple of 3tb drives, and maybe a 4tb or two if they're on sale over the coming weeks as I sell more of my 2tb drives.