Suggestions for Hardware / HDD configuration

[sappel]

Hello everyone,
I currently preparing my homeserver for reactivation: Xeon 1245v3 with 32GB RAM, used to run a few Linux VMs and containers (3-5), nothing too heavy.
I have 2x 4TB drives currently installed, but I want to move these into my NAS for backup purpose. So a new HDD setup is needed. Since I have a really bad mixup of old and new drives lying around, I need some suggestions what to do best with them. I'll list everything I got and perhabs someone can give me a good suggestion.
4x 3,5" Slots free, 1x M.2 2240 + potential PCI-E card with 2x M.2 NVMe (waiting for the delivery)

1. 2x new 2TB WD Gold 3,5"
2. 1x almost new 2TB Seagate Barracude 2,5"
3. 1x used 800GB Intel SSD DC S3520 (got a second one in a Desktop PC, just recently mirrored because the old 250GB SSD was getting full)
4. 1x used 480GB GoodRam CX200 SSD
5. 1x used 512GB NVMe SK Hynix M.2
6. 2x new 250GB Samsung 860 Evo M.2
7. 1x new 32GB Transcent M.2 SSD 2240 (was ordered for the internal M.2)

I need about 2TB of effective space, nothing extremly fast, but since I got quite a few SSDs lying around, I want to make use of them.

So the 32GB M.2 2240 only fits the internal M.2. Perhabs as a SSD Cache for a Raid1 of the 2TB WD Gold?

What to do with the 800GB SSD? What to do with the 512GB NVMe SSD and the 2 new 250GB Samsung M.2?
DeLock has a PCI-E X16 Card for 4x internal NVMe M.2 Key M. Should I go for that one instead of the 2x M.2 card and use all three of those M.2? Or only go for the 2x 250GB SSD besides the 2TB Raid1 and use the 512GB M.2 somewhere else?

Any ideas would be appreciated,
thanks in advance,
Helge

 

[Dominic]

Hi!

It's a little difficult to give recommendations without specific requirements.

I need about 2TB of effective space, nothing extremly fast,

As a start it could be a simple ZFS mirror between the two WD Gold drives.

I'd recommend checking out what you could do with ZFS in the relevant chapter in our reference documentation. Look out for caching and logging with SSDs. Using different sized disks for one pool is not ideal.

Best
Dominic

 

[sappel]

Thanks for your answer.
I'm running 2x 2TB WD Gold with ZFS Mirror now, cached by the 800GB Intel SSD + M.2240 as root for Proxmox (without Raid functionality though) + 2TB Seagate Barracuda 2,5" as internal backup drive.

Best regards,
Helge