Rc-help Server Build

Tony

Staff member
It will allow it, but is a MASSIVE vulnerability. Better to just stick DD-WRT on the router. Or win the lottery and setup my pfSense router and not worry about any of it.....
 

Tony

Staff member
Yup, doing more work on the server. This time, I'm still trying to transfer files to the USB drive. Something weird is happening now. It was running at about 70MBps which is fine for what I want to use it for. If I transfer files from my computer to the USB drive, that is the speed it gets. If I transfer files from my computer to the server array, I get 112MBps, or right at gigabit. BUT.... If I try to transfer files FROM the server array TO the usb drive, it goes at 6-7 MBps. A tenth of the speed that it should be running at.

So I pulled the drive out of the case, again, and put it in my computer. It was pretty warm so I decided to do a test. While it was in my computer, transfer from my SSD to the 8TB drive I just took out of the case. I'm getting 225MBps on an internal transfer. So the heat is not the issue. So I tried to move files from the server to the drive and yup, back to 6MBps...

The only thing I can think of at this point is it's the cache drive on the server bogging it down. On some transfers it will start out at 70MBps, but then drop down to 6MBps. So I'm in the process of moving everything off of the cache drive that may still be on there, and then I'm going to assign the cache drive as a normal drive (removing it) and trying again. There is no parity (parody :chuckles:) drive so that can't cause this issue. If this doesn't work, I'm at a loss as to why it is so slow...
 

Tony

Staff member
I have spent all day trying to figure out why in the HELL I have fast write speeds to the server, but my read speeds are in the tank. I have tried different ethernet cables, I have tried different ports on the NIC's, hell I have even connected up ALL NIC ports to the 48 port switch (which I know is gigabit on EACH channel) and put them into a shared state. Can't remember what that is called, something like "balanced" mode or something... That did nothing. I checked the nic in my computer, it is fine. I tried enabling things that I saw online about this issue, and nothing. I even tried to rename the share from Tony's Share to just files. Thinking the apostrophe was causing some issues. NOPE. And I know, if it was causing issues, it would do it both ways, but guess what, after the name change, the ONLY change I made, it got better. But now we are back to being slow again.

So I just said screw it and I fired up putty and opened up a page on my router and did an scp from the server to the USB disk on the router and started the transfer that way. I don't have to keep a computer on for this transfer, just set it and forget it. The crappy part is I'm only getting a MAX of 15MBps on this transfer. The two systems are LITERALLY 1 foot apart!!!

I have absolutely no clue what is causing this issue. Once I get all of the files transferred I may just wipe the slate clean and start over and see if this issue repeats. If it does, then I will keep searching for a resolution. Hoping it is just a jacked up setting somewhere in there that I can't find.
 

Tony

Staff member
For reasons unknown, I decided to work on the server a little today to do a little testing. I have been watching my wattage load on the sever, and it is pulling at minimum 137 watts at idle and a pretty low load. Sometimes it would get up to 150 watts or there about. So I decided since I have the 5th fan to put in there to keep from tossing a code and running every fan in the server at full bore, that I would install the second CPU just to see what the power draw would be. So I grabbed the fan, CPU and heatsink as well as some thermal compound and headed into the "server room". I installed it, and also put the 4 port nic and one of the single port nic's back in the server (pulled them out trying to find out why my read speeds were so slow, still don't know that answer) and powered on the system.

First check, is the fan spinning? Yup, great. Okay, now that I have powered the server with the lid off, it took all of the fans to 100% so that's kind of annoying lol. Put the lid back on, it settled down and I came into my office and fired up the page for the iDRAC. Idle, it is pulling between 157 watts and 161 watts depending on what it is doing in the background. With a server test running that only pegs out one core at a time (or thread, and I have 24 of them lol), it is pulling 167 watts.

So for a server that has dual CPU's, 12 core 24 thread with 48GB of memory, I think this is doing pretty good on the energy department. It still doesn't take away from the fact that I can't keep it running all the time though, not at 24c/kwh. I have found though that I can switch to a different plan on my electricity and only pay 9c/kwh for the first 1000kw's and 6c after that per kwh. I'm thinking about it, but it's kind of a trade off. Summer, my bill will go down, winter though it will go up... ugh, can't win.
 

Tony

Staff member
Been doing a lot of file transfers to the USB3 drive (WD Red Drive) and I'm consistently getting gigabit speeds with this drive connected to my router. I did not expect that... But I definitely like it.
 

Tony

Staff member
Alright, it's time to see if I can get pfSense running on a VM in this server. If I can, then I will be taking my router back and just getting a wireless access point. Nice little chunk of change in my pocket..
 

Tony

Staff member
pfSense is up and running on my server and I'm connected to the internet typing this on that service. The setup is quite easy, once you know what to, and what not to, change in the setup. I had this installed once before and for some reason, I had no internet connection. So I deleted the vm with pfsense and I created a new one. I have since setup my lan and wan ports (only one lan and one wan which means I have two free ports IF I ever need them). and connected it up to my 48 port switch.

So for those that may want to do this, it's actually quite easy. First, get a stand alone computer that you are not using anymore. Have an old celeron computer or an old laptop? PERFECT! Go to pfSense's website and download the ISO, but it to disk or flash drive and install it on the computer. Any slow computer will work. Most of the processing on a router is done on the NIC and the CPU is only there to route thing to the NIC. If you have 2GB of RAM, you are golden. Now, you are definitely going to want to use an Intel bases NIC on this. That means, in some cases, the onboard NIC on your old computer is likely not going to work properly. IF, it is an Intel NIC, then you can use it and just put a single port NIC in the PCIe slot and you are golden. There is a way to do a vlan setup where you can use one port for your wan and lan, but it's not such a great idea.

Once you have it installed, you will run through a wizard and you will be online. Yes, it is that simple. Of course you can go in and setup different firewall rules, setup more ports on different networks for your IOT's (Internet Of Things) such as your Alexa, your wifi connected toaster, whatever, that you DON'T want to have access to the devices on your network.

Quite honestly, it can do more than I will EVER know how to do and I'm happy just having it running and having a way more secure network than I had before.

My setup is, I have a fiber connection running into my house and into a fiber to ethernet converter. The Cat6e cable coming out of the converter is then plugged into the WAN port that I assigned on the pfSense NIC. From there, I have a line coming out of the LAN port on the pfSense NIC going into a port on my 48 Port Brocade POE switch and EVERYTHING I own is plugged into that switch. I then disabled the DHCP server on my old router (Linksys WRT3200ACM) and I have it setup as a stand alone wireless access point. A very expensive access point at that lol. Well, you could get into Ubiquity Systems which get REALLY expensive, but yea, not for me lmao.

so as simple as that, I have a router on my Unraid server that is now controlling ALL of my network traffic. And yes, I did a speed test and with only two cores, on a GIGABIT internet line, it is only using 70% of the CPU useage. Oh, and I only have 3GB of RAM allocated to the router, and it is sitting at 7% usage lol. VERY lightweight.
 

Tony

Staff member
Just a quick update to this server. When I posted that update back in Aug, I played with it a little bit and then I switched back over to the Linksys for the router. It stayed that way until about mid to late december when I switched everything back over to this server.

Since then, I have been running on this server 100% for over a month now. I saw that it was raising my electric bill a little more than I wanted it to so I tried to switch back, and my router would not get an IP address from my ISP, so I am stuck with this router now lol. I mean I could get a new router with a new MAC address and it would pull a new IP address, but then I would have to go to the store which is not that close to me and yea, we will just leave it running lol.

The future plans for this server are pretty simple now. First, it is going to stay my main router. I don't see a reason to change other than saving $20 on my electric bill. Second, we are going to be switching the websites over to a new server, or should I say website (this one). The other sites that I own are going to be put on this server and hosted right here at my house. Say what you will about network security and such, it's not as bad as the internet makes it out to be. Third, I still have zoneminder running my cameras. Well, I have it running one camera because it doesn't play well with my other cameras. Too much artifacting for some reason. So I'm sticking with one camera for now and it seems to be doing okay.

Just to update, I have 12 cores and 24 threads to use on this server with 48GB of RAM. So I have the overhead to put a lot more on this server.

One thing that I'm still working on is building a rack to mount this server, my other Dell server as well as my switch where it's not just sitting on top of some drawers. I need it up a little higher and I definitely need to get some wire management done in that closet.

Oh, and speaking of cameras. So I have a Swann system on my house that I have used for years (DO NOT purchase Swann cameras!!!). All but 4 cameras on this system have died and one of those that is still working has sensor issues where the contrast is turned up to 11 and it will not change. IF... I connect these cameras to the Swann DVR, it locks up the entire system after an hour. However, if I connect those cameras to my Brocade switch and run a single cable to the DVR, they work fine. There is something with the switch that is built into the DVR that is bad and locking the system up. Stay away from Swann cameras! They SUCK!!!

I will be doing an updated thread and maybe video when I get new cameras for the system. It will be a while though seeing as though I need 16 cameras and they are about $50 each...
 
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