I researched again for parts and, whichever way I go, it’s all very expensive.
The “cheaper” options are still expensive considered the lack of expandability: I can get, for example, two 3.5" 4TB drives for around 90-100 each, or, slightly better, two 2.5" 4TB drives for around 120-130 each; the 2.5" drives would allow me to get rid of the HDD cage in my PC and mount a fan in its place. Either way, 8TB (actually 4TB + mirrored backup) for 200-250, and I can’t expand it further.
Slightly more expensive: a one drive Synology NAS, for around 300 (including a 4TB HDD, bought separately); again, locked with no further scaling possible.
Then, a two drives Synology NAS, for 450-500 (including two 4TB drives, bought separately), no scaling. But it’s getting closer to my needs.
Finally, a four drives Synology NAS, definitely fitting for my needs, which is 500 not including drives; once I add storage, for example just two 8TB drives (to which I’d add another two down the road), I’m close to 800 (and this is by getting the cheapest 8TB drive I can find, nothing with “NAS” in the name haha).
Shucking isn’t really a financially good option, it looks like, since external drives are actually more expensive in my country.
tiny case
Well, the Node 304 can hold six drives. Realistically, that should be enough for me even if I decide to have two backups (so using two drives for storage and then the other four just to back up those two) and even if I get 8TB drives (at the moment I have just shy of 3TB of data and I think i can easily add another 2TB onto it, but further than that… not sure). Worst case scenario changing only the case is pretty painless, especially if I can sell the old one to buy the larger one.
gpu
Yeah, I know I can get an APU, issue is, with that MoBo I picked only PRO APUs support ECC RAM. For what I understand, ECC RAM, while not mandatory, is highly recommended. The data I have is not vital, but if I can avoid corruption and having to download it again, I’d rather do so. To be fair, I’m currently not using ECC RAM and I haven’t encountered data corruption in the past two or three years… so I’m a bit torn on this point now
your config
That’s a very expensive motherboard, wow! I can’t find it for less than 350! Definitely over budget for me at the moment
larger case for my current setup
This is definitely something I’ll consider, at least as a stopgap until I can build a proper NAS. This way would allow me to have many drives and I could also repurpose the ones I already have.
I think I’ll have to put this project on hold for now haha but thanks for the huge help, I’ll definitely watch that video in the meantime!
Thanks again!
edit: looks like I can shave off another 100 from the planned build, since I can get a CPU (Ryzen 5 2600) and a 550W PSU for free. Which is actually not bad. Remove one stick of RAM, since 8GB should be enough, and I can save another 30, bringing the total to around 500. Not that bad as a start! Actually, bring that back to 600, since it would make more sense to get 8TB drives since I’m already around 3TB. Still, saved money is money saved haha