How to Upgrade the CPU and RAM in a ReadyNAS 516

The CPU I put in mt 516 was used!  You're not going to have a lot of luck getting a new one for a reasonable price.  It's a older CPU.  There's nothing wrong with using a older CPU.   They don't normally go BAD.  I've never had a CPU just go bad in all my years of using a computer.  They just get outdated and slow and so you upgrade your PC with a new CPU, but that old CPU is still good, can get pulled and used for whatever else.  I got mine from eBay,  It was wrapped good for shipping, but not in the original CPU type box.   The RAM I got new and that's not a big deal.

I'm using XRAID 5 right now with the 3TB WD RED drives.  I think a couple are in the 4+ year old range.  I'd have to look as I have mine labeled on date installed, so I can easily keep track.  Some 10TB drives would be nice, but wow, I don't have that kind of money.  I'm going to assume without looking at around a $2,000 price tag.  Oh hell, just looked on Amazon, about $458 each times 6 is $2,748 plus tax,  ouch!!!   That's great and all, but backup would be crazy and is something happens, a huge amount of data could be lost.   If you have 2 516, Should use 1 of them as a backup to the main one.  I'd still use XRAID or RAID 5.  Do you need the Pro version with only 6 drives?  Let alone 7200 RPM when you're just streaming PLEX and only on a 1 Gigabit Network?    Maybe if you had one of their NAS units with 10Gigabit support, going to your 10 Gigabit Networked PC(s), that might matter more.

Why use RAID 10, For the Mirroring?  Speed wise?  I already can MAX out my Gigabit Network using drives running around 5400 to 5900 RPM and using RAID 5.  Instead of 10.9TB of space, you could be at 18.1TB without having to do anything.   You can even go RAID 6 for that off chance you have 2 HDD fail at the same time at gain space to 14.5TB.  I think that's overkill with a 6 bay NAS.  I do, do a full NAS Backup of my Data anyway using a couple 8TB Seagate Backup drives. Bare drives I can write to, pop into a plastic case and toss into my Fire Safe.   That's my Backup.  It's not Update to date, but I wouldn't lose to much that I couldn't replace anyway.  My Pictures for example are in the cloud at a few places, from using Carbonate along with backing up documents and whatnot, and Amazon Pictures which is Unlimited as part of being a Prime Member.  Stuff I really don't have to think about as it's all automatic.  it's the large files on my NAS, which for PLEX, I have 718 movies currently, and 102 TV shows with 4126 episodes.  So the TV stuff takes up more space then my Movies, which most are in HD these days.  I still don't have all my Blu-Ray's on my NAS yet.  But the important things like every single James Bond Movies, Star Trek and Star Wars movies are on my NAS.    With PLEX can be watch on any TV in my house or away from home anywhere in the world with a Internet connection.   My own personal Netflix type service.  But it's almost all content I like and it doesn't come and go like on Netflix.  

I also need more space.  I'd like to at least fill up on 6TB WD RED drives No need for Pro versions.  Slower speeds means cooler running drives.  less power, and longer lasting.  It's more then fast enough on a 1Gigabit wired Network.  RAID 10 seems like a huge waste of space for very little payout. If you're not backing up to anything, then maybe it's the way to go.  it's basically a Backup.  Raid 10  is really for I/O-intensive applications such as database, email, and web servers, as well as for any other use requiring high disk performance.  You don't need high disc performance streaming movies on PLEX.    Your Network speed is limited to 1 Gigabit.  That's fast for home networking and faster then WIFI, but not as fast as the hard drives.  

How much space do you need, and how much space are you willing to throw away in the name of security?  If you're really worried, go RAID 6, otherwise RAID 5.  I do Recommend not buying your HDD all at once or from the space place.  At least not all at once. You could end up with a batch of bad drives and they all fail around the same time. It's been known to happen.  I stared to 2 drives in raid 1, when it was about 1 TB of space left got a 3rd drive until it got to almost 1TB, then got a 4th, and that maxed out my old NAS.  I backup, Pulled out those old drives and they're now the first 4 drives in my 515. Those are the 4 3TB WD Red drives running around 5400RPM.  When I got the 516, I ended up getting 2 Seagate 3TB NAS drives which run at around 5900 RPM.      So I have a large age gap of a number of years.  With you going from 4TB drives to 10TB drives, that is more then doubling storage space.  Maybe you start with 3 10TB HDD in a RAID 5 format.  Would that be more storage space then you currently have with the 6 drives?  Maybe when you get down to 2TB, you order up another 10TB HDD and pop it in. It'll get added into your storage about about another 10TB of space.  Now you still have another 2 bays free,  when you get down to another 2TB left, go order up another 10TB HDD.  See you're buying HDD's in different batches.  Less wear and tear.  Why have 50TB of storage and only using 20TB currently?  Now you have wear and tear on HDD's and eating power and not doing anything for you, just going to waste.  That's what I would do.

I use MakeMKV also. I PAID for it and it's well worth it.  It will rip DVD's, HD DVD's and Blu-Ray's into .mkv files.  It's pretty simple to use and fast.   I then use Handbrake which is free.  You can take a 18Gig movie and shrink it down to 12 Gig's or something.  DVD's are even better as you're using a more modern compression format.  The picture and sound is still great.  It does take a long time.  So I would rip a number of movies, and then have Handbrake process them all while I'm away, over night and while I'm at work.    Get home after work and they'll generally be done.  Depends on how many.  Figuring out how you want to set it up can be tricky.

I wired my house with CAT6 cable with Keystones in each room all ending up at my 24 port managed Switch in my small closet where I have my NAS, Cable modem, WiFi router and other devices.  If I had a 10Gigabit NAS, I'd get a Switch to add for that faster network and wire up 10Gigabit to my Windows 10 PC in my Computer Room.  That would be nice and worth crawling under my house once again to do.