Upgrade Readynas Pro 6

I've only ever replaced one CPU fan.  That was because of a failing brearing (and much higher than normal noise), so I didn't use that particular fan.  I recently looked inside that unit and saw that I did replace the original connector witrh a 90° IDC one, but I don't remember why.  I don't remember switching any wires, which can usually be done without having to totally replace the connector, but I may have.

Update on my upgrade project:

Original 1GB RAM now upgraded to 4GB. Easy job, pull out the old stick, and install the two new. Found 2x2GB Crucial second hand ones for some 15 EUR.

Today I finally got the "new" Intel Core 2 Duo E7600 SLGTD 3.06GHz, again a second hand purchase for some 15 EUR. Removing the heat sink was easy and after removing the original Intel(R) Pentium(R) Dual CPU E2160 @1.80GH I installed the new E7600 - and put all together again. Turned power on - machine tunrned on with fans full speed and Readynas showed in the display, and then - nothing else happende. No boot, just display and and fans on. After leaving it like that for 3-4 min I turned it off being pretty upset. I decided to try one more time before reverting to the original processor, but to my big surprice it turned, and booted normally, what a relief. It's been running with no issues for 3 hours now, CPU temp around 40 deg C. It feels snappier so upgrade was an improvement.

One unexpeced and really annoying issue however have been my fan upgrade. So far no luck, and Im working up quite a bill on fans, piling up next to the unit.

System fan, attempt one: 120 mm Blacknoise NB-Multiframe M12-3 (3 pin version). New purchase at some EUR 30.-

At low RPM it stopped spinning, and system gave a Fan Faliure warning. I guess the low system voltage is not sufficient for the fan, and it stops. 

System fan, attempt two: 120 mm Noctua NF-F12 PWM (4 pin version, but can be used on 3 pins.). New purchase at some EUR 30.-

At low RPM it fluctuates in speed making it annoying to listen to. The original system fan runs at some 850 rpm, the Noctua was running at some 1000 rpm. No good, it was pulled from the system and stopped spinning, and system gave a Fan Faliure warning. I guess the low system voltage is not sufficient for the fan, and it stops.

Now I'm waiting for 2 more 120 mm fans:

Noctua NF-P12
Noctua NF-P12 Industrial

which I got second hand for some EUR 20.-

and a 80x80x15mm CPU fan, Noiseblocker BlackSilentPRO PC-P, new for some EUR 30.- I really hope this round of fans will work, as main part of my upgrade was to reduce noise level. If any has a "plug-and-play" recommendation as to choise of silent fans that will just work, I'm all ear.

Update on my upgrade project:

RAM:

Original 1GB RAM now upgraded to 4GB. Easy job, pull out the old stick, and install the two new. Found 2x2GB Crucial second hand ones for some 15 EUR. Works nicely, no issues.

CPU:

Today I finally got the "new" Intel Core 2 Duo E7600 SLGTD 3.06GHz, again a second hand purchase for some 15 EUR. Removing the heat sink was easy and after removing the original Intel(R) Pentium(R) Dual CPU E2160 @1.80GH I installed the new E7600 - and put all together again. Turned power on - machine tunrned on with fans full speed and Readynas showed in the display, and then - nothing else happende. No boot, just display and and fans on. After leaving it like that for 3-4 min I turned it off being pretty upset. I decided to try one more time before reverting to the original processor, but to my big surprice it turned, and booted normally, what a relief. It's been running with no issues for 3 hours now, CPU temp around 40 deg C. It feels much snappier so upgrade was an improvement.

Update on upgrade cont..

FANS:

One unexpeced and really annoying issue however have been my fans upgrade. So far no luck, and I'm working up quite a bill on fans.

System fan, attempt one: 120 mm Blacknoise NB-Multiframe M12-3 (3 pin version). New purchase at some EUR 30.-. At low RPM it stops spinning, and system gives a Fan Faliure warning. I guess the low system voltage is not sufficient for the fan, and it stops. 

System fan, attempt two: 120 mm Noctua NF-F12 PWM (4 pin version, but can be used on 3 pins.). New purchase at some EUR 30.-. At low RPM it fluctuates in speed making it annoying to listen to. The original system fan runs at some 850 rpm, the Noctua was running at some 1000 rpm. No good, it was pulled from the system...

Now I'm waiting for 2 more 120 mm fans to try out:

Noctua NF-P12
Noctua NF-P12 Industrial

which I got second hand for some EUR 20.-

and a 80x80x15mm CPU fan, Noiseblocker BlackSilentPRO PC-P, new for some EUR 30.- I really hope this round of fans will work, as main part of my upgrade was to reduce noise level. If anyone has a "plug-and-play" recommendation as to choise of silent fans that will just work, I'm all ear.

That e7600 should definitely feel snappier--it's almost literally twice as fast as the e2160:

https://www.cpubenchmark.net/compare/Intel-Pentium-E2160-vs-Intel-Core2-Duo-E7600/1134vs948

It will be interesting if the combination of ram and processor improves the real-world transfer speeds. :)

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SamirD wrote:

That e7600 should definitely feel snappier--it's almost literally twice as fast as the e2160:

https://www.cpubenchmark.net/compare/Intel-Pentium-E2160-vs-Intel-Core2-Duo-E7600/1134vs948

 

It will be interesting if the combination of ram and processor improves the real-world transfer speeds. :)

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OS-6 definitely uses more memory than OS 4.2 did - and currently shipping OS-6 ReadyNAS all have have at lease 2 GB of RAM.  So I definitely recommend increasing RAM in legacy NAS running OS-6.

As far as the CPU goes, it depends on how you use the NAS.

A stock Pro-6 running 4.2.x will already saturate a gigabit connection when doing sequential file transfers.  Other loads won't do that, but with those loads the speed will be limited by the disks and the memory caching - not by the CPU.  That won't change with OS-6.  So I don't think the CPU upgrade will increase transfer speeds unless you are using SMB 3 with transport encryption.

But if you are using transport encryption, then the faster CPU likely will make a difference, since I don't think the stock CPU has AES acceleration.  And of course if you are running apps (for instance plex), then the faster CPU will matter.

As far as fans go, I am running a Noctua NF-S12A FLX in my own Pro-6 (still running OS 4.2, with the stock CPU, but with 8 GB of RAM.  That is working well - but the NAS is in my basement, and I don't need silent operation.  I swapped it because it sounded like the bearings in the stock fan sounded like they were beginning to go.  

FWIW, my own Pro-6 is used as a backup NAS.  SMB is disabled, and it runs rsync backup jobs on a power schedule.  I plan to keep it on OS 4.2 until I need to expand the volume (it is at the expansion ceilings for OS 4.2).

Thank you for the insights.  AES isn't available in any of the lga775 processors afaik, so a processor upgrade won't help with that.

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SamirD wrote:

Thank you for the insights.  AES isn't available in any of the lga775 processors afaik, so a processor upgrade won't help with that.

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The encryption is done in software, so the processor upgrade will speed it up.  

Yep, a faster processor will definitely speed up things, but since there are no dedicated AES instructions in the cpu, the software can't take advantage of that (if it is even written for that).