Storage strategy for small system

[chravis]

Hi folks,

I asked this question as part of a previous question, but that question wasn't initially about storage, so I wanted to post a dedicated question. I have a small system with only 4 bays (Dell T30). I think that the most storage I'll ever need in my lifetime won't exceed 4TB (of course this could come back to haunt me one day). I had planned to just get 2 4TB disks and mirror them. @Chris Moore mentioned he had a 2-drive failure one time and suggested maybe a third drive and a 3-way mirror. I'll also have the 1TB disk that comes with the system, but I guess that won't be helpful if the other drives are 4TB. Are there other suggestions? I don't want to over-think such a small system, but I haven't bought the drives yet and I wanted to purchase the right thing the first time.

Thanks!

 

[danb35]

I think I'd probably stick with your plan to build a two-disk mirror--multiple disk failures at the same time are pretty rare, particularly if you're monitoring system health properly (regular SMART tests, email reporting, etc.). But with that said, you should have backups of anything that's important to you--RAID is not a backup.

 

[Spearfoot]

Hi folks,

I asked this question as part of a previous question, but that question wasn't initially about storage, so I wanted to post a dedicated question. I have a small system with only 4 bays (Dell T30). I think that the most storage I'll ever need in my lifetime won't exceed 4TB (of course this could come back to haunt me one day). I had planned to just get 2 4TB disks and mirror them. @Chris Moore mentioned he had a 2-drive failure one time and suggested maybe a third drive and a 3-way mirror. I'll also have the 1TB disk that comes with the system, but I guess that won't be helpful if the other drives are 4TB. Are there other suggestions? I don't want to over-think such a small system, but I haven't bought the drives yet and I wanted to purchase the right thing the first time.

Thanks!

A 2-way mirror setup is probably just fine, providing you follow @danb35's advice and keep good backups.

If you believe your data requirements might reach 4TB then I recommend installing a pair of 8TB disks (or larger). FreeNAS/ZFS works best if utilization is low.

 

[pschatz100]

As has been stated, a 2-disk mirror is perfectly reasonable. Be certain to burn them in beforehand. Check the resources section for instructions and advice on preparing drives.

 

[danb35]

Check the resources section for instructions and advice on preparing drives.

...including here: https://www.familybrown.org/dokuwiki/doku.php?id=fester112:hvalid_hdd

 

[chravis]

Thank you all so much. I'm currently on the Badblocks tests part of Uncle Fester's instructions. I'm curious, why after the badblocks test does it recommend running the long SMART test again?

 

[danb35]

Block errors might show up internal to the disk that don't reflect in bad data being returned (yet). Hence the second long SMART test.