Advice for my build please. 16 SATA HDDs and 10GbE

Joined
Jun 27, 2020
Messages
2
Hello
I’m building my first freenas server (used to use Debian and/or Synology)
What I want ultimately :
16 SATA HDDs in the ZFS equivalent of RAID10 accessible simultaneously by 7-8 1GbE clients (files, streaming, etc.).
What I already have :
- 16 SATA HDDs (all are 4TB)
- MB : Tyan S7012 with 2x Xeon 5560 and 36 GB of ECC RAM and 4x 1GbE
- a Dell 5524 switch (with 2x 10GbE SFP+)
What I plan on buying :
- 1x Chelsio T520-CR for 2x 10GbE SFP+ (less than USD100)
- 2x LSI SAS 9207-8i for handling the 16 drives. (less than USD40 each)
- Cables (10GbE and SAS-to-4-SATA splitters)

Will everything go smoothly ?
Do you have any recommendations ? advice ?
Should I add a SSD to boost performance ?


Thank you for your help
 

pschatz100

Guru
Joined
Mar 30, 2014
Messages
1,184
In RAID 10, data is striped across mirrored pairs. What is your plan for implementing this with ZFS? At the end of the day, how much capacity do you expect to need?

What do you mean by "add a SSD to boost performance"

You didn't say anything about what the system will be used for. It is easier to offer comments if we know what your goal is.
 
Joined
Jun 27, 2020
Messages
2
> What is your plan for implementing this with ZFS?
No plan yet. With traditional HDD RAID systems, I usually pick RAID10 but I don't know ZFS yet. So everything is possible :)

> At the end of the day, how much capacity do you expect to need?
I don't focus on capacity but on the criterias I gave:
- 16 drives.
- some kind of RAID 1 / RAID 10 redundancy : each drive is redundant. which means half of the total storage will be available.
- today the drives are 4TO and I will little by little upgrade them to 8TO drives.
So today : 16 * 4 / 2 = 32 TO
Tomorrow : 64 TO.

> What do you mean by "add a SSD to boost performance"
I was expecting you tell me :)
Let me rephrase that, english is not my native language :
Considering my use case (as stated in my post : serving 8 clients -each over a GbE link - with data - streaming, file server, etc.), would adding a SSD increase performance or robustness of my setup ?

> You didn't say anything about what the system will be used for.
I am not sure I understand.
It was my impression that I did :
serving 8 clients -each over a GbE link - with data - streaming, file server, etc.
This is what the system will be used for.
Maybe you need more specific information ?
What additional information exactly would you require ?

Maybe I should add a few more specific questions instead of Will everything go smoothly ? and Do you have any recommendations ? advice ?
:
My MB has 3 x8 PCIe3.0 slots.
- The LSI SAS 9207-8i adapters : they appear to be fully supported. Will they perform correctly ?
Because I will have 2 adapters to address a total of 16 drives, do I need to tweak something or will they be recognized perfectly by freeNAS ?
- The 1x Chelsio T520-CR 10GbE adapter : Is it good enough ? or too much for what I need ? the model below : T420, is only USD30 cheaper.
- Maybe you would recommend another SAS adapter ? Maybe I should look out for something specific to my hardware during the freenas setup ?
Or do you think all the i have been dotted ?

Thanks for your guidance.
 
Joined
Dec 29, 2014
Messages
1,135
The LSI SAS 9207-8i adapters : they appear to be fully supported. Will they perform correctly ?
Yes, those will work perfectly. That is the preferred 6G SAS/SATA adapter for FreeNAS.
The 1x Chelsio T520-CR 10GbE adapter
I used these prior to going to T580-CR's for 40G. Those will work very well and are on the preferred list for FreeNAS.
 
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