Best configuration

[sabi-tech]

Good morning all,
Firstly thanks for taking the time to read this, hopefully someone can point me in the right direction.

I am building a Freenas box to act as a file storage device for backups and to stream content internally to my Raspberry Pi (in 720p quality)

My PC has a data drive which backs up to another internal drive and then that drive backs up to my NAS.

I have just finished collecting my hardware for my freenas build. I found i was getting some extreme speed issues with my off the shelf Buffalo NAS (15-20MB/s)
I tried Freenas on a spare PC i had and instantly got 111MB/s so am happy with that.

My system specs are as per below:

Code:

CPU: Intel i5 4460S
Motherboard: Asus H81-I MITX
RAM: 2x 8gb Corsair Vengeance Pro DDR3
PSU: EVGA 1000w G3
HDD: 4x Barracuda 2tb
SSD: 1x Sandisk 256gb

So I know that this is slightly mismatched (especially the PSU) however it is all spare kit i had laying about.
I was planning on running FreeNas on a USB stick and using all 4 drives on the sata ports on my motherboard however i'm wondering if it would be better to run it on SSD and only use 3 of the 2tb drives?

I would like the option to replace one drive at a time to increase storage in the future (replace 2tb to 4tb drives)

 

[kmklv]

Hello, I'm not much of an expert on FreeNAS but from what I've learned so far, short of saying 'this isn't server grade hardware' is this.

The parts you're using is relatively older, is it a correct guess that the drives are older than a couple years? They have warranty for only two years, so I would check them throughly before putting them to use. Follow the guide that's here:

https://www.ixsystems.com/community/resources/hard-drive-burn-in-testing.92/

If the drives already have data, I would try to store it on another computer while the tests are going through.

Especially with older drives, I would not use RaidZ, I would definitely use mirroring, 2 mirrored vdevs is what I'd choose myself.
Installing FreeNAS on USB doesn't seem to be recommended any more, so I would install it on an SSD, but 256 is too much wasted space. I would get a cheaper 120gb drive if possible for that purpose and use the 256gb SSD for jails/plugins, since redundancy for those wouldn't be as much of a concern, but faster read times could help.

Your power supply is more than adequate for the task and you could always downgrade to something a bit more silent when you get the parts. If anyone with more experience has something different to say, you should probably listen to them :) but with 20+ years of IT experience although not much with FreeNAS or ZFS, I think this would be the most optimized solution in this case.

 

[sabi-tech]

I am fully aware this is not server grade HW.
I too work in IT (although only 15yrs to your 20+) I was contemplating taking home some of the hardware that is being disposed of I.E V7000 and C7000 with a few blades etc but that is totally overkill for my needs.
The original thought was to just run Windows and run shares. This is the 3rd point of faliure as i have internal drive, backs up to internal drive, backs up to NAS and then finally to an external removable hard drive. I'm not too worried about redundancy, It was mainly to add a networkable backup that i can also store my films on.

Thanks for the info about the USB bit. I wasn't aware of that so might be worth me running 3x 3tb drives and then a smaller SSD. I have plenty of hardware but only 4 ports on the motherboard.

Would it be better to look at an alternate operating system due to the hardware being used?

 

[joeinaz]

What do you have for a case? I assume you are limited to four 3.5" disks. If you have an empty PCIe slot it could be used for an HBA which would accommodate a quantity of disks (usually 8) leaving your SATA ports avaiable for SSDs. My preferred HBA for FreeNAS is the IBM M1015 flashed to "IT mode". That HBA with a case that supports at 4 - 6 disks is a good place to begin to "dabble" in FreeNAS. As your storage needs change or increase the forum can help you with upgrades.

Brief note on the disk drives. If there are concerns about older drives I like to use a tool called Crystal Disk Info. It's a free download for a Windows based system and will quickly evaluate the health of any attached disks. FreeNAS does a similar thing regarding health but Crystal Disk gives far more information (if available) on the drive. Info like "hours used" or the "number of times it has started and stopped" along with detailed error info. It's a nice tool to use if it is a hassle to remove disks from your system and you want to evaluate drives before you build.

The best thing is there are people on this forum who are much more informed on FreeNAS than I am to help you through your build.

Good luck!

 

[sabi-tech]

So at the moment i am aiming for a very small form factor, Similar to that of an off the shelf NAS.
The case is Kolink , however that said i do have a spare full tower and ATX motherboard available.

 

[sabi-tech]

*Kolink Satellite Plus

 

[joeinaz]

So at the moment i am aiming for a very small form factor, Similar to that of an off the shelf NAS.
The case is Kolink , however that said i do have a spare full tower and ATX motherboard available.

What is the model of the full tower and motherboard? A decent full tower and a 1000w power supply may open up many options for deploying FreeNAS. One idea is to start off with your first FreeNAS on the smaller system while you slowly build a nice FreeNAS with the full tower. I just sold a 12 disk pre-configured full tower FreeNAS solution because I have another full tower left to build another system.

 

[sabi-tech]

Tower is a Fractal Designs Define R5 and motherboard is an Asus Z97-K
Quite excited to get this running, Taking it slow, Building up hardware into case tonight and then setting up pools etc tomorrow.

 

[kmklv]

You're welcome sabi, 15-20 years doesn't matter, after 10 it's all the same. I was being sarcastic about this isn't server grade hardware, it seems to be a common post on these parts, and many people already store tons of family pictures, videos etc. on non-server grade hardware, and they want to get a little more reliability out of what they have. I think it's an unnecessary thing to point out, reliability won't go down any further just because the hardware isn't server grade.

There are alternate systems which are mentioned as lighter load on the hardware, such as openmediavault, unraid etc. but you have to decide for yourself what part of your data you want to prioritize. For me, I have lots of pictures of my sons when they were born ,growing up, lots of family pictures of our trips, etc. and while back up is definitely the absolute way to protect this data, unless you have an enterprise architecture at home, there are always gaps in data protection, i.e. no one backs up their pictures folder just because they added one more picture to their drive. Every backup is typically done in intervals, daily, weekly etc. so there will always be gaps where you have data that's not backed up. For me, my data is priceless so I would like to ensure I use the most stable and reliable file system which brought me to ZFS. I have lots of other data, such as copies of movies so I can stream instead of having to carry around optical discs, but I wouldn't cry after that data if I lost it, it would just be a hassle to rip them again. So you can grade your data in a similar way for yourself, and based on the priority, choose your filing system/OS.

If you want to run FreeNAS, I believe you could keep your 4 drives on the motherboard and connect your SSD through SATA-USB adapter which is pretty cheap. (something like this) So you still get reliability of an SSD and free up a SATA slot. There are adapters you can purchase that will add tons more ports as joeinaz mentioned, but you'll have to take cost vs benefit into consideration. If you have only 1 drive left to go on the hba, it may be hard to justify the cost difference (~$10 vs ~$80).

 

[joeinaz]

Tower is a Fractal Designs Define R5 and motherboard is an Asus Z97-K
Quite excited to get this running, Taking it slow, Building up hardware into case tonight and then setting up pools etc tomorrow.

That is an awesome case for a FreeNAS build! A large, quiet tower with lots of fans and dust filters. The only limitation I see is it will not support an E-ATX motherboard; which is a very small consideration. In terms of a FreeNAS case it's more Cadillac than a Chevy...

 

[joeinaz]

You're welcome sabi, 15-20 years doesn't matter, after 10 it's all the same. I was being sarcastic about this isn't server grade hardware, it seems to be a common post on these parts, and many people already store tons of family pictures, videos etc. on non-server grade hardware, and they want to get a little more reliability out of what they have. I think it's an unnecessary thing to point out, reliability won't go down any further just because the hardware isn't server grade.

There are alternate systems which are mentioned as lighter load on the hardware, such as openmediavault, unraid etc. but you have to decide for yourself what part of your data you want to prioritize. For me, I have lots of pictures of my sons when they were born ,growing up, lots of family pictures of our trips, etc. and while back up is definitely the absolute way to protect this data, unless you have an enterprise architecture at home, there are always gaps in data protection, i.e. no one backs up their pictures folder just because they added one more picture to their drive. Every backup is typically done in intervals, daily, weekly etc. so there will always be gaps where you have data that's not backed up. For me, my data is priceless so I would like to ensure I use the most stable and reliable file system which brought me t o ZFS. I have lots of other data, such as copies of movies so I can stream instead of having to carry around optical discs, but I wouldn't cry after that data if I lost it, it would just be a hassle to rip them again. So you can grade your data in a similar way for yourself, and based on the priority, choose your filing system/OS.

If you want to run FreeNAS, I believe you could keep your 4 drives on the motherboard and connect your SSD through SATA-USB adapter which is pretty cheap. (something like this) So you still get reliability of an SSD and free up a SATA slot. There are adapters you can purchase that will add tons more ports as joeinaz mentioned, but you'll have to take cost vs benefit into consideration. If you have only 1 drive left to go on the hba, it may be hard to justify the cost difference (~$10 vs ~$80).

As a point of reference, when there is discussion of "server grade" hardware, it is mostly in reference to the motherboard support of ECC memory. ZFS is a "software based" error correction solution which relies heavily on the fidelity of system memory. A disk failure is easily handled by ZFS but a memory failure could be a potential disaster. With ECC memory, you at least have a fighting chance to survive the failure and gracefully replace the failed DIMM. This is the reason for the emphasis on "server grade" hardware. The good news is if you are starting to build a FreeNAS solution, you can find older motherboards and EEC memory for less cost than many newer consumer grade parts.

As for external USB to SATA adapter you mentioned, I am not a fan of externally attached USB disks in a FreeNAS deployment. I would be concerned about an accidental disconnection. The M1015 is widely supported for FreeNAS use. Today they are less than $30 on eBay.

Finally when investing in NAS hardware:

1. Never go cheap on a power supply (on any computer system).
2. The key is matching the storage solution to the value of your data.
3. ECC memory is a good insurance policy for larger FreeNAS solutions.
4. There is NO substitute for a regular backup.

 

[kmklv]

Agreed on all points, I just wanted to point out as mentioned here that ZFS without ECC isn't any worse than any other file system without ECC. Many semi-technical people would possibly want to implement a storage system at home for their data, and in case they don't have or can't afford additional hardware, I believe they should still be able to reap the benefits of a reliable file system.

 

[joeinaz]

This was an interesting point made in the comments:

https://research.cs.wisc.edu/adsl/Publications/zfs-corruption-fast10.pdf

I guess there are people use FreeNAS with the hardware they have and those assemble a solution specifically for FreeNAS. For those making a FreeNAS solution, ECC memory is generally much more expensive than non-ECC memory however many of the hardware recommendations in the forum include hardware a generation or 2 older as is represents a "sweet spot" for FreeNAS systems.

On the CPU side; my 5 year old E5-2650v2 cost about $65 on eBay; A new Intel i5-9600k has similar aggregate performance at over 4 times the cost.

On the RAM; The good news is RAM prices have dropped and I can buy standard 8GB DDR4 NON-EEC memory for under $40. 8GB of DDR3 ECC memory is available on eBay for less than $20 per stick.

The key to the optimal FreeNAS solution is for people to query the forum BEFORE they buy hardware for a new build. Too frequently people (including myself) have come to the forum to validate their hardware choice after the fact. The preferred way is to come to the forum with 2 things in mind:

1. This is what I want to do.
2. This is the hardware I have or the money I want to spend.

This is where the fun begins...

 

[sabi-tech]

Thanks for all the feedback.
I guess the use case is also slightly different in that whilst it is a NAS it is not the only backup i have.
A lot of the hardware decicions are based on price and importance of data. I have multiple (4) copies of all the data i own in various locations about the house as well as off-site so if one dies i can get back and running without major issue. The main PC is used maybe once a week so not business critical.

 

[sabi-tech]

You're welcome sabi, 15-20 years doesn't matter, after 10 it's all the same. I was being sarcastic about this isn't server grade hardware, it seems to be a common post on these parts, and many people already store tons of family pictures, videos etc. on non-server grade hardware, and they want to get a little more reliability out of what they have. I think it's an unnecessary thing to point out, reliability won't go down any further just because the hardware isn't server grade.

There are alternate systems which are mentioned as lighter load on the hardware, such as openmediavault, unraid etc. but you have to decide for yourself what part of your data you want to prioritize. For me, I have lots of pictures of my sons when they were born ,growing up, lots of family pictures of our trips, etc. and while back up is definitely the absolute way to protect this data, unless you have an enterprise architecture at home, there are always gaps in data protection, i.e. no one backs up their pictures folder just because they added one more picture to their drive. Every backup is typically done in intervals, daily, weekly etc. so there will always be gaps where you have data that's not backed up. For me, my data is priceless so I would like to ensure I use the most stable and reliable file system which brought me to ZFS. I have lots of other data, such as copies of movies so I can stream instead of having to carry around optical discs, but I wouldn't cry after that data if I lost it, it would just be a hassle to rip them again. So you can grade your data in a similar way for yourself, and based on the priority, choose your filing system/OS.

If you want to run FreeNAS, I believe you could keep your 4 drives on the motherboard and connect your SSD through SATA-USB adapter which is pretty cheap. (something like this) So you still get reliability of an SSD and free up a SATA slot. There are adapters you can purchase that will add tons more ports as joeinaz mentioned, but you'll have to take cost vs benefit into consideration. If you have only 1 drive left to go on the hba, it may be hard to justify the cost difference (~$10 vs ~$80).

Funny you mention the USB-SATA solution as it turns out i had issues last night with the build.
I had my CPU die and issues with the installation media so used a spare cpu (4590T) and my USB-SATA drive to boot from and it's now on and working. Only wonder now is why RaidZ1 (single parity) is not available as an option for me. Only RaidZ or RaidZ2

 

[drinking12many]

I am in the camp of use whatever you want as long as you understand the potential risks. I have used HP N40L, AMD FX-8320 based, AMD A6-3650 based, and several others for ESX or FreeNAS without major issue. Like anything backups are the key. I have about 20 years in IT myself and while I understand why ECC is recommended obviously several of the ones I have used above do not support it. I have never used anything but USB keys for the OS for freenas or even ESX recently, though my FreeNas has 2 USB sticks that are mirrored, and I back up the config fairly regularly. Again know the risks. I just back everything up most of the files to some external hard drives fairly regularly for safekeeping just a simple Robocopy script. Family pictures etc I also back up to Backblaze through FreeNas usually costs me less than 1 dollar a month something like 90GB currently.

 

[sabi-tech]

Well i am gonna get hella flamed now, I have finally set up my Freenas box, Non-ECC and Scary raid!¬!
But capacity and speeds work for me, and i have multiple coppies of my data so not worried if it fails.
Thanks for everyone's help!