Change of hard drive

[darkmarauder99]

I installed FreeNAS v9 onto a 120Gb SSD that I happened to have lying around and now I'm being recommended to have the install on a flash drive.
I have a Kingston micro datatraveller 32Gb which I was looking at using for the OS.

So, as long as I have an up to date backup of the FreeNAS config, can I simply do a new install and restore it expecting for the server to be exactly as before?

 

[danb35]

Yes, you can. Be aware that even a 32 GB drive is way more capacity than is needed for the OS--4 GB is plenty.

 

[darkmarauder99]

OK, I'll see about tracking down a lower capacity one.
So, I am guessing that when restoring the config it will already be aware of the storage (volumes) that already exist?

 

[diedrichg]

Smaller USB drive doesn't help, you just can't use any of that additional storage on the 32GB.

Yes to the second question. Just make sure you stick with the exact same version to eliminate issues. If you wish to upgrade versions - do it after the install on the USB.

 

[danb35]

Yes, I should clarify--there's no harm in using a larger USB stick than required, there's just no benefit to it--you can't use the extra space. And yes, your volumes should remain intact.

 

[Robert Smith]

A possible benefit of a larger flash drive is that wear leveling algorithms have more space to work with. As such, in theory, larger flash drives could last longer.

This depends on the flash drive firmware.