FreeNAS filesystems and fsck...

[AustinPowers]

Hello all.
:)

Having already had major issues with Linux-based NAS boxes and stupid fsck forcing full system scans after a dirty shutdown(taking many hours), I need to ask a quick questions of FreeNAS, as I note that it is NOT Linux:

Do either UFS or ZFS force linux-type fsck filesystem checks on the server in the event of a dirty shutdown?

I am toying with the idea of using FreeNAS for my next server, which will be a media server, and what I DON'T want, under ANY circumstances, is hours and hours of forced filesystem checks in the event that there is a dirty shutdown or some other issue that FreeNAS thinks warrants a full filesystem check.

Hours and hours of filesystem checking, prevent you from getting back to watching your videos...

In Windoze, even if you have a drive failure, you whip that one out of service, and fire the box up with the remaining drives, and the server is back on the network again in minutes.

HOWEVER, I note that FreeNAS is Unix-based, not Linux-based, so perhaps FreeNAS does not use fsck at all?

 

[survive]

Hi AustinPowers,

It depends on the file system you use. UFS still has fsck, but zfs does not.

That said, I think your approach to the problem is not quite correct. You linix NAS\file servers fsck because of the dirty shutdown and do this because they need to check & correct any problems these dirty shutdowns have caused....they aren't being just out of spite.

Instead of trying to avoid the fsck's I think it would be wise to avoid the dirty shutdowns. What exactly are causing the dirty shutdowns?

Are you just yanking the power? Don't do that, shut the box down cleanly with the shutdown command.

Dodgy power grid? Get a UPS.

The box just crashes? Figure out why, you aren't doing yourself (or your files) any good with unstable hardware.

-Will

 

[AustinPowers]

Hello.
:)

Thanks for the reply. I am quite sure that the Linux-NAS is not fscking out of spite, but it sounded good when you wrote it that way!
:D

Our power is pretty good most of the time, but we do have the odd power-cut which can be six months or more apart, and when this happened with the other Linux-NAS, fsck would insist on a full filesystem check. This takes hours and hours. In Windoze, if there is a power-cut, you reboot so you can play your videos again, and just leave it doing a full chkdsk in the background. The point being, that the recovery time was minimal on Windoze, whereas with the Linux system, it was not.

I have been doing a bit of reading since my last post, and I have discovered that ZFS does not prevent you accessing the filesystem, it does it's checks(scrub) with the filesystem up and running. Wikipedia told me this, when I just searched for ZFS - there was plenty to read! ;)

It sounds like ZFS is the way to go, and just feed it plenty of RAM.