FreeNAS Up and Running, and performing pretty well. Validate my set up?

[gregh42]

Hello all, I just wanted to report that I'm a new FreeNAS user and so far so good... Running into a few typical noob type things.

First, my NAS is set up as follows:

• 5x 2T WD Red drives
• 1 ZFS Volume that uses all of the disks (gives me about 7.1 TB of effective space) in Raidz1
• I created some AFS shares and a few CIFS shares, since I have a mixed windows/mac environment.
• I set a quota of 500GB on one of the AFS shares.
• I left the other shares alone and didn't put a quota on them.

Can anyone comment on this? Am I doing anything "stupid" that I shouldn't be- does this seem like an OK set up?

When I run a 1GB file test (using Blackmagic, a disk performance utility for Mac) against the AFS share, I am getting about 109 MB/sec for writes. I am getting about 94 MB/sec for reads. This seems great and I am very happy! My network is 1 Gigabit and I am connecting to the machine via that way. I was having performance problems earlier (11 MB/sec), but it turned out it was because the cable I was using was crimped. It took me a while to figure that one out. Murphy's law was in full effect this evening, and that was only the tip of the iceberg (lots of other irritants along the way putting the system together).

I ran into another problem... trying to figure out how to set up a static IP. I tried using dhcp static reservations from the Apple Time Capsule (router), but FreeNAS didn't like that very much. It wouldn't get an IP address after it rebooted until I removed the static reservation. I saw some stuff on line and it sounds like I'll be better off setting the network up in the FreeNAS GUI.

Anyway, I'm running into a few noob type issues but overall I'm really loving FreeNAS. Before I start using it for "real" I'd like to see if anyone has further suggestions.

Thanks,
Greg

 

[bollar]

Just a couple of things...

- If you're sharing CIFS and AFP on the same dataset, know that the hidden Apple files will be visible to the Windows users. If they mess with them, it could create problems for your Mac clients. Netatalk 3.0.1 fixes this, but it's not yet included in FreeNAS.

- FWIW, I have static reservations for my NASes via an Apple Airport Extreme and don't have the problems you're seeing.

 

[gregh42]

Just a couple of things...

- If you're sharing CIFS and AFP on the same dataset, know that the hidden Apple files will be visible to the Windows users. If they mess with them, it could create problems for your Mac clients. Netatalk 3.0.1 fixes this, but it's not yet included in FreeNAS.

- FWIW, I have static reservations for my NASes via an Apple Airport Extreme and don't have the problems you're seeing.

Thanks, I'm not really sure why I'm having the issue with the Apple Airport/Time Capsule. Fortunately, the hostname is showing up on the network for both Windows and Mac and resolves fine when I ping it. I'm not really sure if I need to have a static IP, but I was thinking it would be helpful if I had to map drives to it from the windows box. I'll play around with it some more and see if I still get the problems.

Thanks for the info on the shares- though I can't seem to see the AFP share from my Windows box (just casually using explorer)... But I'm not that concerned since it's just for my home network.

 

[toddos]

Thanks for the info on the shares- though I can't seem to see the AFP share from my Windows box (just casually using explorer)... But I'm not that concerned since it's just for my home network.

Windows does not understand AFP shares, so that makes sense. What bollar was saying is that if you have the CIFS and AFP shares pointing to the same dataset (for example, you have a "videos" dataset and create a \\server\videos CIFS share and the equivalent AFP share, both pointing to the same physical location), you will see a bunch of folders and files starting with "." when you look at the CIFS share from Windows.

 

[JaimieV]

Hi Greg, this is near identical to how I have my home FreeNAS set up too, mixed Mac/Windows environment and I guess the 500gig limit is a Time Machine share? Mine is. It's all been working fine, no interesting issues.

It's possible to make the Windows share hide those Mac files, by the way. In the CIFS shares, hit the Advanced button and paste this into the "Auxiliary parameters" field -

veto files = /Temporary Items/.DS_Store/.AppleDB/.TemporaryItems/.AppleDouble/.bin/.AppleDesktop/Network Trash Folder/.Spotlight/.Trashes/.fseventd/
delete veto files = yes
hide dot files = yes

 

[gregh42]

Hi Greg, this is near identical to how I have my home FreeNAS set up too, mixed Mac/Windows environment and I guess the 500gig limit is a Time Machine share? Mine is. It's all been working fine, no interesting issues.

It's possible to make the Windows share hide those Mac files, by the way. In the CIFS shares, hit the Advanced button and paste this into the "Auxiliary parameters" field -

veto files = /Temporary Items/.DS_Store/.AppleDB/.TemporaryItems/.AppleDouble/.bin/.AppleDesktop/Network Trash Folder/.Spotlight/.Trashes/.fseventd/
delete veto files = yes
hide dot files = yes

Thanks Jamie / Toddos. I will put that in my settings... looks easy enough. I have one AFS share for work in process video editing, and one AFS share for Time Machine backups.

I am still using the Time Capsule router for the backups, but trying to figure out if I can / should back that up to the NAS (from the Time Capsule), or just all together use the NAS for the primary backup location. Decisions, decisions! I am also going to set up CrashPlan (cloud backup server) to back up my NAS... that will be one of my next challenges :)

 

[bollar]

Thanks Jamie / Toddos. I will put that in my settings... looks easy enough. I have one AFS share for work in process video editing, and one AFS share for Time Machine backups.

I am still using the Time Capsule router for the backups, but trying to figure out if I can / should back that up to the NAS (from the Time Capsule), or just all together use the NAS for the primary backup location. Decisions, decisions! I am also going to set up CrashPlan (cloud backup server) to back up my NAS... that will be one of my next challenges :)

If you're using Mountain Lion, I suggest you backup the Macs to a Time Capsule and Time Machine share on FreeNAS separately. As you may have experienced, TM sometimes restarts a backup due to some sort of inconsistency and during this period, you aren't backed up at all! Since ML allows multiple TM destinations, this dramatically improves the security of your Mac backups.

 

[JaimieV]

Got there before me, Bollar! I lose one TM archive a year or so due to "we repaired your TM archive by deleting it", and since Mountain Lion have had dual destinations for all the Macs. I seeded the 2nd destination (USB HDD off an Airport Extreme) by copying the archives from the first (FreeNAS TM share), and have once used the still working one to re-copy over a damaged archive.

(Note that there's currently a bug in FreeNAS (well, in netatalk) that means you can't have two TM shares advertised from one FreeNAS reliably - but you can just use an AFP share for the second rather than one tagged as TM, just by mounting it first)

 

[gregh42]

If you're using Mountain Lion, I suggest you backup the Macs to a Time Capsule and Time Machine share on FreeNAS separately. As you may have experienced, TM sometimes restarts a backup due to some sort of inconsistency and during this period, you aren't backed up at all! Since ML allows multiple TM destinations, this dramatically improves the security of your Mac backups.

I read where others were doing this... ie, the Mac alternates between the locations for the backups (ie, Time Capsule, then NAS). I have ran into the inconsistency and had to delete my wife's backup. I believe the biggest reason for these issues is when either the Time Capsule is powered off during mid-backup, or the Mac locks up during the backup. Typically the lock up during backup is easily solved by restarting the device. I added a UPS to the Time Capsule so I'm hoping I don't have those issues anymore. However.. sounds like it would be a good idea to have two separate backups just to be on the safe side.

Quick update: (unrelated): I left Final Cut Pro open to my AFP share overnight. When I came back this morning I got a mysterious "cannot connect to network" type error. I had to restart the AFP service to get it to come back, but it seems fine now. Is this typical? The CIFS share was still running fine, it only affected AFP. Fortunately, FCP recovered just fine after I restarted it (I am not using iSCSI, just a symlink to the mount point).

Edit:
I checked the FreeNAS server and it had a few errors on it from AFP last night.
afpd: operation timed out
afpd: dsi_stream_read len(-1): operation timed out
afpd: afpd: alarm reconnect timer expired. goodbye

I haven't seen any of these errors today yet.

 

[JaimieV]

The TM archives do get mangled occasionally even without power or network outages, although I've found that closing a Mac laptop lid and putting it to sleep during backup is the most common reason! If you have the spare disk capacity and want to up the reliability of TM, it's worth doing the dual destination thing. If you don't mind occasionally losing your TM history then it doesn't really matter, of course - although you will occasionally be without a current backup as the old one is deleted before the new one is created.

Not met the issue in your update+edit, but I have seen it elsewhere in the forums here - they've always looked like "haven't chatted for a while, so netatalk has put the connection to sleep" to me. I don't tend to leave apps running which keep active stores on the NAS, though.

 

[gregh42]

The TM archives do get mangled occasionally even without power or network outages, although I've found that closing a Mac laptop lid and putting it to sleep during backup is the most common reason! If you have the spare disk capacity and want to up the reliability of TM, it's worth doing the dual destination thing. If you don't mind occasionally losing your TM history then it doesn't really matter, of course - although you will occasionally be without a current backup as the old one is deleted before the new one is created.

Not met the issue in your update+edit, but I have seen it elsewhere in the forums here - they've always looked like "haven't chatted for a while, so netatalk has put the connection to sleep" to me. I don't tend to leave apps running which keep active stores on the NAS, though.

I am a little paranoid about my TM backup- it bailed me out a few weeks ago when I lost my SSD drive. (In fact, that's what got me going down the path of a NAS in the first place). Definitely worth the disk... Thanks for the perspective.

On the other issue, I think you are right- it is probably just related to the app keeping the connection open to long with no use. I was able to work on a video today for several hours using the NAS and didn't run into any problems. I suppose it is a good practice to close the program that might be keeping the connection open, though I tend to get distracted and walk away / forget. ;)