Help deciding on what OS for NAS solution

[CrackJack]

Hello,

So I am going to be building a NAS in the coming weeks current specs are:
I7 2600k OC to 4.4ghz,
24gb non ecc ram at 1333mhz cl9
Asrock p67 pro 3
2 x 120gb ssd boot drives mirrored
8 x 2tb 7200 rpm 256mb cache seagate drives = these will be ran in a raidz3/equivalent
HBA Lsi 9200-8I
1 pcie x1 to x16 riser for the HBA or GPU
Rx 480 - GPU acceleration/needed due mobo refusing to boot w/o one

So I have narrowed down my options to Freenas or Openmediavault not really into the idea of Unraid.
I have spent the best part of the past 3-6 months researching and messing around with both of these solutions within a VM I like both. Though I am definitely stuck between the two.

My use case:

File storage - Music/Films
Plex for streaming said media
running minecraft server with mods/ARMA 3 server with mods
maybe running VM with gpu pass through so another person can play games when at my house
running a VM so I have desktop experience anywhere with an internet connection


I am aware Freenas doesn't allow GPU passthrough yet (Nvidea on linux to extent) but to my understanding its in dev but has been in dev for 5+ years so... Its not a deal breaker I love the simplicity and helpful guides and docs freenas has. Oh natively supports ZFS big+

Openmediavault allows gpu pass through with some setup of course, it can also setup and use ZFS but doesnt use it natively.

I would say I am more confident jumping into freenas more than openmediavault only because I only really looked into openmediavault the past few weeks and it seems user friendly just doesnt have that much user guides and support compared to freenas but this could be down to my lack of perspective.

I would be happy with either one of these solutions I would just really like and appreciate some outside thoughts and opinions.

I am going to also leave a poll for people who don't want to answer another one *these* threads.

Thank you in advance!

 

[PhiloEpisteme]

Hi @CrackJack welcome to the forums.

Keep in mind that building a FreeNAS machine requires hardware different than what you would expect in a typical gaming machine. For example, it is rare that people overclock these types of machines; in fact many of the popular board and CPUs folks use don't even support over clocking.

Asrock p67 pro 3

Is this the board you're referring to? This isn't really an ideal board. For one it has a LOT of features a server doesn't want/need such as audio support and overclocking. Furthermore, bing a non-server board it isn't designed to be run 24/7 and may have longevity issues, but you never know there.

It also only supports 32GB of memory. The more you ask of your machine the more memory it needs. While not a deal breaker you may be happier with a machine with a 64GB max.

One big thing against this board is the Realtek NIC. Folks have had performance and reliability issues with these. Perhaps worth researching that a bit more.

It also has several PCI slots, which are fairly old and won't support newer hardware and even if you find a card to plug into it it will be painfully slow.

24gb non ecc ram at 1333mhz cl9

Have you done any research about ECC memory and why you might want to use it? I'm not going to say you HAVE to use it or you're a fool; but I do believe it is important that people understand the risks for the choices they make just so they don't get a nasty surprise.

2 x 120gb ssd boot drives mirrored

This is an excellent choice. You could go smaller if you wanted to save a bit of money. I believe some folks have reported issues with WD Green drives, so may stay away from those.

8 x 2tb 7200 rpm 256mb cache seagate drives = these will be ran in a raidz3/equivalent

There isn't really an equivalent to RAIDZ3 in FreeNAS other than using RAIDZ3 for a vdev :)

How much of this do you already own? If you already own some of it I would say that perhaps you could give it a shot. But be realistic about what to expect out of the hardware. If you get poor performance consider upgrading that board, memory, and cpu. If you do a good job of building your pool and maintaining your system you could use this to experiment and learn and see if it will perform to your desires; provided that Realtek NIC doesn't cause you serious issues.

Whatever you do, make sure you do a good job of maintaining your pool. I've recently come to start thinking of data integrity as composed of 3 parts; the hardware you chose, the redundancy model you used vis a vis the redundancy in the vdevs and any backups you keep, and maintenance. There are a lot of folks who ignore that last step and find themselves in a precarious situation when their drives go bad and they caught it too late. make sure you set up regular scrubs, short and long SMART tests, and get email notifications. And never forget that any amount of redundancy in a single machine is not a replacement for a backup.

 

[sretalla]

It seems to me that your hardware (non-ECC RAM) and research have put you on a path that ends in something other than FreeNAS (so I voted Openmediavault, since you seem to be comfortable with that)

If you go for an ECC build, I'm sure all of your objectives can be met with FreeNAS (waiting for FreeBSD 12 in a year or more to get PCI passthrough on VMs)

You will also probably find what you want on Openmediavault and the VM stuff may work better for you in the short term (really depends on what you expect).

 

[garm]

Asrock p67 pro 3

In addition to being a poor server board, the chipset doesn’t support VT-d. This is a requirement for device passthrough..

Back to the drawing board kid

 

[CrackJack]

In addition to being a poor server board, the chipset doesn’t support VT-d. This is a requirement for device passthrough..

Back to the drawing board kid

It certainly does support GPU passthrough as I have tried it and works!
I agree though it is a poor board lacking x16 slots but I am on budget at it is what I have spare.

 

[CrackJack]

Hi @CrackJack welcome to the forums.

Keep in mind that building a FreeNAS machine requires hardware different than what you would expect in a typical gaming machine. For example, it is rare that people overclock these types of machines; in fact many of the popular board and CPUs folks use don't even support over clocking.


Is this the board you're referring to? This isn't really an ideal board. For one it has a LOT of features a server doesn't want/need such as audio support and overclocking. Furthermore, bing a non-server board it isn't designed to be run 24/7 and may have longevity issues, but you never know there.

It also only supports 32GB of memory. The more you ask of your machine the more memory it needs. While not a deal breaker you may be happier with a machine with a 64GB max.

One big thing against this board is the Realtek NIC. Folks have had performance and reliability issues with these. Perhaps worth researching that a bit more.

It also has several PCI slots, which are fairly old and won't support newer hardware and even if you find a card to plug into it it will be painfully slow.


Have you done any research about ECC memory and why you might want to use it? I'm not going to say you HAVE to use it or you're a fool; but I do believe it is important that people understand the risks for the choices they make just so they don't get a nasty surprise.


This is an excellent choice. You could go smaller if you wanted to save a bit of money. I believe some folks have reported issues with WD Green drives, so may stay away from those.


There isn't really an equivalent to RAIDZ3 in FreeNAS other than using RAIDZ3 for a vdev :)

How much of this do you already own? If you already own some of it I would say that perhaps you could give it a shot. But be realistic about what to expect out of the hardware. If you get poor performance consider upgrading that board, memory, and cpu. If you do a good job of building your pool and maintaining your system you could use this to experiment and learn and see if it will perform to your desires; provided that Realtek NIC doesn't cause you serious issues.

Whatever you do, make sure you do a good job of maintaining your pool. I've recently come to start thinking of data integrity as composed of 3 parts; the hardware you chose, the redundancy model you used vis a vis the redundancy in the vdevs and any backups you keep, and maintenance. There are a lot of folks who ignore that last step and find themselves in a precarious situation when their drives go bad and they caught it too late. make sure you set up regular scrubs, short and long SMART tests, and get email notifications. And never forget that any amount of redundancy in a single machine is not a replacement for a backup.

I own everything but the hard drives, hba, and I am doing this all on a budget as I am quite poor its taken me over 2 years to save up to basically buying this as well as a building a new pc and getting parts so I can build a I5 htpc so I am buying £1000 worth of parts across 3 machines. I am doing it now because of the possibility of brexit and that will damage our pretty pricey tech market more.

The board and cpu doesnt support ECC.

I may in future invest in a better board but doubt as time goes on sandybridge able boards are becoming rare and more expensive so I will probably with in 3 years do a full CPU,Mobo and ram update.

Yeah the board is crap but damn it OC's well, I will be using an x1 to x16 riser for gpu output and the x16 slot for the HBA which is more than enough I could plug then plug 14 drives into the system but I am sticking to 7 or 8 2tb main reason for this I can have more parity drives, this system isnt meant for hyspeed storage performance just to be used as a home server to store my growing collection of music (1.9tb as of now) as well as movies and shows and maybe run a vm or jail with a server every now and then.

 

[garm]

It certainly does support GPU passthrough as I have tried it and works!
I agree though it is a poor board lacking x16 slots but I am on budget at it is what I have spare.

Not using bhyve..
https://wiki.freebsd.org/bhyve/pci_passthru

 

[CrackJack]

Not using bhyve..
https://wiki.freebsd.org/bhyve/pci_passthru

I am aware that is why I said, 'I am aware Freenas doesn't allow GPU passthrough yet (Nvidea on linux to extent) but to my understanding its in dev but has been in dev for 5+ years so... Its not a deal breaker I love the simplicity and helpful guides and docs freenas has. Oh natively supports ZFS big+'

I replying to the fact you said the motherboard not the OS(bhyve is apart of freenas) doesnt support gpu pass through.

 

[garm]

If you have documentation detailing that GPU passthrough some how will not depend on the underlying structure and VT-d, do please share with the rest of the class

 

[CrackJack]

If you have documentation detailing that GPU passthrough some how will not depend on the underlying structure and VT-d, do please share with the rest of the class

I dont know what your going on about, this getting off topic isn't helpful.

I7 2600k and Asrock p67 pro3 allows gpu pass through I have tested this in a VM a hyper v not in freenass VM or Openmediavault. It works just fine you can't tell me it doesn't when I have the system sat next to me. So could you please stop being unhelpful and telling me it wont work because it does. I acknowledge freenas/bhyve doesnt support AMD gpu pass through yet in any capacity.

 

[adrianwi]

With those specs and that attitude, can I suggest not FreeNAS

 

[CrackJack]

With those specs and that attitude, can I suggest not FreeNAS

Whats wrong with specs? They meet freenas minimum requirements. Am I missing something?
Looking at your NAS specs our setups will be very similar your cpu is 4th i7 basically with ECC memory support
8gb+ extra

Don't know how you can garner someones attitude from words on a screen, I speak/write pretty frankly and straight forward.

Telling someone there being unhelpful because what they are telling you is factually wrong as well as being condescending isn't attitude its a fair response. I would expect and prefer someone to tell me I am wrong if I am saying something that is wrong.

 

[CrackJack]

General reply, I cant afford to go and get another cpu, mobo, ram RN these will changed out over the next few years. Yes I am aware of the risks of using non ECC memory but as long as your vigilant and make backups its not a huge deal it can be I am aware plus also ECC ram isnt completely error proof. I am not storing mission critical data, just media which I still have a lot on disc still.

 

[garm]

I don't know what your going on about, this getting off topic isn't helpful.

I7 2600k and Asrock p67 pro3 allows gpu pass through I have tested this in a VM a hyper v not in freenass VM or Openmediavault. It works just fine you can't tell me it doesn't when I have the system sat next to me. So could you please stop being unhelpful and telling me it won't work because it does. I acknowledge freenas/bhyve doesnt support AMD gpu pass through yet in any capacity. View attachment 32868

Just for clarification, I’m only talking about FreeNAS, this being the FreeNAS forum and all. What you may or may not get working outside of FreeBSD is of no consequence to me. I’m telling you, on your own question about FreeNAS, that your gear is wrong and will not work as per your stated expectation.

 

[garm]

factually wrong

Please qualify that statement..

 

[garm]

Yes I am aware of the risks of using non ECC

The cost of ZFS is due to data integrity. Sure you can run nonECC RAM, a network chip that is unreliable and a motherboard that will underperform but why?

Your question was if FreeNAS is for you, based on what you told us I would recommend you look elsewhere

 

[CrackJack]

In addition to being a poor server board, the chipset doesn’t support VT-d

Please qualify that statement..

^Factually wrong^ the Chipset does support it.

Who said I was going to use the network chip....
I forgot to mention I have spare intel gigabit lan card I am going to be using
In what way will the mobo underperform its 1 x16 slot for the hba more than enough bandwidth to utilize 8 drives with leg room. Its a really good board besides the lack of PCIE. it all so has 6 sata on board.

Fair enough, yet so many people use freenas without ECC memory especially for home use. Plus in my 15 years of Computing I have never had an obvious bit error which cause irreparable damage. Yes it happens but RAM in the bast 5 - 10 years has come a long way and is a hell of a lot more stable partially the reason I am also downclocking it as both kits are patriot 1866 kits so its more stable.

 

[garm]

^Factually wrong^ the Chipset does support it.

No it dosent
https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ark/products/52810/intel-p67-express-chipset.html

 

[CrackJack]

No it dosent
https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ark/products/52810/intel-p67-express-chipset.html

It can and does I have it physically working! Most if not all of intels chipsets on the consumer market are the same exact thing with features disabled its not uncommon for board partners such as Asrock which are the most known for doing this enabling features on boards that the chipset "can't" do this board can do virtualization thanks to Asrock. Other P67 boards can do it too.

 

[CrackJack]

No it dosent
https://ark.intel.com/content/www/us/en/ark/products/52810/intel-p67-express-chipset.html

To add to this point Virtualization is more so cpu dependent than board.