Hi all,
Looking for some direction on how to proceed with upgrading my existing NAS. Here's what I currently have:
- 6x3TB RAIDZ2, 8.7 year old WD Red Drives with 77,000 hours on them. SMART tests pass for all drives. One drive has a single reallocated Sector.
- SuperMicro X10SLL-F mobo (6 SATA ports)
- Xeon E3-1281 v3
- 91% utilization on my pool
- 32GB RAM
- M1015 - only 2 ports in use for some spare drives, so full 8 ports could be utilized
- Case has 6 official HD slots, plus I added a 3x3.5 to 2x5.25 bay to host my misc drives. I could potentially add another 3x3.5 to 2x5.25 bay adapter to host a total of 12 drives in the case.
I use my NAS for Plex, serving files, backup, and, more recently, PhotoPrism. As far as I can tell, the existing hardware meets my needs. However, it is clear that at the very least I need to get some more storage, and I'm concerned about my aging hdds.
Would the general consensus be to continue to use the aging array and just let RAIDZ2 do its job as the drives naturally fail? I was thinking I should replace the drives with 6x8TB, but it pains me to let go of the 6x3TB that are still functioning. I'd really like 24 to 40TB of storage in the end, but I'm curious what you guys think would be the best way to get there. Should I keep the 6x3TB and add another pool of 6x6TB? Ditch the 6x3TB entirely and replace with new 6x8TB? I hate to waste the old drives, but I also think the energy costs/heat/vibration might make it silly to run 12 drives in a mid tower case.
Also, if there are some cheap options to improve my cpu/mobo/ram in a way that would significantly boost performance and allow me to run SCALE, it might be worth it to me, although I don't have strong use case for virtualization at this point. I'm open to used hardware on eBay, etc.
I don't want to derail the discussion further, but another consideration is that I need to upgrade my current desktop machine for gaming and some productivity. No, no - it's not for me. It's for the children. They need an upgrade, so I'm considering doing them a favor by upgrading my machine so that they can have my old processor. I will do anything for my children. I saw that the W680 can support ECC RAM, and I had some wild thoughts last night that I would get that ASUS W680-ACE, and somehow virtualize TrueNAS on it, stuff my old 6x3TB drives in there, and use it as my Windows gaming and productivity workstation. You know -- I want everything in one box. Please tell me I'm crazy so that I abandon this dream, but it would be pretty cool if I could somehow virtualize TrueNAS and use those 6x3TB as backup, while running Windows with my video card and playing games. Is that even possible? If it is, please don't tell me.
Thank you for your time and any suggestions you may have!
Sincerely,
Toadlips
Looking for some direction on how to proceed with upgrading my existing NAS. Here's what I currently have:
- 6x3TB RAIDZ2, 8.7 year old WD Red Drives with 77,000 hours on them. SMART tests pass for all drives. One drive has a single reallocated Sector.
- SuperMicro X10SLL-F mobo (6 SATA ports)
- Xeon E3-1281 v3
- 91% utilization on my pool
- 32GB RAM
- M1015 - only 2 ports in use for some spare drives, so full 8 ports could be utilized
- Case has 6 official HD slots, plus I added a 3x3.5 to 2x5.25 bay to host my misc drives. I could potentially add another 3x3.5 to 2x5.25 bay adapter to host a total of 12 drives in the case.
I use my NAS for Plex, serving files, backup, and, more recently, PhotoPrism. As far as I can tell, the existing hardware meets my needs. However, it is clear that at the very least I need to get some more storage, and I'm concerned about my aging hdds.
Would the general consensus be to continue to use the aging array and just let RAIDZ2 do its job as the drives naturally fail? I was thinking I should replace the drives with 6x8TB, but it pains me to let go of the 6x3TB that are still functioning. I'd really like 24 to 40TB of storage in the end, but I'm curious what you guys think would be the best way to get there. Should I keep the 6x3TB and add another pool of 6x6TB? Ditch the 6x3TB entirely and replace with new 6x8TB? I hate to waste the old drives, but I also think the energy costs/heat/vibration might make it silly to run 12 drives in a mid tower case.
Also, if there are some cheap options to improve my cpu/mobo/ram in a way that would significantly boost performance and allow me to run SCALE, it might be worth it to me, although I don't have strong use case for virtualization at this point. I'm open to used hardware on eBay, etc.
I don't want to derail the discussion further, but another consideration is that I need to upgrade my current desktop machine for gaming and some productivity. No, no - it's not for me. It's for the children. They need an upgrade, so I'm considering doing them a favor by upgrading my machine so that they can have my old processor. I will do anything for my children. I saw that the W680 can support ECC RAM, and I had some wild thoughts last night that I would get that ASUS W680-ACE, and somehow virtualize TrueNAS on it, stuff my old 6x3TB drives in there, and use it as my Windows gaming and productivity workstation. You know -- I want everything in one box. Please tell me I'm crazy so that I abandon this dream, but it would be pretty cool if I could somehow virtualize TrueNAS and use those 6x3TB as backup, while running Windows with my video card and playing games. Is that even possible? If it is, please don't tell me.
Thank you for your time and any suggestions you may have!
Sincerely,
Toadlips