Moving external drives into TR-004, but TrueNAS not seeing them.

[SaltyCoffee]

Hi I just picked up a QNAP TR-004 to JBOD my loosie external drives that make up my drive pool. But after rebooting, TrueNAS does not recognize them anymore. Nor is it recognizing the new drive I installed with them. The QNAP jumpers are set to JBOD, so theoretically it should work, right? What am I missing?

 

[jgreco]

What am I missing?

SAS.

Cheap USB enclosures often cheat on things like serial numbers and other things that TrueNAS uses for identifying target disks. TrueNAS has to do this the correct way, because unlike a cheap QNAP, a TrueNAS system may actually use SAS disks and have redundant paths, so it has to be able to accurately identify when two apparent devices might actually just be a multipath to a single device.

We already know that many USB bridges are hardwired to a single serial number, and this makes it impossible for TrueNAS to reliably tell the difference between the devices. They report with the same serial number and are taken to be the same device.

We strongly recommend that you follow the various hardware guides and best practices listed throughout these forums in order to have a good experience with TrueNAS.

 

[eldxmgw]

I managed to install Scale on my Qnap TS-853A.
Today i tried to attach both drives in the expansion unit TR-002 which is just the smaller unit than yours.
See my last message here with the trouble i run into: https://www.truenas.com/community/t...enas-scale-on-qnap-hardware.95372/post-677485

 

[jgreco]

Yup, isn't expected to work. Has been discussed repeatedly. This is at LEAST the third time this month.

Use USB to SATA adapter to replace disk?

Happy new Year! Time for new hardware too! I want to upgrade my pool. I got 4 drives in my HPe MicroServer which I’d like to swap for bigger ones. I don’t want to go through resilvering and was wondering if it is possible to attach the new drives one by one externally and replace each of the...

www.truenas.com

The two hard drives in the USB hard drive cabinet can only recognize 1 (no raid)...

大家好。 我有一个独立供电的双盘位硬盘盒，里面放了两块500G的硬盘，通过USB3.0接口连接到我TureNAS的USB3.0插口 NAS：联想L440笔记本；16G内存；256G SSD 安装 TrueNAS；内置1Tx2 HDD镜像数据池。 问题：系统可以识别两个USB硬盘（/dev/da0、/dev/da1），但是在TrueNAS web管理界面的“磁盘”页面，只显示“da1”，看不到“da0” . 我在命令行：“zpool add droot mirror da0...

www.truenas.com

 

[eldxmgw]

Yup, isn't expected to work. Has been discussed repeatedly. This is at LEAST the third time this month.

Use USB to SATA adapter to replace disk?

Happy new Year! Time for new hardware too! I want to upgrade my pool. I got 4 drives in my HPe MicroServer which I’d like to swap for bigger ones. I don’t want to go through resilvering and was wondering if it is possible to attach the new drives one by one externally and replace each of the...

www.truenas.com

The two hard drives in the USB hard drive cabinet can only recognize 1 (no raid)...

大家好。 我有一个独立供电的双盘位硬盘盒，里面放了两块500G的硬盘，通过USB3.0接口连接到我TureNAS的USB3.0插口 NAS：联想L440笔记本；16G内存；256G SSD 安装 TrueNAS；内置1Tx2 HDD镜像数据池。 问题：系统可以识别两个USB硬盘（/dev/da0、/dev/da1），但是在TrueNAS web管理界面的“磁盘”页面，只显示“da1”，看不到“da0” . 我在命令行：“zpool add droot mirror da0...

www.truenas.com

Thank you very much @jgreco, this is at least a very helpful answer!
Ok, i shouldn't be sad because after years with annoying QTS i'm very happy to get in touch with somebody that already transformed his Qnap into a better NAS with TN Core. A day after i also manged the same.
This expansion bay should only work as a DAS for single archive disks. If this isn't ment to work by this way on TrueNAS, no problem.
I think the best way is to accept this situation and attach it as a DAS via USB 3.1 on my hackintosh and copy achive files over LAN from the TrueNAS driven Qnap to the Hackintosh workstation.
Qnap also mentions that this expansion bay could be used either via QTS on your NAS, or as a DAS in individual, JBOD, R0 or R1 mode on your client.
So no tears, here - you saved me a lot of time

 

[jgreco]

So no tears, here - you saved me a lot of time

Well, it's still unfortunate. There's really no reason these things shouldn't work. All they'd need to do is to pass the serial number from the disk.

 

[jgreco]

And according to you in another thread "the NAS should be able to cope with [handling identifiers] more easily on an already-partitioned-and-identified hard disk". So shouldn't this then work?

Dunno! I don't actually have such a setup. I understand and appreciate the complexities of these kinds of issues; I am an infrastructure engineer and I deal with lots of issues that are variations on these themes. However, I'm not a developer of TrueNAS, or even an iX employee, so I really have only my own experiences and supposition to base this on.

Due to the way I *believe* things work, based on some ZFS basics, and having partitioned hundreds or more likely thousands of FreeBSD disks over the years by hand, I would expect that conflicting serial numbers would NOT impact "zpool import <x>" and that you could use such a pool. However, the TrueNAS middleware seems to be using the serial numbers in various ways to identify unique disk devices, and it could potentially be catastrophic to reuse an already-used HDD. There is actually such a bug/issue in 12.0-U7 which is of relatively high concern.

But there is also this thing called ground truth. That's the facts that have proven to be true, rather than the theoretical "I think this should be able to <x>". In the end, the ground truth is quite important -- if something you THINK should work does not in ACTUALITY work, then that is that. It don't work, and no amount of thinking at it will force it to work. However, if something you TRY does work, but you can come to a THEORY as to why you shouldn't do it, then you do have both options open to you.

I spend a lot of my times in the theory zone of why one should or should not do a given thing.

 

[eldxmgw]

Hey, as far as I know JBOD is the mode you want. Individual is looking for the QNAP software specifically as I understand it. I'm new to QNAP though so I am just going from the quick start guide! You'd probably know more than me at this point!

If you mean the Qnap NAS, yes. Almost all works out of the box so far i can tell.
Just the front panel display hangs with the message booting the device.... but there's a script that can handle that.
I red some people had issues (depending on the model) with max. fan RPM all the time, no functional LEDs aso.
So far i tested this unit with a single external USB HDD, installed latest Scale on it, configured 1/4 LAN ports and finished base config.
Because i just wanted to see if this works, i pulled all 8 disks from this unit.
Now i have to secure some TB on QTS, and then i can finally get rid of QTS forever.
Some people tell that they search for a DOM replacement.
I decided not to do this investment, since i understood that some people have trouble with the boot order.
My NAS has a standard but limited BIOS where i can (thx god) configure the smart fan of the unit (so no max. RPM fan issue),
and configure the boot order that lasts forever.
My plan is to install TN Core or Scale (not sure for now) on two USB attached 2,5" disks in a mirror and configure the DOM
in last boot order and leave the card where it is.
TN recorgnizes the card as a mass storage but i just ignore and don't use it.
The way using two small sized USB disks as a mirror is working since years for me. I use this without any issues on my TN Core NAS which is my slow and fast storage for my vCenter Cluster.

The manual says:
- JBOD combines disks together in a linear fashion. The system writes data to a disk until it is full, and then writes to the next disk.
- Individual: The NAS or computer identifies each installed disk as a separate, external drive. The disks are not combined into a single volume or RAID group. This configuration is also known as a port multiplier.

Yes when i configure the TR-002 in JBOD or R* mode TN sees a disk but two as one. But i fear creating a pool by a pre managed "combined mode" hardwired by a disk enclosure like this focusing on the importance of the archive data is way to risky for me.
Anyway JBOD or R* modes isn't that what i'm seeking for. The disks should be single volumes with a file system what can be mounted and red by most systems in more than a decade. Yes, two disks should always have the same content and be physically stored in a special outdoor suitcase on different places. But i think the route should be "keep it simple". Therefore a RAID level, JBOD aso. will be contraproductive.
Single volumes, kept identical by your own hands with xFAT as a FS is IMHO the way to go.

 

[SaltyCoffee]

Well, balls.....

Dunno! I don't actually have such a setup. I understand and appreciate the complexities of these kinds of issues; I am an infrastructure engineer and I deal with lots of issues that are variations on these themes. However, I'm not a developer of TrueNAS, or even an iX employee, so I really have only my own experiences and supposition to base this on.

Due to the way I *believe* things work, based on some ZFS basics, and having partitioned hundreds or more likely thousands of FreeBSD disks over the years by hand, I would expect that conflicting serial numbers would NOT impact "zpool import <x>" and that you could use such a pool. However, the TrueNAS middleware seems to be using the serial numbers in various ways to identify unique disk devices, and it could potentially be catastrophic to reuse an already-used HDD. There is actually such a bug/issue in 12.0-U7 which is of relatively high concern.

But there is also this thing called ground truth. That's the facts that have proven to be true, rather than the theoretical "I think this should be able to <x>". In the end, the ground truth is quite important -- if something you THINK should work does not in ACTUALITY work, then that is that. It don't work, and no amount of thinking at it will force it to work. However, if something you TRY does work, but you can come to a THEORY as to why you shouldn't do it, then you do have both options open to you.

I spend a lot of my times in the theory zone of why one should or should not do a given thing.

Pretty much. It's just tough when you actually do research going in only to hit a wall like this. I think the problem is that none of this stuff comes up when doing initial research into the use of an enclosure with TrueNAS (at least it didn't for me). Just the typical "don't use usb since it's a crime against humanity" stuff. It's not until I got this specific problem that this is coming up for me. I'm sure I'm not the only one, given the number of people posting about this and the regularity. Oh well, now I have to salvage this situation since I'm not likely to return this enclosure.

If you mean the Qnap NAS, yes. Almost all works out of the box so far i can tell.
Just the front panel display hangs with the message booting the device.... but there's a script that can handle that.
I red some people had issues (depending on the model) with max. fan RPM all the time, no functional LEDs aso.
So far i tested this unit with a single external USB HDD, installed latest Scale on it, configured 1/4 LAN ports and finished base config.
Because i just wanted to see if this works, i pulled all 8 disks from this unit.
Now i have to secure some TB on QTS, and then i can finally get rid of QTS forever.
Some people tell that they search for a DOM replacement.
I decided not to do this investment, since i understood that some people have trouble with the boot order.
My NAS has a standard but limited BIOS where i can (thx god) configure the smart fan of the unit (so no max. RPM fan issue),
and configure the boot order that lasts forever.
My plan is to install TN Core or Scale (not sure for now) on two USB attached 2,5" disks in a mirror and configure the DOM
in last boot order and leave the card where it is.
TN recorgnizes the card as a mass storage but i just ignore and don't use it.
The way using two small sized USB disks as a mirror is working since years for me. I use this without any issues on my TN Core NAS which is my slow and fast storage for my vCenter Cluster.

The manual says:
- JBOD combines disks together in a linear fashion. The system writes data to a disk until it is full, and then writes to the next disk.
- Individual: The NAS or computer identifies each installed disk as a separate, external drive. The disks are not combined into a single volume or RAID group. This configuration is also known as a port multiplier.

Yes when i configure the TR-002 in JBOD or R* mode TN sees a disk but two as one. But i fear creating a pool by a pre managed "combined mode" hardwired by a disk enclosure like this focusing on the importance of the archive data is way to risky for me.
Anyway JBOD or R* modes isn't that what i'm seeking for. The disks should be single volumes with a file system what can be mounted and red by most systems in more than a decade. Yes, two disks should always have the same content and be physically stored in a special outdoor suitcase on different places. But i think the route should be "keep it simple". Therefore a RAID level, JBOD aso. will be contraproductive.
Single volumes, kept identical by your own hands with xFAT as a FS is IMHO the way to go.

So you got it working using QNAP's software? I'd be interested to try the guides you used to get up and running. I'm working on a save at this point. Interesting what you're saying about the different modes. I hadn't seen that. I'm actually getting individual drives recognized in TN with JBOD mode, but they're not being recognized as part of my pool unfortunately. Although an old drive I had replaced a couple months ago, after popping it into the QNAP is recognized as part of the pool, creating yet another outlier.


This is the weird thing, guys, that leads me to believe I can at least set up a new pool and transfer my existing data to it. Also a headache, but at least possible. There's only 1 drive that is going invisible, so I just wouldn't use that one right? Truth on the ground kind of stuff, but wondering if this isn't just another dark alley I'm going down.

EDIT: Oh I forgot to mention, that invisible drive? TN is including it as part of my pool, and separate from the other drives in my pool. It just doesn't show up in the disks section So.. there's also that

 

[jgreco]

. I'm sure I'm not the only one, given the number of people posting about this and the regularity.

Well, I admit, we seem to have had a bunch of people showing up lately with USB enclosures, RAID cards, and other random hardware catastrophes and going "WTF".

Many years ago, we had lots of people with AMD APU's and Realtek ethernets. I started to push, hard, on moving people towards server-grade gear such as Supermicro, because we had always known that the hardware that works well is going to be that sort of thing, and the closer you could get to whatever iXsystems was selling, which was iX-labeled Supermicro/LSI HBA/Chelsio, the closer to serenity your solution would be. It would give you a highly compatible system.

Part of this was successful because a number of forum participants, such as Cyberjock, aggressively redirected the occasional errant people onto the golden path. This was not necessarily happy-making for some of the new participants, who saw this as "hostile", and many people who didn't have the thick skin necessary for survival in such an environment would simply depart. Some of them might have had some halfway level of success, but others failed completely. A few of them eventually returned after having learned the lessons the hard way, and then realizing that perhaps the lessons taught here were necessary.

This worked out pretty well for many years. But iXsystems doesn't want the "hard sell" education, and in the last several years, we've seen a gradual reappearance of people just showing up one day, sometimes having already purchased a used PC, or a recycled server, or other bad hardware choices such as USB. I'm not sure what the actual driver is here.

Bearing in mind that no one on these forums is iX staff or paid by iX to provide this support, except where they have an iXsystems badge under their profile picture, what do you suggest be done to dissuade people from doing the bad things, and/or do you have any other suggestions? As fellow community members, we all want you to be successful, but a decade of experience says that this is just hard to accomplish sometimes. I literally have no good path forward for your unfortunate choice of external enclosure, for example.

 

[SaltyCoffee]

Well, I admit, we seem to have had a bunch of people showing up lately with USB enclosures, RAID cards, and other random hardware catastrophes and going "WTF".

Many years ago, we had lots of people with AMD APU's and Realtek ethernets. I started to push, hard, on moving people towards server-grade gear such as Supermicro, because we had always known that the hardware that works well is going to be that sort of thing, and the closer you could get to whatever iXsystems was selling, which was iX-labeled Supermicro/LSI HBA/Chelsio, the closer to serenity your solution would be. It would give you a highly compatible system.

Part of this was successful because a number of forum participants, such as Cyberjock, aggressively redirected the occasional errant people onto the golden path. This was not necessarily happy-making for some of the new participants, who saw this as "hostile", and many people who didn't have the thick skin necessary for survival in such an environment would simply depart. Some of them might have had some halfway level of success, but others failed completely. A few of them eventually returned after having learned the lessons the hard way, and then realizing that perhaps the lessons taught here were necessary.

This worked out pretty well for many years. But iXsystems doesn't want the "hard sell" education, and in the last several years, we've seen a gradual reappearance of people just showing up one day, sometimes having already purchased a used PC, or a recycled server, or other bad hardware choices such as USB. I'm not sure what the actual driver is here.

Bearing in mind that no one on these forums is iX staff or paid by iX to provide this support, except where they have an iXsystems badge under their profile picture, what do you suggest be done to dissuade people from doing the bad things, and/or do you have any other suggestions? As fellow community members, we all want you to be successful, but a decade of experience says that this is just hard to accomplish sometimes. I literally have no good path forward for your unfortunate choice of external enclosure, for example.

I think I might actually be able to provide maybe a little insight into this. As I'm probably one of the "thin skinned" as you put it.

My thing is I have a technical background and even in days gone by I was an IT manager for over a decade. I get what the helpful souls of this forum and others are trying to do and are saying. That I'm ignoring it isn't to mean I don't believe them. It's that this help isn't helping me. I don't want a sermon when I'm looking for answers. And of the answers I got, I don't want a hulking tower that heats up my room and creates noise pollution. I came to TN because I wanted a small shelf sat system that is neither seen nor heard but just does it's job. And I had that coming in; using USB. For me USB was part of the solution I was seeking, only because it's what I had at the time, and it worked for me, despite the doomsayers ideals. My truth on the ground, as it were.

Now I'm just trying to consolidate what is admittedly a bit of an eyesore with an enclosure. I passed on the eSATA enclosure because 1) my TN device doesn't have an external eSATA port and 2) eSATA was double the price. Plus I imagine the purists would still crap on it since it's still a DAS and not internally accessed/addressed. And again, for me, USB has had no performance issues. Until now, that is. So maybe I have graduated to the ones who "come around after failing". But see, even now I will try to make this work. Because it's what I have and purity doesn't help me.

At some point I will probably spend the money for a proper QNAP, and I might even install TN on it. But I'll never build an iX Systems replica. It's just not what I want or need, even if it is the ideal set up for TN.

As to what would work, maybe well positioned individuals such as your self who see the big picture on the forums and what gets posted repeatedly could put this information in a sticky for people exactly like me who are coming at it from this perspective. It might seem patronizing and maybe even a little beneath you to do it, I'm guessing, but it would have helped me a whole lot when I was doing my initial research into using enclosures with TN. A common failures of USB thread or maybe just "so you want to build a usb system" thread with this exact issue in it would have pushed me in a different direction. We come-arounders need to see the failure (our own or someone elses) because our truth on the ground doesn't match what the purists say. It's super annoying for us too because, of course we'd much rather be able to just trust solid advice.

Hope that helps; the view from the other side. Thanks for all the un-compensated, thankless time you and others put into guiding people out here in the wild west. I'm sure it doesn't get said enough.

 

[Arwen]

My thought is that TrueNAS (CORE or SCALE), is not the end all for SOHO NASes.

To paraphrase a famous saying: There is not one NAS to rule them all

In someways, TrueNAS is a niche product because it has some limitations that people coming from other products find unacceptable. Like;

• Unable to grow a RAID-xx by 1 disk, (though this is planned for OpenZFS soon)
• Unable to shrink a RAID-xx by 1 disk, (which does not seem like this will ever be part of OpenZFS)
• Convert a Mirror to RAID-xx, or visa-versa.
• Support native NTFS or FAT-xx as first class file system, (including using it for exporting client files)
• Not being able to take ZFS disks and use them easily on MS-Windows, (desktops or servers), in case of disaster

Not to mention other things like not being able to share the boot device with a data disk. Or, not being able to install any software a user wants, without trouble and no maintenance.

Of course, I'd rather live with the limitations of ZFS than suffer the consequences of using other storage methods. So much so, my 2 laptops, (very old & very new), desktop and media server all use ZFS with Linux. And have for 6 years.

 

[Arwen]

@SaltyCoffee I hope you find something that works reliably for you.

The warning is that multi-disk USB enclosures that give the same serial number for each disk, can be made to work using device names and not serial numbers. However, TrueNAS does not normally work that way, and during a simple drive replacement, other failure, or even an TrueNAS update, you could end up with an unusable pool at best. At worst, corrupted pool.

In essence, you and others with USB attached data drives are going off in to uncharted territory. It may work fine for you, for others but someone may use the "wrong" USB enclosure and get bit. Possibly hard enough for data corruption and needing a full restore.

So, good luck. We just don't have many users with USB attached data drives to give any solid, working advice.

Yes, we probably need a sticky or resource on, "So you want to use USB for data drives?".

 

[eldxmgw]

Well, balls.....



Pretty much. It's just tough when you actually do research going in only to hit a wall like this. I think the problem is that none of this stuff comes up when doing initial research into the use of an enclosure with TrueNAS (at least it didn't for me). Just the typical "don't use usb since it's a crime against humanity" stuff. It's not until I got this specific problem that this is coming up for me. I'm sure I'm not the only one, given the number of people posting about this and the regularity. Oh well, now I have to salvage this situation since I'm not likely to return this enclosure.


So you got it working using QNAP's software? I'd be interested to try the guides you used to get up and running. I'm working on a save at this point. Interesting what you're saying about the different modes. I hadn't seen that. I'm actually getting individual drives recognized in TN with JBOD mode, but they're not being recognized as part of my pool unfortunately. Although an old drive I had replaced a couple months ago, after popping it into the QNAP is recognized as part of the pool, creating yet another outlier.


This is the weird thing, guys, that leads me to believe I can at least set up a new pool and transfer my existing data to it. Also a headache, but at least possible. There's only 1 drive that is going invisible, so I just wouldn't use that one right? Truth on the ground kind of stuff, but wondering if this isn't just another dark alley I'm going down.

EDIT: Oh I forgot to mention, that invisible drive? TN is including it as part of my pool, and separate from the other drives in my pool. It just doesn't show up in the disks section So.. there's also that

No i don't use the expansion unit with TN* because of the reasons i mentioned earlier in backlog.
The unit is now connected to my hackintosh workstation via USB3 and individual mode showing both drives as i wanted.
I don't need to use any extra software for this mode. All is mounted natively in OSX.

 

[eldxmgw]

Many years ago, we had lots of people with AMD APU's and Realtek ethernets. I started to push, hard, on moving people towards server-grade gear such as Supermicro, because we had always known that the hardware that works well is going to be that sort of thing, and the closer you could get to whatever iXsystems was selling, which was iX-labeled Supermicro/LSI HBA/Chelsio, the closer to serenity your solution would be. It would give you a highly compatible system.

I remember reading this kind of threads years ago when starting with FreeNAS. ;)
In that time i never managed to buy Chelisio 10GBit NICs. I ended up with Intel-X520-DA2, either OEM or Fujitsu branded NICs.

 

[SaltyCoffee]

@SaltyCoffee I hope you find something that works reliably for you.

The warning is that multi-disk USB enclosures that give the same serial number for each disk, can be made to work using device names and not serial numbers. However, TrueNAS does not normally work that way, and during a simple drive replacement, other failure, or even an TrueNAS update, you could end up with an unusable pool at best. At worst, corrupted pool.

In essence, you and others with USB attached data drives are going off in to uncharted territory. It may work fine for you, for others but someone may use the "wrong" USB enclosure and get bit. Possibly hard enough for data corruption and needing a full restore.

So, good luck. We just don't have many users with USB attached data drives to give any solid, working advice.

Yes, we probably need a sticky or resource on, "So you want to use USB for data drives?".

Right, I'm proceeding with USB as an unsupported configuration and as such, am backing up data regularly. This is a habit I got more religious bout after a disaster with windows spaces (don't judge me!). I have off site copies of everything.

As for alternatives, I didn't see much out there when I initially decided on TN. Unraid seemed to be the closest option, albeit a paid one (and they don't seem to be much different with respect to the thread topic). And of course the QNAP and Synology proprietary solutions. Anything else you could point me to would be helpful.

But the takeaway for me here I guess, is that those of us in the 'raid device' market should just go with QNAP or Synology or similar and leave all this tinkering to the purists...

 

[jgreco]

is that those of us in the 'raid device' market should just go with QNAP or Synology or similar and leave all this tinkering to the purists...

What's wrong with actually buying the correct hardware? The whole point of FreeNAS is to avoid the tinkering. There's a thing you can do that doesn't involve building your own server and learning how to install FreeBSD and Samba and all that crap; it's to buy a FreeNAS Mini. If you find that unpleasantly expensive, you can also do any of the inexpensive hardware options listed around here.

QNAP and Synology are just going to guide you into their pricey closed ecosystems; Synology is restricting you to using their approved drives (mostly Synology).

One of the benefits to buying the correct hardware is that you're NOT locked into FreeNAS/TrueNAS; the same hardware typically works fine with other NASwares.

 

[Arwen]

...

But the takeaway for me here I guess, is that those of us in the 'raid device' market should just go with QNAP or Synology or similar and leave all this tinkering to the purists...

It is not a "purists" thought. Most of us understand that while TrueNAS (CORE or SCALE) is free, and perhaps the top end of the free NAS products, it may also be the one with the most quirks and limitations.

Improperly setup environments can lead to data loss. Or poor design choices without understanding those are less than ideal design choices, can also lead to data loss. If you KNOW you have a less than ideal design choice, and are prepared for problems, (like having to do a full restore, meaning you have current backups), then it is less of a problem.

I'd rather point someone to another product that may meet their needs better. Than to have them loose data on TrueNAS due to the higher learning curve, (for FreeBSD and or OpenZFS).

For example, their are other free NASes;

XigmaNAS – XigmaNAS

www.xigmanas.org

https://www.openmediavault.org/

Plus others...

Not trying to suggest you use something else...

 

[SaltyCoffee]

What's wrong with actually buying the correct hardware? The whole point of FreeNAS is to avoid the tinkering. There's a thing you can do that doesn't involve building your own server and learning how to install FreeBSD and Samba and all that crap; it's to buy a FreeNAS Mini. If you find that unpleasantly expensive, you can also do any of the inexpensive hardware options listed around here.

QNAP and Synology are just going to guide you into their pricey closed ecosystems; Synology is restricting you to using their approved drives (mostly Synology).

One of the benefits to buying the correct hardware is that you're NOT locked into FreeNAS/TrueNAS; the same hardware typically works fine with other NASwares.

I had looked into this initially when evaluating QNAP, Synology, and Unraid. Ix were priced double of anything I was considering. And what you're saying about the proprietary trap is why I opted for TN to begin with. Even now, I do see a path to making this work. But, in the end, my limit of the amount of tinkering I'm willing to do did not exceed the amount necessary. I'm just not the target demo for TN. This was a risk I understood going in. It was a gamble and it didn't pay off. Not entirely anyway. I could leave it as is, with the loose drives, and be fine. But I'm opting to exchange this JBOD for a proper QNAP. I may try to install TN on it. But at least I know the trap will work for me if it has to. And now I have an extra set-top computer to do something else with.

It is not a "purists" thought. Most of us understand that while TrueNAS (CORE or SCALE) is free, and perhaps the top end of the free NAS products, it may also be the one with the most quirks and limitations.

Improperly setup environments can lead to data loss. Or poor design choices without understanding those are less than ideal design choices, can also lead to data loss. If you KNOW you have a less than ideal design choice, and are prepared for problems, (like having to do a full restore, meaning you have current backups), then it is less of a problem.

I'd rather point someone to another product that may meet their needs better. Than to have them loose data on TrueNAS due to the higher learning curve, (for FreeBSD and or OpenZFS).

For example, their are other free NASes;

XigmaNAS – XigmaNAS

www.xigmanas.org

https://www.openmediavault.org/

Plus others...

Not trying to suggest you use something else...

Thanks I'll check Xigma and OMV out.

 

[Patrick M. Hausen]

You don't need to buy from iX. Supermicro offers a nice micro tower case that holds 4 3.5" drives, two additional 2.5" ones, and a PCIe card. Look in my signature at "Main Private NAS" and "Backup NAS" for ideas. They are also whisper quiet considered they contain spinning disks. Noticeable at home, yes. But with the cabinet door closed barely so.