Possible to make freenas plex machine dual boot with ubuntu?

[justforplex]

I built a decent little box a few years ago with freenas running plex and it worked fine. Now Im thinking Id like to use that box for an occassional linux ubuntu or kali computer in the basement, when Im down there. Is there a way to do this? See, the nas box was actually running ubuntu BEFORE I turned it into the nas machine, so I tried connecting the old linux drive and booted to linux, but now the plex isnt running to any of my TVs in the house. Ive searched and as usual, found many much older threads on various forums that go in different directions, not equal to my goals. So Im wondering it cant be that uncommon a goal to load freenas onto a box and still want to use that same box as a regular computer with windows or linux, right? I understand nas uses zfs and linux doesnt, but everything is on seperate drives; nas is on its own hdd, and the tv shows and movies are on their own drives, with the linux load on its own drive. Im typing this out on the linux side right now, but plex refuses to run to my TV's normally. I feel like this is an easy fix but Im unaware of something simple in the chain or boot setup? Thanks folks.

 

[danb35]

cant be that uncommon a goal to load freenas onto a box and still want to use that same box as a regular computer with windows or linux, right?

Yeah, it pretty much is. What you're suggesting isn't supported. You could always put Ubuntu into a VM on the TrueNAS box.

 

[justforplex]

OK shit. So second question - did my install of nas alter my content drives such that they cannot now be used with another system/OS? I cant just throw in a new linux boot drive in place of the nas drive, and run plex off linux? Bc I just got done trying that and while it can actually see the content drives, it refuses to let me drill down through them, and plex media server wont see the content drives at all. So are my content drives just screwed with anything other than nas?

 

[danb35]

If you used the "content drives" with Free/TrueNAS, you made them a ZFS pool. To read them in anything else, you'd need to install ZFS in that OS.

 

[justforplex]

So if the nas OS is on a seperate drive from the ubuntu, shouldnt it load up normally when I power the box up? Regardless of which drive I choose to boot with? I mean, power is going to that nas OS drive...

 

[pschatz100]

So Im wondering it cant be that uncommon a goal to load freenas onto a box and still want to use that same box as a regular computer with windows or linux, right? I understand nas uses zfs and linux doesnt, but everything is on seperate drives; nas is on its own hdd, and the tv shows and movies are on their own drives, with the linux load on its own drive. Im typing this out on the linux side right now, but plex refuses to run to my TV's normally. I feel like this is an easy fix but Im unaware of something simple in the chain or boot setup? Thanks folks.

To follow up on @danb35 comment, the desire to use a FreeNAS/TrueNAS box as a regular computer for other tasks is not very common - but it is not impossible either. However, out of the box, FreeNAS/TrueNAS configures the computer as a NAS and expects it to be dedicated to that purpose. And that is what the vast majority of users want.

On to your other comments...

I think there may be some confusion between Operating Systems and File Systems. An operating system, such as Ubuntu or FreeBSD (or Windows for that matter), can support several different file systems. The exact file systems that can be supported will be determined by the version of the OS you are running.

In the case of FreeNAS/TrueNAS, what you have is a NAS appliance - which means it comes pre-configured with a specific set of functionality, including support for ZFS file system. When you reconfigured your old system for FreeNAS, you installed what is essentially a pre-configured application and, yes, it will have converted your data drives to ZFS file system.

Note that ZFS is not proprietary to FreeNAS/TrueNAS, but in order to access your data from another operating system, that other operating system will need to support the same ZFS system. The latest LTS version of Ubuntu, 20.04, supports ZFS. I doubt that earlier versions of Ubuntu support ZFS, so if you are booting from an old Ubuntu system disk then most likely it cannot read the ZFS disks. Make sense?

Do you have your data backed up? I would make certain you have a good backup, just in case you manage to damage your data by all your experimentation.

 

[justforplex]

To follow up on @danb35 comment, the desire to use a FreeNAS/TrueNAS box as a regular computer for other tasks is not very common - but it is not impossible either. However, out of the box, FreeNAS/TrueNAS configures the computer as a NAS and expects it to be dedicated to that purpose. And that is what the vast majority of users want.

Note that ZFS is not proprietary to FreeNAS/TrueNAS, but in order to access your data from another operating system, that other operating system will need to support the same ZFS system. The latest LTS version of Ubuntu, 20.04, supports ZFS. I doubt that earlier versions of Ubuntu support ZFS, so if you are booting from an old Ubuntu system disk then most likely it cannot read the ZFS disks. Make sense?

Do you have your data backed up? I would make certain you have a good backup, just in case you manage to damage your data by all your experimentation.

Thank you for that explanation of things, well written too!

Oh I just dont want to run another electricity sucking box to use as a regular computer in that area of the house, was hoping there was a way to run the Nas/plex in the background and Ubuntu as a regular use machine. My use would be light. I still feel like this should be possible.

I will load a drive with the current Ubuntu and try it. I just feel like my plex usage, which was the sole reason for the nas, isnt that high. I feel like the truenas software will run my drives continuously and lead to early failure. Hoping to avoid that. You're right, I need to backup. First things first.

 

[danb35]

hoping there was a way to run the Nas/plex in the background and Ubuntu as a regular use machine.

If you're using Ubuntu as your "daily driver" OS, why not just install Plex there?

truenas software will run my drives continuously and lead to early failure.

TrueNAS will normally keep the drives spinning, but that will not lead to early failure.

 

[justforplex]

sorry, didnt mean to sound sarcastic there. edit

 

[justforplex]

If you're using Ubuntu as your "daily driver" OS, why not just install Plex there?

TrueNAS will normally keep the drives spinning, but that will not lead to early failure.

Right, thats what I plan to do now. Just run plex ms from ubuntu, after backing up the drives.

 

[danb35]

I didn't take you as being sarcastic; it's a serious question--if you use Ubuntu as your daily driver, and the only reason for the NAS is to run Plex, why not just run Plex on Ubuntu? It just seems like the NAS is an unnecessary complication in your stated use case. But Ubuntu supports ZFS, so there shouldn't be any need to reformat or otherwise modify your existing disks.

 

[winnielinnie]

Just a side note: ZFS on Ubuntu 20.04 is version 0.8. The is before OpenZFS 2.0, and may not fully support a ZFS pool that was created with TrueNAS Core 12.