NAS or plates

[JT40]

Thanks everyone for the suggestions so far.

Let's start with the facts :D :

1. UPS of about 150 pounds is really enough, approx 6h downtime supported. Why I shouted 400? Because I thought to the rest of the devices by mistake, pointless because it would cost me something like 1k and more...

Probably I'll add something like the main laptop I use, which has a dead battery :D :D :D , anyway I should keep it only for the NAS.

2. Commercial NAS enclosures that have 4 slots cost 500 pounds without disks, so everything would be 500 + (160*4 disks) = 1140.
   Not really a great price.............
   I'm planning to find some open source project, probably I'll go with TrueNas, it may save me 200 pounds probably.

3. The NAS will be used as backup, Time Machine would use once a hour, but I can reduce it.
   Other machines probably once a day, or when I transfer some files manually, the largest load up will be in the beginning, later just a few files per day max...
   Basically, my disks would be just spinning most of the time, and writing mostly stuff coming from Time Machine, but there isn't much to do, really little usage.
   Reason why I wouldn't like to spend much, but security first, and that adds up costs...

4. I'm planning to use RAID 1 between all the disks, I know it sounds stupid, but it seems reliable enough, but moreover, simple!
   Each disk will be 6TB, for me is enough.
   With a RAID 5, I would get the same size, but with the data striped along all the disks, for a simple restore, it's better to just pull out a disk that's why I'd prefer a RAID 1.
   I would use a RAID 5 in a production environment when I need high availability, but in my case I need reliability and simplicity.
   How does it sound?

Size wise, I could also get 3x8TB, it would save me some money and give me more space, there is also an option with 2 disks 16TB each, 275 pounds each disk, when I'll break one, you know I'll cry a lot :D .
For a RAID 1 there are many options, even 2x8TB could be sufficient, the only thing is that with my brain not fresh of NAS experience, I'm not sure if it's a great idea.

[rcoleman-netgate]

@jt40 said in NAS or plates:

Commercial NAS enclosures that have 4 slots cost 500 pounds without disks, so everything would be 500 + (160*4 disks) = 1140.

Buy a 50 older computer with 8G RAM and 8 drive bays and spend the extra 450 on more drives. Install TrueNAS Core.

You can do all those things in it but on ZFS. I do TimeMachine over Fiber to my DC 8mi away. Because I CAN

[JT40]

@rcoleman-netgate said in NAS or plates:

@jt40 said in NAS or plates:

Commercial NAS enclosures that have 4 slots cost 500 pounds without disks, so everything would be 500 + (160*4 disks) = 1140.

Buy a 50 older computer with 8G RAM and 8 drive bays and spend the extra 450 on more drives. Install TrueNAS Core.

You can do all those things in it but on ZFS. I do TimeMachine over Fiber to my DC 8mi away. Because I CAN

Not really a bad idea, I have some older gaming hardware that was going to be recycled, I will probably buy a smaller case though :D , or buy directly a smaller and more silent system btw, something around 150 pounds max, it depends what's in the market...

Anyway, do you better consider a RAID 1 with a low amount of disks in my case, or a RAID 5 with 4 disks?
I think that a RAID 1 feels more hot swap for a migration in a new system, if ever required.

[rcoleman-netgate]

@jt40 said in NAS or plates:

Anyway, do you better consider a RAID 1 with a low amount of disks in my case, or a RAID 5 with 4 disks?
I think that a RAID 1 feels more hot swap for a migration in a new system, if ever required.

If you go TrueNAS you have no option of RAID.

TrueNAS uses ZFS. Most modern NAS deployments use ZFS. The only reason my ESXi uses RAID is because it's the hardware and supported in ESXi. It will eventually be an iSCSI connection to a TrueNAS server and slimmed down from 2U to 1U.

The type os ZFS style you use depends on what you want for capacity, speed, and redundancy.

I have long-term storage wants so I do multiple drives of parity in ZFS to save my bacon down the road.

[JT40]

@johnpoz said in NAS or plates:

@jt40 said in NAS or plates:

I expect the disks to last 8y

That is pretty optimistic if you ask me..

UPS for 400.. what sort of run time are you looking for.. How much juice do you have to supply? That seems pretty high, the ups I have running my nas and couple of my ap etc.. cost me.. $157.38 delivered and it has a plenty of run time for my needs.. Nas only draws about 55W..

How do these SOHO boxes perform with a power cut? Do they have some proper protection in place for data consistency or integrity as a whole between the disks?
I think that the point of a NAS, in the time of writing, is that it can prevent data integrity only with DC ON.

[JT40]

@rcoleman-netgate said in NAS or plates:

@jt40 said in NAS or plates:

Anyway, do you better consider a RAID 1 with a low amount of disks in my case, or a RAID 5 with 4 disks?
I think that a RAID 1 feels more hot swap for a migration in a new system, if ever required.

If you go TrueNAS you have no option of RAID.

TrueNAS uses ZFS. Most modern NAS deployments use ZFS. The only reason my ESXi uses RAID is because it's the hardware and supported in ESXi. It will eventually be an iSCSI connection to a TrueNAS server and slimmed down from 2U to 1U.

The type os ZFS style you use depends on what you want for capacity, speed, and redundancy.

I have long-term storage wants so I do multiple drives of parity in ZFS to save my bacon down the road.

Thanks, I will check out ZFS, not so much familiar with all the characteristics.
For long term storage, I have cloud backups which I'm also planning to automate with some script, but I'll also evaluate cold storage in AWS for data that I don't use much, usually the heavy stuff that I barely use.

[rcoleman-netgate]

@jt40 said in NAS or plates:

For long term storage, I have cloud backups

I wouldn't consider anything in the cloud as a long-term storage space.

[JT40]

@rcoleman-netgate said in NAS or plates:

@jt40 said in NAS or plates:

For long term storage, I have cloud backups

I wouldn't consider anything in the cloud as a long-term storage space.

Why? Anyway a cold storage solution is very cheap, something like iCloud instead is more expensive due to the file sync available, but still affordable...

[rcoleman-netgate]

@jt40 Yes, it's cheap. it's easy. But don't rely on it.

I'll point you to the T-Mobile Sidekick debacle for reference.

[johnpoz]

I use glacier as 3rd tier layer backup for my important stuff like home movies. Well maybe even consider it a 4th.

I have my home movies on the nas, on multiple volumes. I also have a copy on my PC. I also have a copy on mdisc (suppose to be good for 1k years).. Not sure I believe that but they should be better than typical bluray, etc.

I also have a copy at my sons house of the mdisc copies. And then I do also have them on glacier. I would only need those copies in a worse case scenario sort of my house caught fire, and then say my son's house got flooded or something.. But you can never be too safe with stuff you can never get back.. And the mdisc should be able to survive a flood ;) Your grandkids only have their 1st bday once sort of thing, and pictures, etc..

While I have multiple copies here at the house - really it only 1 copy, if the house is lost. But then there is my sons who is 40 plus miles away. And then there are other copies at my other son's in San Diego - which reminds me should make sure his archive copy is up to date.. He might be a disc behind. But the only way I would really need the glacier copy if something took out my house and my son's house, and California decided to slide into the ocean all around the same time..

If I lost my whole plex media library - while hey it wouldn't be a good day, but it wouldn't be the end of the world either.. Nothing on there is not replaceable.. Home movies, and pictures those can not..

I would never trust any single copy no matter where it is a secure copy when it comes to stuff that can not be replaced. But it does make for a cheap offline backup in your backup/disaster plan.

[JT40]

@rcoleman-netgate said in NAS or plates:

@jt40 Yes, it's cheap. it's easy. But don't rely on it.

I'll point you to the T-Mobile Sidekick debacle for reference.

Sure, but someone could also steal my NAS when visiting me during night time :D .

Certainly, I don't trust cloud blindly, I always have my own copy of the data, in somehow.

@johnpoz said in NAS or plates:

I use glacier as 3rd tier layer backup for my important stuff like home movies. Well maybe even consider it a 4th.

I have my home movies on the nas, on multiple volumes. I also have a copy on my PC. I also have a copy on mdisc (suppose to be good for 1k years).. Not sure I believe that but they should be better than typical bluray, etc.

I also have a copy at my sons house of the mdisc copies. And then I do also have them on glacier. I would only need those copies in a worse case scenario sort of my house caught fire, and then say my son's house got flooded or something.. But you can never be too safe with stuff you can never get back.. And the mdisc should be able to survive a flood ;) Your grandkids only have their 1st bday once sort of thing, and pictures, etc..

While I have multiple copies here at the house - really it only 1 copy, if the house is lost. But then there is my sons who is 40 plus miles away. And then there are other copies at my other son's in San Diego - which reminds me should make sure his archive copy is up to date.. He might be a disc behind. But the only way I would really need the glacier copy if something took out my house and my son's house, and California decided to slide into the ocean all around the same time..

If I lost my whole plex media library - while hey it wouldn't be a good day, but it wouldn't be the end of the world either.. Nothing on there is not replaceable.. Home movies, and pictures those can not..

I would never trust any single copy no matter where it is a secure copy when it comes to stuff that can not be replaced. But it does make for a cheap offline backup in your backup/disaster plan.

I wouldn't care about movies :D , more about my project, expensive courses, some little personal data (the important ones are encrypted) etc...

Anyway, RAID 1 or RAID 5? :D
I'd use a RAID 1 with 2 disks, it seems a very cheap solution in my case...
RAID 5 would guarantee me more safety only if I use 4 disks, unfortunately more expensive, it's also more expensive to replace those disks in future if some breaks.

Btw, the UPS battery doesn't need to be used time to time to avoid decay?

[johnpoz]

@jt40 said in NAS or plates:

I wouldn't care about movies :D

I don't care about "movies" either other than "home" movies.. If you don't have any of those - then no not concern for you. Whatever is important and non replaceable is the point.

[rcoleman-netgate]

@jt40 said in NAS or plates:

Anyway, RAID 1 or RAID 5? :D
I'd use a RAID 1 with 2 disks, it seems a very cheap solution in my case...
RAID 5 would guarantee me more safety only if I use 4 disks, unfortunately more expensive, it's also more expensive to replace those disks in future if some breaks.

Do you need speed? Reliability? Speed and Reliability?

With a R5 how many disks? How big?

These are all things to contemplate... I considered R6 for my array before building TrueNAS and realized that it would copy data at a third of the speed of my R5 and that meant it would take months to transfer my 40TB array.

With my TrueNAS I believe I'm set up in basically a RAID 16... Two pools in Z3 that are mirrored. Gives me up to 6 drives of failure but that's not how you want to look at it - if one drive goes replace it. Have a cold spare, and a hot spare, for those circumstances.

Check out the RAID Performance Calculator: https://wintelguy.com/raidperf.pl to get an idea of what you need.

Also look at their ZFS calculator: https://wintelguy.com/zfs-calc.pl

And believe me when I say: avoid RAID. That locks you in more than you probably want. If you're building on your own hardware (as I recommended above) TrueNAS is not RAID.

[JT40]

@rcoleman-netgate said in NAS or plates:

@jt40 said in NAS or plates:

Anyway, RAID 1 or RAID 5? :D
I'd use a RAID 1 with 2 disks, it seems a very cheap solution in my case...
RAID 5 would guarantee me more safety only if I use 4 disks, unfortunately more expensive, it's also more expensive to replace those disks in future if some breaks.

Do you need speed? Reliability? Speed and Reliability?

With a R5 how many disks? How big?

These are all things to contemplate... I considered R6 for my array before building TrueNAS and realized that it would copy data at a third of the speed of my R5 and that meant it would take months to transfer my 40TB array.

With my TrueNAS I believe I'm set up in basically a RAID 16... Two pools in Z3 that are mirrored. Gives me up to 6 drives of failure but that's not how you want to look at it - if one drive goes replace it. Have a cold spare, and a hot spare, for those circumstances.

Check out the RAID Performance Calculator: https://wintelguy.com/raidperf.pl to get an idea of what you need.

Also look at their ZFS calculator: https://wintelguy.com/zfs-calc.pl

And believe me when I say: avoid RAID. That locks you in more than you probably want. If you're building on your own hardware (as I recommended above) TrueNAS is not RAID.

Regarding reliability, yes, I need that first, but for the speed, it's not crucial unless for massive read/write operations which will happen mainly the first time, and after a disaster recovery that I hope I won't need to do.

Ok but what this means? Well, I need probably 8-10TB to use, I wish to use much more but I'll leave videos and other heavy files online, which I can in somehow afford to lose, this is crucial for cost saving...
I could trim it down if I clean up old snapshots from Time Machine too, but I'd like to be a bit future proof :D , the needs may always increase a bit over time.
I could stretch it to 7TB minimum, max of 8TB if really needed.
The immediate usage would fill up around 5TB max though, the rest is due to Time Machine over time mostly, + my VMs that keep increase over time... This backup process would also add up a lot of writing on weekly basis I guess, because I don't use tools for snapshots, I just backup the entire VM to make it extremely easy, it's like 100GB average a week for a single VM, max of 200GB weekly between all of them.

I just remembered that my VM backups online are the biggest pain... A NAS would solve that issue once and for all.

I just noticed that I can't go with my current hardware, it has only 4 SATA ports and it's consumer class SATA controller with past issues of performance when all the disks are connected.
Plus, unless I buy 12-16TB disks, it won't be enough for my needs... What hardware do you suggest?
At least it's clear that TrueNAS is the way, I need to stay away from RAID.

[JT40]

500GB writing weekly let's say, mainly during weekend.

[rcoleman-netgate]

@jt40 said in NAS or plates:

I just noticed that I can't go with my current hardware, it has only 4 SATA ports and it's consumer class SATA controller with past issues of performance when all the disks are connected.
Plus, unless I buy 12-16TB disks, it won't be enough for my needs... What hardware do you suggest?
At least it's clear that TrueNAS is the way, I need to stay away from RAID.

The nice thing about ZFS is growth.
You can start with 4 drives in a Z+2 (if they're 10TB drives that gives you 20TB before formatting, 16-17 after [conservatively]). Then when you need more you add a SATA RAID card in IT mode (one that has been re-imaged with a firmware that allows for non-RAID operation) and then import the drives you need, or migrate to a bigger machine, import the ZFS pool and then grow it from there.

When you use ZFS and you want to use de-duplication (the removal of identical files but they are instead given a key serial number and referenced -- saving space) that requires a LOT of RAM to do so bear that much in mind. I have 100TB, 46% used, and no-deduping, running on 64GB and it's serious overkill. I don't need 64, but 40GB of it is being used by the ZFS cache.

For full/good suggestions on TrueNAS deployment this isn't the place you want to get that opinion. I would visit either their forums or their subreddit.

[keyser]

@rcoleman-netgate While I do agree that ZFS is the superior storage filesystem because of the many many features, I would like to argue it’s use for “small home installs”. In my book it has no use in home installs unless you max out the possible disk count from the very start.

THE most painfull thing is the fact you cannot expand ZFS pools with one disk at a time like with both software and hardware RAID if the filesystem on top supports it (which almost all filesystems does).
So small home NAS builds should only be using ZFS if ALL disk slots are filled from the beginning. Expanding is not possible unless you add a whole new vdev. And unless that consists of the same drive count, performance will suffer greatly because data is not migrated/leveled across vdevs.

So use ZFS with care in home builds. You need to know in advance what capacity you need and what performance you need. Expanding into more capacity and speed is VERY painfull for most small installs (involves whiping the intire layout and starting over).
But if your do know your capacity and speed needs and can buy it up front…. Then ZFS is top dog because of the massive amount of features it provides.