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Raid
#91
If you use a hardware raid contoller and something happened to said controller, you better hope that you can find the exact same controller somewhere, otherwise you will lose your raid configuration and your raided data.

Mark
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#92
I have a plan in motion to be able to start testing FreeNAS, if I can figure out how to install it. Is it a bootable USB stick like unRAID is?
Server: Synology Diskstation 1511+ with 8x WD Red NAS 3TB drives, DSM 5.2
Main HTPC: Home Built i3, 8GB RAM, Corsair 128GB SSD, nVidia 630GTX, Harmony Home Control, Pioneer VSX-53, Panasonic VT30 65" 3D TV, Windows 10, Isengard
Bedroom HTPC: Zotac-ID 41 8GB RAM, 128GB SSD, Rii micro keyboard remote, Samsung HW-E550, Sony 32" Google TV, OpenElec 6.0 beta 4
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#93
patseguin Wrote:I have a plan in motion to be able to start testing FreeNAS, if I can figure out how to install it. Is it a bootable USB stick like unRAID is?

Yes and now please go find their install guide, it will tell you all you need to know.
HTPC: LibreELEC 7 on Shuttle XS35GTv2 & Raspberry Pi 3
NAS: NAS4Free 2x 3TB Raid1
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#94
Would you say something like http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.as...6822108072 is still better than any software RAID setup?
Server: Synology Diskstation 1511+ with 8x WD Red NAS 3TB drives, DSM 5.2
Main HTPC: Home Built i3, 8GB RAM, Corsair 128GB SSD, nVidia 630GTX, Harmony Home Control, Pioneer VSX-53, Panasonic VT30 65" 3D TV, Windows 10, Isengard
Bedroom HTPC: Zotac-ID 41 8GB RAM, 128GB SSD, Rii micro keyboard remote, Samsung HW-E550, Sony 32" Google TV, OpenElec 6.0 beta 4
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#95
You first have to define "better".

Better performance: Most likely.

Better if the controller dies: Very much no, since you have to find the same controller to regain your array, or it's entirely lost.

You really need to move beyond the whole "better?" thing and focus on the question "best for my needs?" (which takes some reading up), or you'll never get done.

If you had answered that question somewhere in the beginning of your adventures, you would by now know which solution, which hardware and sit on the couch watching content from your RAID server Smile
HTPC: LibreELEC 7 on Shuttle XS35GTv2 & Raspberry Pi 3
NAS: NAS4Free 2x 3TB Raid1
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#96
I see where you're coming from but the only way for me to answer that question was through trial and error. :-) I've been enjoying my media from my WHS but I'm worried that Stablebit Drivepool might not offer enough protection.

EDIT: Does FreeNAS require a 3 day drive prep like unRAID does? I am strongly thinking about trying it out because of all the good things you guys have said about ZFS.

EDIT #2: My Syhnlogy NAS came in today. I might keep it boxed in case I want to return it because I think I'm going to try FreeNAS. Here's a question though, would I maybe want to put my spare green drives in it and use it as a backup?
Server: Synology Diskstation 1511+ with 8x WD Red NAS 3TB drives, DSM 5.2
Main HTPC: Home Built i3, 8GB RAM, Corsair 128GB SSD, nVidia 630GTX, Harmony Home Control, Pioneer VSX-53, Panasonic VT30 65" 3D TV, Windows 10, Isengard
Bedroom HTPC: Zotac-ID 41 8GB RAM, 128GB SSD, Rii micro keyboard remote, Samsung HW-E550, Sony 32" Google TV, OpenElec 6.0 beta 4
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#97
Pat....

Before you go any further ask yourself the most important and perhaps the only meaningful question: What do I want?

I don't mean hardware, but what is your goal?

You seem to be fascinated by speeds and backups and whatelse more... You can ALWAYS go faster, ALWAYS go more reliable, but to what extend does it still make sense?

If you want a storage solution for your movies and other media, speed is the least interresting thing. If you open a movie, it takes roughly 90 minutes to watch it, so if your server takes 89 minutes to transfer your movie, you are still able to watch it properly...

Forget about SATA II or SATA III, the fastest HD out there at the moment does about 120 Mbyte/sec and the max speed for sata II is 150 MB/sec. Sure, SSD is faster but SSD for storing movies is just not an option...

Besides the speed of the drives or the controllers, your network is most likely limited to 1Gb, so that also maxes out (theoretical) around 120 Mbyte/sec...

You continue to find all kinds of options that could work for you. The only person profiting from this is your retailer....

If you run freenas (which can be setup in 5 minutes, burn iso to CD, boot from CD with USB stick in machine and doesn't need any time to prep the drives) you will end up with an easy to maintain system that is flexible and easily expandable...

To make you worry even more: Most raid cards (cheaper ones) have no option to grow... So you can't add a drive to the array and make use of the space... This is called Online Capacity Expansion.

ZFS can't do this either, but it can add a second pool of drives to an original pool...

In my case, I started with a pool of 10x2 TB... they were shared as "MEDIAPOOL", so i had a single location to copy my data to. I later added a second pool of 10 drives to the original pool.

Most importantly, sit down, chill out, have a drink and be HONEST to yourself.
What are you looking for? What are you trying to accomplish?
Then look at the hardware YOU HAVE and see what option you have.
If the options fit the hardware you're done. If they don't, see if you can compromise, or explore the cheapest and reliable option to purchase additional hardware but keep focussed on your goal and don't try to explore other alternatives if you made new purchases already...

The best system is a system that does what you need it to do.
The dumbest system is a system that can do more than what you need and for which you paid a lot of money...
Balance.....
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#98
Thanks Gollum, you're very kind and patient.
Server: Synology Diskstation 1511+ with 8x WD Red NAS 3TB drives, DSM 5.2
Main HTPC: Home Built i3, 8GB RAM, Corsair 128GB SSD, nVidia 630GTX, Harmony Home Control, Pioneer VSX-53, Panasonic VT30 65" 3D TV, Windows 10, Isengard
Bedroom HTPC: Zotac-ID 41 8GB RAM, 128GB SSD, Rii micro keyboard remote, Samsung HW-E550, Sony 32" Google TV, OpenElec 6.0 beta 4
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#99
For me, write speed is irrelevant. Reads matter. Multiple consecutive reads that preferably turn up as few drives as possible.

If I watch one episode of a show, I want to be able to watch the next episode without having to spin up a different drive. This means my drives last longer. It uses less energy as well, but that only concerns me in terms of heat dissipation.

I want any 2 TB drive to be replaced by any other 2 TB drive and I want to be able to buy any controller if one fails.

Remember that general RAID solutions are meant for fault tolerance in mission critical applications for small files accessed by many users simultaneously. Almost none of that usage exists in a media system. You have huge files that are accessed by few clients with very little concurrency (normally far less than 10 clients, rarely using the same files).

Striping will result in shorter drive lifetimes, more heat and generally fewer options. JBOD solutions generally lack the organization to help you reduce unnecessary disk spinup. You can read performance numbers all day long and be impressed. But it should solve the problems you actually have.

I use unraid because it fits my needs and is cheap (cheap license, cheap hardware, many options). I could spend $10k on a really nice RAID setup and it not address half of my concerns. As it is, the $800 I spent on hardware runs flawlessly.

And no, I am not affiliated with Lime Tech or unraid in any way other than as a user.
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I haven't said much because it was apparent early on that what was actually best for the true needs was not important...
what could be installed with the least amount of effort seemed to be

sure easy has it's place but again the number of people that gave up on XBMC because it just didn't magically work on the first non educated attempt is probably a staggering number...and truly a shame

I am pro unraid because i did more research than i care to admit and for "ME" it was the best decision

when you look at the pro's and con's of all of the contenders and make a decision then most likely the cons of what you choose won't be that significant

use what you want....but take the info and MAKE A DECISION
we can't decide for you ....Good Luck
WE ALL WE GOT
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I got home last night and my WHS/Stablebit Drivepool setup reported a "drive missing". I had a feeling that my hardware was quirky given issues I had even installing Windows. So, I decided to keep my Synology Diskstation and am copying my media to it right now. the UI is super nice and I never have to use remote desktop. I put all my drives in and it automatically selected the best raid setup which was called hybrid something. I have 5x 3TB drives and it reports a little over 10Tb of usable space so I'm guessing it chose RAID5 although I thought that would have given me 12TB of space.
Server: Synology Diskstation 1511+ with 8x WD Red NAS 3TB drives, DSM 5.2
Main HTPC: Home Built i3, 8GB RAM, Corsair 128GB SSD, nVidia 630GTX, Harmony Home Control, Pioneer VSX-53, Panasonic VT30 65" 3D TV, Windows 10, Isengard
Bedroom HTPC: Zotac-ID 41 8GB RAM, 128GB SSD, Rii micro keyboard remote, Samsung HW-E550, Sony 32" Google TV, OpenElec 6.0 beta 4
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patseguin Wrote:I got home last night and my WHS/Stablebit Drivepool setup reported a "drive missing". I had a feeling that my hardware was quirky given issues I had even installing Windows. So, I decided to keep my Synology Diskstation and am copying my media to it right now. the UI is super nice and I never have to use remote desktop. I put all my drives in and it automatically selected the best raid setup which was called hybrid something. I have 5x 3TB drives and it reports a little over 10Tb of usable space so I'm guessing it chose RAID5 although I thought that would have given me 12TB of space.

You've been working at this RAID issue this long and still haven't learned the difference between an actual gigabyte and what a hard drive manufacturer uses?

Real GB: 1073741824 bytes
Hard drive manufacture GB: 1000000000 bytes

A single kilobyte is 1024, or 2^10 bytes, and it goes on from there, 1TB is 1024GB. Hard drive manufacturers report this differently, instead they stick with base 10, and as the drives grow in size, the difference gets far more significant .
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Pat, the issue that you ran into is what i warned you about in the beginning...
You use your non supported disks on a raid setup... So the software had a read error on one of your drives and tries to re-read the data... The time-out for this from your card is different than the timeout in the drive firmware, and therefor your raid card kicks out the drive from your array... Your os reports a drive missing... it will quickly find it again and starts a rebuild of your array which can take days, and in the meantime it can fault again, starting from scratch...

You however already decided to go for your synology, disregarding anything that we have opted in this thread so far...
The synology is 800 USD, with 5x 3Tbyte drives that are xpensive as well... YOu are spending WAY too much money on a scenario that could be achieved spending nothing with the same results...

You will run into other issues with your diskstation within a week, and probably buy more hardware then. I like your enthousiasm, just wish you would do more research and trial and error yourself before running to the hardware store. Cheap hardware and problems is the best way to learn understand your hardware and software. If i remember correctly earlier on you said you had 20 years of experience as a system builder? I sincerely don't understand your question about your available space in your raid array...
Difference between Gb and GB or GiB...
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Probably a typo Gollum. I have 5x 3TB drives and the diskstation reports 10TB of space, which isn't a huge issue. I just thought that RAID 5 would give me close to 12TB.

Again, I have 20 years building experience but nearly nothing with this kind of stuff. I only disregarded what was in this thread because I fear that my hardware in my server has a problem. I didn't want to entrust my data to a software RAID on possibly faulty hardware. I would have had no problem going the FreeNAS route if I didn't believe that I had a hardware issue. I had errors even installing Windows off the DVD. I eventually disconnected the DVD and installed from a USB stick and it seemed fine. I think the motherboard might be faulty which is why I had it laying around and that would explain my USB issues, DVD drive issues, and HD issues.

I don't know why you said I'd have a problem in the future with the diskstation. The drives I have are listed in Synology's compatible drives. It built the array last night and did a consistency check which went over night and it reported no problems.
Server: Synology Diskstation 1511+ with 8x WD Red NAS 3TB drives, DSM 5.2
Main HTPC: Home Built i3, 8GB RAM, Corsair 128GB SSD, nVidia 630GTX, Harmony Home Control, Pioneer VSX-53, Panasonic VT30 65" 3D TV, Windows 10, Isengard
Bedroom HTPC: Zotac-ID 41 8GB RAM, 128GB SSD, Rii micro keyboard remote, Samsung HW-E550, Sony 32" Google TV, OpenElec 6.0 beta 4
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I'm glad that everything works for you now. The difference in size is that you are unaware of the difference between a gigabyte and a gibibyte..
A 2Terabyte harddisk is NOT 2000 gigabyte in size but 2000 gibibyte. When you connect a 2TB drive you have about 1.83 left (if I recall correctly). If you do that 5x, you'll notice that you already lost 1 TB due to incorrect assumption that your drive is 2TB. (and I do agree that 2TB should be 2000 Gigabyte)...
I have no clue how much real space there is on a 3TB drive, assume it will be something around 2.7 TB, and you have 4 drives cause you lose one in your raid5 array... so 4x2.7 is 10.8 TB...

The reason i said you will have a problem in the future with the diskstation is not because of the product. It's a great machine. The problem you will encounter is that now your interest in this matter has gotten your attention to other option that are more versatile. You probably still wonder how ZFS would be, and how FreeNAS would perform, if it could run on your old hardware, if it would save money to have various programs (SabNZBD, sickbeard, couchpotato, headphones, transmission, virtualbox, phpMyAdmin, MySQL, etc etc) running on the same machine that holds your storage, so that you don't need to have multiple machines powered on 24/7, or adding a drive which is obviously impossible on a 5-bay machine...

The diskstation is a great great machine. I have read about them a lot and lots of people are really happy with it, and it also allows for some other programs to run in the background, just not to the extend of a machine running linux or freebsd. To put things into perspective, you have bough a computer based on a mini-itx board with a very slow cpu, no graphics card, little memory, no storage devices, for 800 USD... for that kind of money you could have assembled quite a phat machine...
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