Free space missmatch between windows server 2012r2 and FreeNAS

xhulian

Cadet
Joined
Jan 22, 2018
Messages
5
I have set up a freenas storage from 2 years now and did something like "set and forget", which in my case is not that good because my freenas storage is not that small, it has 60 SAS disk 8 TB each one and it is combined in 6 RAIDZ2 and at the top of those RAIDZ-s there are 2 volumes, each of them is 160 TB. It has been working for 2 years and did had any problem at all, suddenly before 2 days i see that one of the volumes goes offline in that windows server where it is exposed, the first thought that came to my head that moment is that something strange has happened and I try to bring the volume online but I did not had luck, than I tried something else (command promt, DISKPART, "select disk X", online disk) and the volume came online but the I had read only permissions, than I entered to web interface of FreeNAS and i see a warning, "The capacity for the volume 'RAIDZ2_6VDEV' is currently at 84%, while the recommended value is below 80%. " and than when see one of the volumes it says that it used 100% menawhile the same volume in the windows server where it is exposed is shown with 18 TB free. I do not have snapshots configured for my freenas. I have read that when FresNAS is above 80% is decreases it's performance but in this case I can not add anymore data in that storage. And from the FreeNAS shell i can not see the files in my volume so that I could delete any file.

I have been reading those forums for 2 days and have not found anything that could help me, can anybody tell me what is happening with my storage and how can I fix this?

Atach there are 2 images that maybe will help

Thanks in advance!
 

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garm

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Aug 19, 2017
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assumptions:
You get payed to manage this system
You haven’t actually done your homework

assertions:
You’re in deep [expletive]

advice:
If this system is backed up; expand storage, and rebuild the pool (if necessary). Plan for future data growth, when using block storage on ZFS you do not want to be above 50% utilization, plan accordingly.
If the system isn’t backed up; hire a consultant with rock solid knowledge of ZFS, do not rely on free advice online (see assertion above)...
 

majerus

Contributor
Joined
Dec 21, 2012
Messages
126
@garm how about a helpful response instead of this crap? ZFS doesnt need to be 50% to maintain performance. I agree this guy might be in a tight spot, however you have no idea what circumstances this guy might be under. There is no reason to rebuild the pool, just add a vdev if he was actually out of space.
 

garm

Wizard
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Aug 19, 2017
Messages
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@majerus.. 100% utilization is no joke.. I’m only going on the information provided by OP..
I have set up a freenas storage from 2 years now and did something like "set and forget",
..
might not be trivial to add a vdev to a 60 disk system, but I never said you shouldn’t do that? When using block storage on ZFS, you do not go over 50% utilization, so with data growth in mind, the system should be below that, with a 60 disk system it’s far from trivial to suddenly double the pool, especially if the disks being used are 8 TB already. Building a new system and migrate data might be the only viable option, but not something you decide to do based on free internet opinions.. so you should talk to a professional..
 

xhulian

Cadet
Joined
Jan 22, 2018
Messages
5
@garm regarding my homework, I do not work as a storage guy or system administrator in my everyday, I am a network engineer and I have given my help to set up the storage before 2 years and for a simple explanation above I just said "I have set up a freenas storage from 2 years now and did something like "set and forget" ", and the our system admin guy is not working with us anymore and this company assigned to me his duty just for some time till we find another system admin, and this is the situation where I am now and when see that windows reports smth else from freenas I thought that it might something like a small trick that I don't know to free up some space in that volume, and in the country where I live the owners of the business they do not pay for those kind of things(this is one of reasons why we went for freenas with this big storage) so my last option was to write on those forums for any advice, so it would be more helpful to me if someone could give me an advice rather than doing assumptions. For ex. can you tell why the dataset says the is 100% used meanwhile one of the volumes has still free space? why the same volume in freenas is 100% used meanwhile in windows server shows still free space? What can I do to free up some space in this volume while the volume in wondows is read only? I do have one other storage that I could back up all the data of this volume and than destroy the volume and recreate it again, but I am trying to find a solution that would not request this kind of thing. @majerus in atach is screenshot of snapshot
 

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majerus

Contributor
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Dec 21, 2012
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126
That is kinda crazy.. Did a scrub ever finish?
 

xhulian

Cadet
Joined
Jan 22, 2018
Messages
5
@majerus The scrub did solve the problem, I set up a periodic scrub now and I hope it will work. Thank you for your advice.
@garm as it turned out, that 0% free space was not the end of the world, it just needed a scurb
 
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