Harddrive configuration help

[Eddie Current]

I'm new to FreeNAS and would welcome suggestions on how best I could setup my disks. My use for this setup will be for streaming audio/video, storage of family picture and laptop backups.

Below are the 11ea. HDs I have installed with help from a 4 ports PCIe to SATA Controller card:

1ea. 64GB Sandisk Ultra SSD
1ea. 128GB Toshiba M.2 (on MB)
3ea. 500GB WD Carver Black
1ea. 1TB WD Blue
1ea. 4TB WD Carver Black
2ea. 2TB WD Carver Black
2ea. 2TB WD NAS Red

 

[m0nkey_]

Your 64GB SSD is a perfect candidate as a boot drive. Big enough to install FreeNAS, but too small for any real usage.

The four 2TB drives would make a nice RAIDZ1 or RAIDZ2 pool (depends on how many disks you are willing to lose at any given time).

The single 1TB drive would be a nice scratch drive, using it for downloads (movies, isos, etc.) anything temporary.

The 4TB drive could be a good backup drive for the 4x2TB pool.

 

[Eddie Current]

Thank you, I like the way you think! What could I use the 128GB m.2 for? Does FreeNAS use a swap drive like Linux (whatever distro)?

 

[m0nkey_]

A 2GB swap partition will be created on each drive added to FreeNAS. The M.2 SSD would not be useful in this case. Unless you wish to use it for a boot drive, but you're just wasting space. It's probably best to put it in a laptop or something.

 

[Eddie Current]

OK, it was out my laptop, I replaced it with a Samsung M.2 NVMe 950 Pro 250GB (screamer). Unless it can be used for something beneficial Ill just pull it and use it somewhere else later. After I get this box built I'm already planning another. As I upgrade the drives in this one I will use them in the next build that I will give to a friend of mine who is in desperate need of a NAS (currently using multi-portable drives for storage).