Help with FreeNAS install, but already have some full drives

[Skram0]

Here's the situation, I already have 4 2TB drives being used in a Win 7 box running XBMC. They're just set as individual drives, c, d, e, & f. 3 are full, and 1 is about 1/4 full. I want to turn these drives into a FreeNAS RaidZ. But I want to keep the data.

I wouldn't mind if I had to purchase 2 more 2TB drives and try to free up the used 4th drive to make a 2+1. But could I then copy the data from 1 of the full drives over, then add that empty drive to the RaidZ to make a 3+1 while keeping the existing data? Then do the same to the remaining 2 full drives while making a 4+1 then a 5+1? I got a 3+1 1.5TB setup at work for dump storage and it works great.

I'd love to get these drives out of the Win 7 box and into a NAS in the office. I don't mind only having 1 parity drive, at least I'd be covered for 1 drive failure. I'm not sure on the inner workings of adding volumes and if you add a new volume to your RaidZ if it keeps your existing data. I know it'd be easier if I had all empty drives, I'd just create the raid and be done with it. But I got all this data in the way. Any ideas would be very helpful.

 

[Stephens]

Read noobsauce80's ZFS primer. You can do a search for his nick.

 

[Skram0]

Read noobsauce80's ZFS primer. You can do a search for his nick.

Thanks for that. BTW if anyone else reads my post with the same question. noobsauce80's post is HERE.

So I'm getting that I'm screwed with trying to use my existing drives while preserving their data. Unless I can dump the data spanned across many smaller drives to free up my 2TB drives, then create a new zpool. But then I'll be limited to that size unless I spend more money for more drives to create another vdev with redundancy. Suppose I could just buy some 3TBs and start there, but I don't want to waste these priceless original Samsung 2TB gems. Buying a HD used to be easy and affordable, I'd just pick up a low cost Samsung 2TB. But now that the disease called "Seagate" infected the "Samsung" line, drive reliability is just a dream.

Probably my best option would be to purchase 3 3TBs and create a vdev of 6TB of storage, then move my current data to those. Then create another vdev in the zpool of 4 2TBs for 6TB of additional storage. I'd have a total of 12TB of storage and a redundancy of 1 2TB and 1 3TB failures. But this will cost me over $500, and difficult to justify the large price up front.

 

[cyberjock]

Yeah, your options are pretty limited when you have a bunch of drives you want to add to FreeNAS but have data on them.

FreeNAS is definitely known for its expensive(but cheap compared to other solutions) initial investment. FreeNAS really grabs you by the balls when you do the initial setup. A good build really needs you to have all of the hardware up front and empty. But the long term maintenance and value is what makes it such a good long term project.

I recommend you bite the bullet and purchase 3x3TB drives and then add your 2TB drives like you mentioned. It's not the most elegant, but you firmly understand how your redundancy and potential failures work. I know what you mean about the large upfront price, but keep in mind the redundancy and piece of mind you will have. Right now each of your drives is individual. A failure of any one drive will cause a loss of that data. You're already in a position to lose data from a single failure.

At the end of the day the question is "How much is your data worth to you?"

 

[Skram0]

FreeNAS is definitely known for its expensive(but cheap compared to other solutions) initial investment. FreeNAS really grabs you by the balls when you do the initial setup. A good build really needs you to have all of the hardware up front and empty. But the long term maintenance and value is what makes it such a good long term project.

I recommend you bite the bullet and purchase 3x3TB drives and then add your 2TB drives like you mentioned. It's not the most elegant, but you firmly understand how your redundancy and potential failures work. I know what you mean about the large upfront price, but keep in mind the redundancy and piece of mind you will have. Right now each of your drives is individual. A failure of any one drive will cause a loss of that data. You're already in a position to lose data from a single failure.

The 4 drive setup at work was a snap. I was using the drives for dump storage in a RAID 5 using Vista. But the hardware was old 2nd hand equipment and lacking in RAM. The best network transfer I could get was about 250 Mbit as seen with DUMeter. But that also includes all the overhead too. So I dumped the data to smaller drives, used an old server motherboard with 4GB of RAM, ditched the promise RAID card, used the onboard SATA ports, and installed FreeNAS 64bit. My dumps to it now have doubled to around 550Mbit. Just what I was looking for, more speed.

But with this build I'd like to have ample storage space and to get the drives out of the OS box and in to their own case away from the living room. I think maybe I'll buy 1 drive at a time, then build it when I have all the parts.

Thanks alot for all your efforts and help. Much appreciated.

 

[Stephens]

Keep in mind warranties start when you buy drives, so keep that in mind. You need to do a SMART long test on each drive as you get it. Personally, I'd just save the money and get them all around the same time. You can catch sales that way too.

 

[jgreco]

Warranties normally start when the drive is manufactured. Or has something changed recently?

 

[Stephens]

Nothing's changed recently. Two different warranties, manufacturer vs retailer. If you purchase a drive that fails and send it back to the manufacturer, they're within their rights to give you a refurb in exchange. Retailers do that too, but in order to avoid that situation if possible, I return to the retailer within their period for a REFUND. Then I buy a new drive. So my advice is to do a long test on them as you get them so you can return for a full refund and get a new drive if necessary.

 

[jgreco]

That's not, strictly speaking, a warranty. It's a return policy. However, it's a reasonable strategy.