Home NAS Build Configuration Advise

[h20frks]

Hello everyone, I am new to this forum and need some advice. I have been reading this forum and the documentation in preparation to build a home NAS for family photos, videos, music and local pc backup along with using Jails and VMs.

I see many posts about different raid configurations and pros/cons of each and came to the conclusion that I was going to do a RAIDZ2, however I was thinking about all the things I want this NAS to do and started to rethink the RAID configuration and would I get better performance if I created separate RAIDs based on what the zdev would be used for?

Is this even possible or recommended?

Example-

• Workstation backup RAIDZ2– Used for local backup of windows pcs and file archive
• Family Photos/Videos and music RAID1 (Mirror) – Shares across the network and media servers, sync phones with nextcloud.
• VM Machine RAID1 (Mirror) – user for supporting the virtual machines
• Jails RAID1 (Mirror) – used to support the Jails
• Regular Snapshots 15-min

I might not have a clear understanding of the zdevs and zpools or if this is even possible or recommended at all due to possible performance hit. I would really like your opinions on this and the below hardware.

Hardware-

• 2 HP S700 2.5" 120GB SATA III 3D NAND Internal Solid State Drive (SSD) 2DP97AA#ABC – used for mirror Cache
• IOCrest SI-PEX40064 PCI-Express 2.0 Low Profile Ready SATA III (6.0 Gb/s) Controller Card
• Intel Core i5-8400 Coffee Lake 6-Core 2.8 GHz (4.0 GHz Turbo) LGA 1151 (300 Series) 65W BX80684I58400 Desktop Processor Intel UHD Graphics 630
• CORSAIR Vengeance LPX 16GB (2x8GB) DDR4 4266 (PC4-34100) C19 for Intel 200 – Red
• GIGABYTE B360M DS3H LGA 1151 (300 Series) Intel B360 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.1 Micro ATX Intel Motherboard
• 6 HGST DeskStar NAS 3.5" 6TB 7200 RPM 128MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s High-Performance Hard Drive for Desktop NAS Systems Retail Packaging 0S04007 (4-drives for RADIZ2, 2-drive for Mirror)
  
• Rosewill Hive Series 650W Modular Gaming Power Supply, 80 PLUS Bronze Certified, Single +12V Rail, Intel 4th Gen CPU Ready, SLI & CrossFire Ready - Hive-650
• Patriot Memory 16GB Supersonic Boost XT USB 3.0 Flash Drive, Speed Up to 90MB/s (PEF16GSBUSB) – Mirror OS

 

[Inxsible]

I want this NAS to do and started to rethink the RAID configuration and would I get better performance if I created separate RAIDs based on what the zdev would be used for?

I think you mean vdev not zdev and if so then it's a really bad idea to mix different RAIDZ configurations in the same pool because you lose the 2-drive redundancy from your RAIDZ2 vdev, if another vdev is RAIDZ1. In short, it's usually not a good idea to mix different RAIDZx or mirror configurations.

• Workstation backup RAIDZ2– Used for local backup of windows pcs and file archive

• Family Photos/Videos and music RAID1 (Mirror) – Shares across the network and media servers, sync phones with nextcloud.

• VM Machine RAID1 (Mirror) – user for supporting the virtual machines

• Jails RAID1 (Mirror) – used to support the Jails

• Regular Snapshots 15-min

If you were to create separate pools, then this could be done. But it would be inherently cumbersome to maintain so many different pools. Also you can't easily transfer data between pools which means that you would have to size them accurately from the get go. If your Family Photo pool started getting full, you can't simply use the VM Machine pool even if it was 90% empty. That's why most here would advise you to create a single pool with separate datasets. You have full control over datasets as to how much space you want to give to each dataset.

 

[Inxsible]

2 HP S700 2.5" 120GB SATA III 3D NAND Internal Solid State Drive (SSD) 2DP97AA#ABC – used for mirror Cache

Are you sure you need a cache? Are you talking L2ARC?

IOCrest SI-PEX40064 PCI-Express 2.0 Low Profile Ready SATA III (6.0 Gb/s) Controller Card

Meh. A SAS based HBA would be better.

ntel Core i5-8400 Coffee Lake 6-Core 2.8 GHz (4.0 GHz Turbo) LGA 1151 (300 Series) 65W BX80684I58400 Desktop Processor Intel UHD Graphics 630

Intel i5s do not support ECC. If you are buying your hardware and not re-utilizing existing hardware, I would suggest buying ECC compatible hardware.

CORSAIR Vengeance LPX 16GB (2x8GB) DDR4 4266 (PC4-34100) C19 for Intel 200 – Red

Not ECC. Try again. See comment for processor.

GIGABYTE B360M DS3H LGA 1151 (300 Series) Intel B360 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.1 Micro ATX Intel Motherboard

Not ECC compatible. See above.

6 HGST DeskStar NAS 3.5" 6TB 7200 RPM 128MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s High-Performance Hard Drive for Desktop NAS Systems Retail Packaging 0S04007 (4-drives for RADIZ2, 2-drive for Mirror)

Ok.

Rosewill Hive Series 650W Modular Gaming Power Supply, 80 PLUS Bronze Certified, Single +12V Rail, Intel 4th Gen CPU Ready, SLI & CrossFire Ready - Hive-650

650W is way way too much if you are going to have a max of 4 drives. WAY TOO MUCH !

Patriot Memory 16GB Supersonic Boost XT USB 3.0 Flash Drive, Speed Up to 90MB/s (PEF16GSBUSB) – Mirror OS

If you have spare SATA ports, use a Crucial MX or ADATA SSD. No need for mirror. If you are short on SATA ports, then using USB is fine. Most people have had good luck with Sandisk Cruzer USB sticks.


Based on your choice of hardware, it seems to me that you have not read the Hardware Recommendations at all. You should give it a gander before you go out and buy anything.

 

[h20frks]

Are you sure you need a cache? Are you talking L2ARC?

Meh. A SAS based HBA would be better.

Intel i5s do not support ECC. If you are buying your hardware and not re-utilizing existing hardware, I would suggest buying ECC compatible hardware.

Not ECC. Try again. See comment for processor.

Not ECC compatible. See above.

Ok.

650W is way way too much if you are going to have a max of 4 drives. WAY TOO MUCH !

If you have spare SATA ports, use a Crucial MX or ADATA SSD. No need for mirror. If you are short on SATA ports, then using USB is fine. Most people have had good luck with Sandisk Cruzer USB sticks.


Based on your choice of hardware, it seems to me that you have not read the Hardware Recommendations at all. You should give it a gander before you go out and buy anything.[/QUOTE

Thank you. Yes I did read the hardware recommendation document and the above hardware was picked best bang for the buck (if you would) I know it was not ECC supported hardware, but i read many posts of people running FreeNAS for years on non ECC supported hardware with no issues; now maybe that person(s) are just really lucky; not sure. My other thought was this is a home server that would not get the traffic/use like a corporate NAS would and the hardware document might lean to the corporate side a bit to play safe on publishing something that would work for both use cases.

I will differently re-consider my hardware selection and look at server based boards, ECC, and Intel nix

 

[h20frks]

I think you mean vdev not zdev and if so then it's a really bad idea to mix different RAIDZ configurations in the same pool because you lose the 2-drive redundancy from your RAIDZ2 vdev, if another vdev is RAIDZ1. In short, it's usually not a good idea to mix different RAIDZx or mirror configurations.
If you were to create separate pools, then this could be done. But it would be inherently cumbersome to maintain so many different pools. Also you can't easily transfer data between pools which means that you would have to size them accurately from the get go. If your Family Photo pool started getting full, you can't simply use the VM Machine pool even if it was 90% empty. That's why most here would advise you to create a single pool with separate datasets. You have full control over datasets as to how much space you want to give to each dataset.

So I should just create a single RAIDZ2 with 5- 6TB drives. Would I see performance issues trying to encode and stream videos on my media center and showing family photos etc? Would Jails and VMs run well ? I thought that Mirror is the best performance for high file read demands line jails/VM etc.

 

[h20frks]

I thought during reading the hardware recommendation was to put the ZIL on SSD to get best performance (yes the SSD I picked did not have power backup).

 

[IQless]

Unless you are going to have a lot of VM's running on this box, you might not get a very high-performance boost from a SLOG. Most home users won't have the need for one.
Take a look at this link: https://forums.freenas.org/index.php?threads/testing-the-benefits-of-slog-using-a-ram-disk.56561
Always better to test to see if you actually need one, before spending the money :)

You should also read up on vdevs, pools, slogs, l2arc:
https://forums.freenas.org/index.php?threads/slideshow-explaining-vdev-zpool-zil-and-l2arc-for-noobs.7775

If this was my layout I might have gone with:

• 1xSSD for boot
• 6xHGST in RAIDZ2
• 1xSSD for Jails (an alternative is to just hold off on this, and use it as a SLOG if you deem this necessary)

This is just what I would have done, others might have better options for you :)

 

[h20frks]

I think you mean vdev not zdev and if so then it's a really bad idea to mix different RAIDZ configurations in the same pool because you lose the 2-drive redundancy from your RAIDZ2 vdev, if another vdev is RAIDZ1. In short, it's usually not a good idea to mix different RAIDZx or mirror configurations.
If you were to create separate pools, then this could be done. But it would be inherently cumbersome to maintain so many different pools. Also you can't easily transfer data between pools which means that you would have to size them accurately from the get go. If your Family Photo pool started getting full, you can't simply use the VM Machine pool even if it was 90% empty. That's why most here would advise you to create a single pool with separate datasets. You have full control over datasets as to how much space you want to give to each dataset.

So this was my thought-
7-disks
5-disks configured for RAIDZ2
2-disks configured for Mirror
have 2-pools
Pool 1 for RAIDZ2 the data on this pool would be the windows pc backup and file archive
Pool2 for Mirror the data on this pool would be the photos, videos, music, vms, jails etc. thinking that these tasks need fast writes/reads encoding videos during streaming etc.

The whole server would get backed up to a smaller NAS.

 

[Dice]

There is no reason to get a separated pool based on types of data in the way @h20frks has layed out the configuration.
In case you'd want "separation" of the data, you'd use datasets, potentially quotas (specifically to manage the cannibalising windows backup worm can).

The circumstance where you would like to separate pools include:
- extensive local backup (I'd recommend against this - IMO it is a waste of space or lack of dedication to create a stand alone quality backup solution)
- IO dependent workloads (that is - running databases or corporate type workloads that are far beyond what you've indicated thus far to lay within your interests or reach)
- Vastly different sized drives, or generation of drives.

My configuration suggestion is very much in line with @IQless.
Put the jails and VMs on SSD.

So the brunt conclusion. This setup will mitigate any incentive to get a L2ARC, and - until you've gotten around to configure an UPS and ECC memory installed, you've no business getting a SLOG.
cheers