Installing FreeNAS, Multiple Drives?

[UserSN]

Hello Community,

I'm installing FreeNAS on my box and i have it loaded with 8SSD and 10HDD drives. I'm planning on creating 4 Virtual drives to ISCI them onto windows server machines once complete.

When installing FreeNAS does it get installed onto 1 of my SSD's or do i select all of them? If i install the OS on 1 drive and it fails what happens? Can I install the OS on 2 SSD's for redundancy in case of failure or does that happen automatically once i finish the install?

Does the configuration of pools/virtual drives happen post installation where i allocate which disks i want on the VHD's? If so then my best guess is i have to only choose 1 or 2 drives for the install for redundancy. Just need a bit of clarification if anyone can help.

Thanks

 

[Kris Moore]

First of all, Welcome!

FreeNAS installs usually to a single boot device, but you can indeed mirror them if you wish. (post-install is fine) Then after installation you make a "pool" of your other drives, which is for storage.

 

[UserSN]

First of all, Welcome!

FreeNAS installs usually to a single boot device, but you can indeed mirror them if you wish. (post-install is fine) Then after installation you make a "pool" of your other drives, which is for storage.

Thank you Kris much appreciated

 

[danb35]

If so then my best guess is i have to only choose 1 or 2 drives for the install for redundancy.

Keep in mind that you can't use the OS drives for data.

 

[UserSN]

Keep in mind that you can't use the OS drives for data.

Got it that's helpful info! Thanks

 

[NugentS]

But don't use USB Thumbdrives to boot from.
SATADOM or a small SATA SSD (2 mirrored) to boot from

 

[HoneyBadger]

But don't use USB Thumbdrives to boot from.
SATADOM or a small SATA SSD (2 mirrored) to boot from

If you're short on SATA ports, you can use a SATA-to-USB adapter with a conventional SSD (or even an HDD). The protocol isn't the big problem as much as the media itself; cheap USB sticks tend to be from whatever cheap NAND fell off the truck outside the factory, and it has poor wear-leveling and endurance characteristics.

 

[UserSN]

I have 2 SAS HBA cards plugged into a backplane so im planning on using atleast 2 SSD's for the OS and the rest for storage. I'm not going to keep the OS on a USB drive, just using the USB to install.

 

[HoneyBadger]

How large are these SSDs? A boot device doesn't need to be any larger than 32G, so if these are 250G+ SSDs it may make more sense from an "available capacity" purpose to grab a couple used Intel DC S3500 80G drives on the cheap to use for boot only and devote all eight SSDs to your pool.

 

[UserSN]

They are 2TB SSDs, okay so i'll look into some smaller cap SSD's for the boot, i do want these to be redundant for safety so 2 of them in mirrored? Does FreeNAS handle the mirroring of the OS drives or do i have to do it with a raid card?

 

[danb35]

Does FreeNAS handle the mirroring of the OS drives

2. Installing and Upgrading — FreeNAS®11.3-U4 User Guide Table of Contents

www.ixsystems.com

 

[HoneyBadger]

Does FreeNAS handle the mirroring of the OS drives or do i have to do it with a raid card?

Yes, follow the guide linked by @danb35 for the installation and ensure that you select both of the smaller drives during boot - and only the smaller drives, losing 4T of raw space for a boot volume is definitely not worth it.

Don't use a RAID card here.

 

[UserSN]

Thank you guys