Migrating from Desktop PCs to Rack Servers

[nddj]

Hello to everyone on the forum, I have acquired a Dell poweredge R710 and would like to rebuild the TrueNAS Scale I have built on my desktop PC with the R710. The problem we know of at this time is that the R710 has a hardware raid. We anticipate problems importing the HDDs we are currently using on the desktop, one virtual drive at a time with a hardware raid. Am I correct in thinking that TrueNAS uses a software raid and therefore the use of a hardware raid is deprecated? What would be the best solution in this case? If anyone is running TrueNAS Scale (or core) on the same type of Dell rack server, please let me know how you are running it.

Current Configuration
TrueNAS-SCALE-22.12.0
Intel core i7 8700K
RAM 64GB(Crucial DDR4 16GB×4)
M/B ASUS ROG STRIX Z390-F GAMING
Crucial SATA SSD 500GB(boot-pool)
WD Red NVMe SSD 1TB
WD Red SATA HDD 8TB×4
NVMe SSDs are used for L2ARC and RAID Z1 with 4 8TB HDDs.

 

[Etorix]

Correct. The (required) solution is to replace the hardware RAID controller with a plain HBA.

What's all the noise about HBAs, and why can't I use a RAID controller?

1) An HBA is a Host Bus Adapter. This is a controller that allows SAS and SATA devices to be attached to, and communicate directly with, a server. RAID controllers typically aggregate several disks into a Virtual Disk abstraction of some sort...

www.truenas.com

 

[nddj]

Correct. The (required) solution is to replace the hardware RAID controller with a plain HBA.

What's all the noise about HBAs, and why can't I use a RAID controller?

1) An HBA is a Host Bus Adapter. This is a controller that allows SAS and SATA devices to be attached to, and communicate directly with, a server. RAID controllers typically aggregate several disks into a Virtual Disk abstraction of some sort...

www.truenas.com

thank you for the advice. I read the linked thread, and it seems that the main topic is referring to FreeBSD, but is it okay to deal with Scale (Linux) in the same way? Since English is not the main language, please point out if there are any oversights. thank you

 

[danb35]

it seems that the main topic is referring to FreeBSD, but is it okay to deal with Scale (Linux) in the same way?

This really boils down to ZFS' requirement, or perhaps expectation, that it will have direct access to, and control over, its storage devices. It expects this under Linux just as it does under FreeBSD.

 

[nddj]

This really boils down to ZFS' requirement, or perhaps expectation, that it will have direct access to, and control over, its storage devices. It expects this under Linux just as it does under FreeBSD.

Thanks for the quick reply. I see, so you are saying that the problem is the same as when using the software raid, so the solution is the same. I understand. I will purchase the Dell H310 card (https://onl.bz/XEzgEVF) and change the configuration based on the thread. Thanks! It will take some time for the card to arrive, so I'll post a report on the results in this thread, though it may be late.

 

[WI_Hedgehog]

It is as if you were changing from one brand of RAID card to another and neither brand could read the other brand's disk layout. You basically need to have two RAID cards and two sets of disks so you can transfer data from one system to the other. TrueNAS uses software RAID, so my example is not real, just a simplified explanation.

The next problem is TrueNAS may not work with your current RAID card. You may need to back the data up to an external device or system. You should always have a backup anyway, and if you do first test the backup to ensure it does not encounter problems when trying to restore, then set up TrueNAS and restore the data.

Mind you that technically you should have a 3-2-1 backup system so that if something goes wrong you have a second backup to restore from.

 

[nddj]

It is as if you were changing from one brand of RAID card to another and neither brand could read the other brand's disk layout. You basically need to have two RAID cards and two sets of disks so you can transfer data from one system to the other. TrueNAS uses software RAID, so my example is not real, just a simplified explanation.

The next problem is TrueNAS may not work with your current RAID card. You may need to back the data up to an external device or system. You should always have a backup anyway, and if you do first test the backup to ensure it does not encounter problems when trying to restore, then set up TrueNAS and restore the data.

Mind you that technically you should have a 3-2-1 backup system so that if something goes wrong you have a second backup to restore from.

Since I still have about 2TB of data stored, I'm considering backing up the data itself, destroying the pool and rebuilding it.

 

[WI_Hedgehog]

Here's an option:
Toshiba Canvio Advance 4TB Portable External Hard Drive USB 3.0, Green - HDTCA40XG3CA $90.74

Personally I'd get two so I had two backups, but that of course is your choice. Then I'd do as you suggest and recreate the pool.*

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*I actually did what you're suggesting, but have a 2.5" 10.5K RPM SAS drive hanging around for that (in addition to the laptop the data is primarily stored on).
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