Moving existing server to new chassis... sanity check.

[Michael Hanna]

My current freenas server is housed in a full size atx tower. I have a Supermicro MBD-X10SRH-CLN4F-0 motherboard connected to 8 WD Red Pro drives via 2 SFF- 8643 breakout cables directly to each drive. I've outgrown this case and need more drives so am moving into a new Norco 4224 chassis. In the new setup all of the "guts" of the existing server are just being moved to the new chassis. In this new setup the 8 existing drives will be connected to the same SFF-8643 ports on the motherboard but will now be connected to 2 of the 8087 ports on the backplanes of the Norco chassis instead of directly to the drives via the breakout cables. If my understanding is correct (please correct me if I'm wrong), there is nothing special I need to do within freenas for this change... it should just recognize the drives even if the drive order, location, and naming change? I have multiple backups of my data but would like to avoid any unnecessary headaches in this move. If there is something I am missing here please let me know. Thanks in advance for any advise on this move.

 

[danb35]

If my understanding is correct (please correct me if I'm wrong), there is nothing special I need to do within freenas for this change

Your understanding is correct.

 

[sretalla]

If cables aren't a concern, you may want to bring in more of the backplanes... in case one backplane fails and you have more than 2 drives on it (I'm assuming you're RAIDZ2), then your pool is offline.

If you're using 4 backplanes, no more than 2 disks on each, then you're still in play even if you lose a backplane (this also lets you spread out the disks in the chassis for better cooling). This also gives you 8 more disk slots ready for use with hot-plug.

 

[Michael Hanna]

If cables aren't a concern, you may want to bring in more of the backplanes... in case one backplane fails and you have more than 2 drives on it (I'm assuming you're RAIDZ2), then your pool is offline.

If you're using 4 backplanes, no more than 2 disks on each, then you're still in play even if you lose a backplane (this also lets you spread out the disks in the chassis for better cooling). This also gives you 8 more disk slots ready for use with hot-plug.

That is an excellent idea... I didn't even consider that. Yes, I'm currently running RAIDZ2 so having all my drives on only 2 of the backplanes does present a risk. I'll spread the drives evenly between 4 of the backplanes. Going this route will spread my drives out over multiple HBA's... I'm assuming there is still nothing I need to do within freenas before making this move...it should just pick the drives up as usual?

 

[sretalla]

I'm assuming there is still nothing I need to do within freenas before making this move...it should just pick the drives up as usual?

Yes, as mentioned by @danb35, you're all good, just move it over. As long as all of the drives are there and visible to the system, you'll hardly notice a difference... watch out for Network issues like the new MAC and new NIC driver depending on the difference between old and new. (for example, igb0 may now become em0 if you changed NIC from one intel model to another). Also any DHCP reservations you may have had will point to the old MAC address, so will need to be re-worked.

If you're moving the Mobo too, forget the network bits.

 

[kdragon75]

That is an excellent idea... I didn't even consider that. Yes, I'm currently running RAIDZ2 so having all my drives on only 2 of the backplanes does present a risk. I'll spread the drives evenly between 4 of the backplanes. Going this route will spread my drives out over multiple HBA's... I'm assuming there is still nothing I need to do within freenas before making this move...it should just pick the drives up as usual?

I would love to see FreeNAS prob ses infos to make layout suggestions like this. I know there's a lot of variation on the way way numbers are implemented but I would think the delineation of backplane/enclosures to be fairly clear.