Need help with basics -- FreeNAS in Linux or Linux in FreeNAS?

[erode]

I've got the hardware, I just need to figure out the rest. Is FreeNAS going to be able to handle running a VM for Plex to transcode? It uses ffmpeg which does not run in FreeBSD as far as I understand it. Will the performance be better if I run the Linux VM inside FreeNAS, or would it be better if I ran FreeNAS in a VM on top of Linux? Is that even possible since FreeNAS would have to manage a file system on top of a file system?

I hope to make a decision by tonight so I can get moving on this *finally*. Appreciate any advice you can give me.

Thanks

Specs:
Silverstone Temjin microATX enclosure
Silverstone 600w 80-Plus
ASRock Z77 Extreme-4m microATX
Intel i5-3470 w/ Intel 2500 HD
2x4GB DDR3-1600
2x3TB WD Red (5200rpm NAS)
2x150GB WD Velociraptor 10,000rpm (available, don't need to use them if unnecessary)
ATI 5870 1GB if necessary for encoding

 

[James]

ffmpeg runs fine on FreeBSD. You'll have to install it in the FreeNAS plugins jail: http://doc.freenas.org/index.php/Plugins#Installing_non-PBI_Software.

 

[survive]

Hi erode,

As far as I know plex won't run in a jail....double check this before you go to far! There is a streaming plug-in that's one of the pre-built ones available.

-Will

 

[erode]

ffmpeg runs fine on FreeBSD. You'll have to install it in the FreeNAS plugins jail: http://doc.freenas.org/index.php/Plugins#Installing_non-PBI_Software.

The concept of a "jail" is new to me. Is it basically a sandbox? Can it run an OS like Debian? That is where I would think Plex could run.

 

[erode]

Hi erode,

As far as I know plex won't run in a jail....double check this before you go to far! There is a streaming plug-in that's one of the pre-built ones available.

-Will

Well that's disconcerting. :( I heard someone mention running Plex in a VM within FreeNAS, is that what a Jail is? My setup revolves specifically around Plex as the media server. I have Rokus depending on it, so I'd like to find some way for it to work. Any ideas? I will hold off on getting FreeNAS installed tonight. It is tough for me to research this stuff properly because I am fairly unfamiliar with the jargon that goes with FreeBSD. Didn't even know what a jail was. :P

 

[cyberjock]

Your best option with plex and FreeNAS is to have one machine be Plex and another as FreeNAS. You could also try running them both on ESXi, but if you've never used ESXi before that's a major no-no and don't try it. You need to be fluent with ESXi to setup your FreeNAS server correctly without data loss later.

 

[cyberjock]

This is yet another reason why you don't trust everything you hear. Always do your research before you jump. :P

If you had searched for Plex in the forums it would have been very obvious that Plex isn't compatible with FreeBSD. There is a voting thread on the Plex forums asking if Plex on FreeBSD would be useful. I definitely voted.

 

[erode]

Your best option with plex and FreeNAS is to have one machine be Plex and another as FreeNAS. You could also try running them both on ESXi, but if you've never used ESXi before that's a major no-no and don't try it. You need to be fluent with ESXi to setup your FreeNAS server correctly without data loss later.

I built this machine to do it all, I don't think I want to build a second for Plex alone. I'll have to come up with some compromise.

This is yet another reason why you don't trust everything you hear. Always do your research before you jump. :P

If you had searched for Plex in the forums it would have been very obvious that Plex isn't compatible with FreeBSD. There is a voting thread on the Plex forums asking if Plex on FreeBSD would be useful. I definitely voted.

I saw that, but all it seemed to imply was that there was no direct support as a plugin (like there is for Sabnzbd, couchpotato, etc). When I heard I could just run a VM inside of FreeNAS it made sense as a less-than-ideal option. But it seems that FreeNAS doesn't really support running a VM instance? I am still kind of hazy on just how trimmed down FreeNAS is. I can't imagine FreeBSD would have any trouble doing it, but I would prefer to have all the benefits that FreeNAS provides.

 

[cyberjock]

I built this machine to do it all, I don't think I want to build a second for Plex alone. I'll have to come up with some compromise.

I knew that was coming. Far too many people show up asking how to do Plex after they've bought hardware. I'm not sure if I've seen one person that hasn't spent their money before realizing their error. :(

The only VM FreeNAS currently has is the jail.

 

[hervon]

If you want a good challenge, as pointed out by noobsauce80, the VMWare ESXi route could be a good option. By the way ESXi is free for single use. You could run Plex and FreeNas as 2 separate virtual machines inside ESXi. I consider myself a motivated noob and managed to setup ESXi with FreeNAS with few issues. That way, my computer is not only dedicated to FreeNAS. It can host another OS beside it. I have a few web links that helped me through the whole setup.

Edited : typos

 

[erode]

I knew that was coming. Far too many people show up asking how to do Plex after they've bought hardware. I'm not sure if I've seen one person that hasn't spent their money before realizing their error. :(

The only VM FreeNAS currently has is the jail.

It's a common thing I'm sure. I built the system after being frustrated with underpowered NAS units. If I was told I would have to build twice as many servers, I would have just gone with something other than FreeNAS.

If you want a good challenge, as pointed out by noobsauce80, the VMWare ESXi route could be a good option. By the way ESXi is free for single use. You could run Plex and FreeNas as 2 separate virtual machines inside ESXi. I consider myself a motivated noob and managed to setup ESXi with FreeNAS with few issues. That way, my computer is not only dedicated to FreeNAS. It can host another OS beside it. I have a few web links that helped me through the whole setup.

Edited : typos

After some research I think this is the best bet. I am a noob but I am technically inclined and can learn how to do anything with a bit of time. I would rather go with ESXi than build another $500 system. This option was actually recommended by my Sys Admin coworker as I was leaving work yesterday (after I made this post).

Thanks for your help guys!

 

[cyberjock]

Consider this your warning.. if you don't know what you are doing in ESXi you can have an extremely unreliable FreeNAS server. You can have zero redundancy where you think you do... etc. You need to have a very thorough(not a weeks worth of reading some web pages) understanding of FreeNAS and how it works to make ESXi work for you.

I experimented with it a week ago in ESXi and I couldn't even get it to work. I believe it was a hardware issue and my non-server-grade motherboard and/or RAID controller didn't support VT-d fully.

 

[erode]

Consider this your warning.. if you don't know what you are doing in ESXi you can have an extremely unreliable FreeNAS server. You can have zero redundancy where you think you do... etc. You need to have a very thorough(not a weeks worth of reading some web pages) understanding of FreeNAS and how it works to make ESXi work for you.

I experimented with it a week ago in ESXi and I couldn't even get it to work. I believe it was a hardware issue and my non-server-grade motherboard and/or RAID controller didn't support VT-d fully.

That's fair. I have nothing to lose at this point, I have a blank canvas and if I can get it to work nicely, cool. If not, well I will continue to search then.

 

[hervon]

Here are a few tips and links that helped me.

First register for free to VMWare to get VMware vSphere Hypervisor 5.1 and VMware vSphere Client 5.1 VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi) will boot on your server. VMware vSphere Client will be installed on a remote computer to manage the ESXi server.

I used the link to prepare a USB flash drive that will contain ESXi to boot on the server.

I had to customize the ESXi image to support my E1000 intel network adapter.

This links helped my to install freeNAS on ESXi. After installation, I imported my saved settings.

At first I had a network problem that got cured by enabling Promiscuous Mode.


This is the delicate part that allows Raw Device Mappings (direct access to FreeNAS) in ESXi. Avoid being drunk during this part!

I have been running this setup for a few weeks. The only problem I had lately had nothing to do the ESXi. (Bad gateway caused by router).

I added a 120GB SSD in my server as a datastore. Now I 'USB Flash boot' with ESXi instead of FreeNAS.

 

[erode]

Here are a few tips and links that helped me.

First register for free to VMWare to get VMware vSphere Hypervisor 5.1 and VMware vSphere Client 5.1 VMware vSphere Hypervisor (ESXi) will boot on your server. VMware vSphere Client will be installed on a remote computer to manage the ESXi server.

I used the link to prepare a USB flash drive that will contain ESXi to boot on the server.

I had to customize the ESXi image to support my E1000 intel network adapter.

This links helped my to install freeNAS on ESXi. After installation, I imported my saved settings.

At first I had a network problem that got cured by enabling Promiscuous Mode.


This is the delicate part that allows Raw Device Mappings (direct access to FreeNAS) in ESXi. Avoid being drunk during this part!

I have been running this setup for a few weeks. The only problem I had lately had nothing to do the ESXi. (Bad gateway caused by router).

I added a 120GB SSD in my server as a datastore. Now I 'USB Flash boot' with ESXi instead of FreeNAS.

Perhaps coincidentally almost all of those links I had already begun to compile for a guide. No issues with ESXi having a network problem. I'm installing it and the VMs to a WD Velociraptor, instead of a USB stick.

The only trouble I'm having is getting the drives mapped as RDM. I got it working but FreeNAS could not wipe the drives and was spitting out some errors about block size. I believe the problem might stem from some confusion over which physical drive mappings to use. There were duplicates of my 4 drives :number appended. Still trying to figure out what that means.

Other than that, seems like a pretty awesome system!

 

[cyberjock]

The only trouble I'm having is getting the drives mapped as RDM. I got it working but FreeNAS could not wipe the drives and was spitting out some errors about block size. I believe the problem might stem from some confusion over which physical drive mappings to use. There were duplicates of my 4 drives :number appended. Still trying to figure out what that means.

If you are using RDM you are making a terrible mistake if your data is important. You have not only ignored the warning you are doing EXACTLY what a lot of other people do with ESXi and then wonder why everything came crashing down in just a couple of months. Some even proved that they had redundancy by simulating disk failures, etc. FreeNAS should NOT be used with RDM. PERIOD.

If you REALLY think you are going to post a guide on this forum with RDM you have another thing coming. I'd expect quite a few people will immediately mark you as crazy and try to get the thread deleted as it is horribly bad advice and not even remotely worth for a guide on this forum. You'd likely be better off using Windows Server and sticking with NTFS and hardware RAID. But to each their own. Good luck!

 

[cyberjock]

BTW... here's the clip from the manual that should have been your wake up call that what you are doing is likely to end badly for you..

According to Wikipedia: “ZFS can not fully protect the user's data when using a hardware RAID controller, as it is not able to perform the automatic self-healing unless it controls the redundancy of the disks and data. ZFS prefers direct, exclusive access to the disks, with nothing in between that interferes. If the user insists on using hardware-level RAID, the controller should be configured as JBOD mode (i.e. turn off RAIDfunctionality) for ZFS to be able to guarantee data integrity. Note that hardware RAID configured as JBOD may still detach disks that do not respond in time; and as such may require TLER/CCTL/ERC enabled disks to prevent drive dropouts. These limitations do not apply when using a non-RAID controller, which is the preferred method of supplying disks to ZFS.”

Yes, this applies for ESXi. You are not providing exclusive access to the disks with nothing in between.

 

[erode]

If you are using RDM you are making a terrible mistake if your data is important. You have not only ignored the warning you are doing EXACTLY what a lot of other people do with ESXi and then wonder why everything came crashing down in just a couple of months. Some even proved that they had redundancy by simulating disk failures, etc. FreeNAS should NOT be used with RDM. PERIOD.

If you REALLY think you are going to post a guide on this forum with RDM you have another thing coming. I'd expect quite a few people will immediately mark you as crazy and try to get the thread deleted as it is horribly bad advice and not even remotely worth for a guide on this forum. You'd likely be better off using Windows Server and sticking with NTFS and hardware RAID. But to each their own. Good luck!

Uh. Thanks? I'm sure you have good intentions but your attitude is dreadful. I'm storing television episodes here, not national security documents. I know this method isn't recommended, I'm okay with the consequences. I'm probably just going to go find another forum for discussion.

 

[hervon]

Uh. Thanks? I'm sure you have good intentions but your attitude is dreadful. I'm storing television episodes here, not national security documents. I know this method isn't recommended, I'm okay with the consequences. I'm probably just going to go find another forum for discussion.

Stay! One's attitude is not everyone's attitude. ;-) This is still the best place to share info about FreeNAS either on bare metal or as a VM.

 

[cyberjock]

Uh. Thanks? I'm sure you have good intentions but your attitude is dreadful. I'm storing television episodes here, not national security documents. I know this method isn't recommended, I'm okay with the consequences. I'm probably just going to go find another forum for discussion.

Yeah, my attitude sucks at times. I get tired of smart people doing stupid things. I guess you could be stupid.. I know alot of people's actions really make me ask that question. But before I even responded to your first post I knew exactly where this thread would go. And now it comes full circle. And I'm sure I know what thread you'll be creating in a few months.. but C'est la vie.

Quite honestly, I have zero understanding as to why you are wasting your time with all of this when you could simply have used Windows, made the RAID within Windows and not dealt with FreeNAS at all. I think that Windows is far more reliable than what you are about to do.. but whatever. I'm unsubscribing from this thread since you haven't thought this through(notice that none of our ESXi wizards have made a post in this thread.. they're tired of telling people not to do stupid things, watching them do it anyway, then begging for hours of one-on-one help later because they did happen to put some important stuff on it). All you have to do is search this forum for "ESXi" and you'll see plenty of threads where people lost everything from a single disk failure because they didn't understand RDM. But anyway, take care. I truly hope I don't see another thread from you asking how to recover your data, but I sadly expect it just as much as I knew this thread would end...