New user Query

[dejv]

Hi, I am new to this

Does FreeNAS do the job I need?

- I need somewhere to store all my series/movies/music and then connect decoders to it to play them from any tv/computer in the house

- I have different pcs/laptop which I need them to sync with a nas (If I create a folder on all pcs and put everything in it and it syncs that folder is enough) not all pcs are in same location. ( I need a software to be installed on each pc for the sync to happen any recommendation? it must also work on the internet not just locally)

- On the nas I will have different folders according to the pcname it is synced to. (example folder1 - my laptop, folder 2 - my work computer, folder 3- my kid folder, folder4 - wife folder etc)

- Daily the pc backups folder is zipped (as I was told that ransom ware doesn't effect zipped folders) and it is transferred on a separate hard disk in the same machine and that zip file is stored for 5 days then gets deleted or over written

Reason: my wife just got the ransom ware virus and lost everything and now I want to sync all my pcs including my laptop which is at work.

 

[diedrichg]

Does freenas does the job I need?

Yes.

For the media you can use Plex or Emby, MiniDLNA or Subsonic.

For the backups you can use Crashplan, OwnCloud, Syncthing or BTSync. On the client side you could simply use Sync Toy if those other options are overkill.

 

[dejv]

Same goes to the above I use crashplan or the other software instead of FreeNAS?

 

[pirateghost]

Same goes to the above I use crashplan or the other software instead of FreeNAS?

??

 

[dejv]

Yes.

For the media you can use Plex or Emby, MiniDLNA or Subsonic.

I install plex/emby/minidlna/subsonic as addons on freenas ?

For the backups you can use Crashplan, OwnCloud, Syncthing or BTSync. On the client side you could simply use Sync Toy if those other options are overkill.

Do I use one of the above instead of freenas or they are installed on freenas as plugins ?

 

[diedrichg]

Everything mentioned above can be installed in a jail (walled garden FreeBSD [partition] - for lack of better words) within FreeNAS.

http://doc.freenas.org/9.10/plugins.html

SyncToy is a piece of Windows software that performs file syncing between Windows and a CIFS share. There are other similar syncing software such as GoodSync, FreeFileSync and Syncback free to name a few.

 

[pirateghost]

I install plex/emby/minidlna/subsonic as addons on freenas ?


Do I use one of the above instead of freenas or they are installed on freenas as plugins ?

FreeNAS is the OS.

Applications mentioned can be installed, within jails, ON FreeNAS. You wouldn't use one of them in place of FreeNAS. You would use it with FreeNAS

 

[dejv]

ok thanks for the info.

will a IBM System X3400, E6410 @2.33Ghz, 8gb ram be enough?

with regards to hard disk Currently I have 3x250gb and wish to setup raid 5

 

[Mirfster]

will a IBM System X3400, E6410 @2.33Ghz, 8gb ram be enough?

8 GB of RAM is the recommended minimum, so if you are thinking of running other stuff especially Plex I would not think 8GB is going to cut it. YMMV...

 

[Nick2253]

Your E5410 should be enough for a stream or two in Plex. I would also recommend more than 8GB of memory.

3x250GB is very little space. Are you planning on getting more hard drive, or getting larger hard drives? I would recommend that you get at least four hard drives, if not six, especially if you're talking about holding media. In general, you don't want to go more than 80% full on a ZFS pool.

 

[dejv]

thanks all for the feedback.

For now I was going to start with them as a test, then if I find that it is working without any problems I will replace the disks with larger ones, my questions below:

- after setting up 3 x 250gb (raid 5) = 500gb - is it a headache to replace the hard disks with larger ones and reconfigure with the new hard disks?
- also when syncing the pcs using the suggested software, is there a way to limit the users example maximum folder size 20gb?
- would it be possible to setup a script that runs daily that compresses the user folder to zip file and transfer to a usb hard disk or another internal hard disk which is not part of the raid ?

 

[Nick2253]

- after setting up 3 x 250gb (raid 5) = 500gb - is it a headache to replace the hard disks with larger ones and reconfigure with the new hard disks?

When you say RAID5, I'm assuming you mean RAIDZ1. It's not a headache to replace small disks one-for-one with larger disks; the headache is that you cannot expand RAIDZx vdevs with more drives. In other words, in the future, if you wanted to go to a 4 drive RAIDZ1 vdev, you'd need to wipe and redo your drives.

- also when syncing the pcs using the suggested software, is there a way to limit the users example maximum folder size 20gb?

If you use datasets, you can put quotas on datasets to prevent the size from going above 20GB. However, not all tools will handle that gracefully: some testing will be needed.

- would it be possible to setup a script that runs daily that compresses the user folder to zip file and transfer to a usb hard disk or another internal hard disk which is not part of the raid ?

A script to compress and zip the user folder is easy. Transferring it to a USB drive is harder. If you want to go that route, I'd suggest running the script from your main desktop, and attaching the USB drive there. If you want to go with the internal route, then the easiest way is to set up a one-drive pool, and then have your script transfer the data to that pool.