Newbie: increase existing 1 disk pool by adding another disk (Stripe)

[marco cammarata]

Dear community,

I am very, very new to TrueNAS and I am having some hard time in understanding a basic thing

I have installed TrueNAS on a super basic system (Intel Nuc with 1 5TB HD connected via USB) that I am willing to expand my Pool by adding another disk of 5TB
With my disappointed, the only thing that I managed to do was to get a mirror configuration. No way to expand to 10TB stripe configuration. Or how can I do?

If impossible, the other option would be to create a new pool I guess. And I also assume there will be no way to merge those 2 pools in a bigger one later on.

I know it's so basic, but I have not found clear resources on this

thank you!

 

[marco cammarata]

Ehm...I managed to solved, finally!
I realized I could add a Vdev to my existing pool and....that was all.

 

[sretalla]

connected via USB

This is not the path to long-term success, which means:

Intel Nuc

Isn't a great selection of hardware for TrueNAS

Be aware that you're on a ticking time bomb for disk/pool failure due to the nature of ZFS transactions and USB controllers being unable to handle them.

Also, running with a striped pool may be convenient, you're all-in if any drive is lost, all is lost.

I know it's so basic, but I have not found clear resources on this

At the top of the page: Resources, then look for the ZFS primer.

 

[marco cammarata]

Hi Sretalla,
thanks for your reply.

Oh gosh, so I am understanding that USB is a dangerous method to connect drives with TrueNAS, regardless the fact I am using a Nuc, right?

as I wish to reuse the HW I have (the NUC and 2x5b 2.5" drive) which can it be a preferable solution to:
- run a plex server
- install plug-in like sab/sonarr/etc
- access files from different devices
- (nice to have) run a OSX timemachine

I can think about:
- migrate to windows/linux and work with shared folders
- stay with Truenas but at least be in a more secure Mirror configuration
- other?

thanks for you recommendations!

 

[sretalla]

USB is a dangerous method to connect drives with TrueNAS

Maybe a little strong to say dangerous, but indeed a higher risk than those of us with experience would take, especially in a pool with no redundancy.

Even if you do add redundancy (mirror), that's likely to still end with drives dropping from your pool at some point if they're connected over USB.

You might find that you have better results with that hardware and a different filesystem (which means not TrueNAS, unfortunately) since Extfs and NTFS (or others) don't generate the same large transaction groups that causes overload with ZFS on USB controllers.

You can certainly get the functions you want from OMV or with various docker containers on Windows or Linux.

 

[HoneyBadger]

An additional danger point (one that may be more relevant) is that the only 5TB 2.5" drives I'm aware of in common use are SMR (shingled) which provide very poor results under any kind of RAID and do especially bad with ZFS due to the interaction with copy-on-write.

 

[marco cammarata]

Thanks a lot for the advices, I will try to make a good usage of them and migrate soon to a “classic” OS solution

 

[marco cammarata]

Be aware that you're on a ticking time bomb for disk/pool failure due to the nature of ZFS transactions and USB controllers being unable to handle them.

I was, I definitely was...

 

[sretalla]

I don't think those errors are fatal... but indeed they point to the fact that you can't check SMART status properly, so you'll be in for trouble with the disks down the road with no warning if the USB controller doesn't die first.

 

[marco cammarata]

Yes, you are right, after a reboot I was still not able to read the data. I had to unplug the disk and reboot again to come back with "normal state"