SOLVED One boot drive or cheap sata card?

Irgendjemand5

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Sep 20, 2021
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Hello I’m building my first NAS so I’m somewhat inexperienced.

Asus P5P43TD PRO (6sata, 1esata, USB 2.0) that's what I have. Don’t have money to spend.
8GB Ram,
4 core CPU
core 2 quad Q9400

I want to use

- 3 mirrored drives: 2 old 2TB WD red + 2TB 870 EVO ssd (this should be for data I absolutely don’t want to lose.)
- Raid z1: 3x new 6tb wd red pro for backups + somewhat important data

so I need 6 Sata ports for Data drives.

I (maybe) will use 2 boot ssd’s (one samsung 840 pro, one old corsair)
problem is I don’t have enough Sata ports and the recommended sas expander cards cost 100+€ which I can’t spend.

So I was thinking to only use one boot ssd OR use a second mirrored boot ssd connected via usb 2.0.
I would use the esata port to have enough ports.

OR buy a cheap sata expander card. (please suggestions: from amazon Germany)


Please suggestions what would be the best (cost efficient) way.
Other useful info is also appreciated (I skimmed over the hardware guide)

Thank you!
 
Last edited:

ThreeDee

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look around .. I paid $25 for LSI card in sig
In the past I've used USB to SATA cables for boot drive without issue
 

NugentS

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a single boot drive is fine as its real easy to rebuild if you need to - just make sure you get a regular copy of the config file. Even USB if you have to - but I would suggest mirroring USB boot drives with different models and different sizes to ensure they they both don't fail at the same time. Stick with good names and keep a spare handy.

do NOT even think about using a cheap SATA expander card - just say No

Your system is borderline too old. I am guessing a Core2Duo Quad which is not ideal for the scenario.

Mirroring 2 old 2TB HDD's with a 2TB SSD - I have no idea what that's going to do - I am not saying it won't work but I suspect your results will be variable. The new 6TB drives - make sure they are CMR and not SMR. ZFS and SHR do not mix well.

Lastly I cannot find out what chipset the ethernet port is. Be warned that consumer boards use Realtek chipsets a lot which are crap with TrueNAS or they use obscure Intel chipsets which flat out don't work. You may need a proper NIC as well.
 

Irgendjemand5

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In the past I've used USB to SATA cables for boot drive without issue
thanks


a single boot drive is fine as its real easy to rebuild if you need to - just make sure you get a regular copy of the config file. Even USB if you have to - but I would suggest mirroring USB boot drives with different models and different sizes to ensure they they both don't fail at the same time. Stick with good names and keep a spare handy.
ok, I will do samsung evo 240 pro as boot and mirrored ssd on usb than

do NOT even think about using a cheap SATA expander card - just say No
OK!

Your system is borderline too old. I am guessing a Core2Duo Quad which is not ideal for the scenario.
you guessed right: I looked now: core 2 quad Q9400
but I'm not concerned with low transfer speeds. I just want safe data.

I can't find my ehternet card as well now. but I have installed truenas and I can reach it in my home network.
 

ThreeDee

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I just want safe data.
then get some server grade hardware and run ECC memory and have plenty of redundancy as well as a good battery back up :cool:
 

Irgendjemand5

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As boot I have now a mirrored pool of 2 SSD's

Samsung 128gb on SATA
corsair 120gb on USB


but the USB drive behaves strange:
truenas doesn't see that its an SSD drive for example: and the model no is ASMT 2105
potentially how much of a problem could this be?

Screenshot from 2021-09-23 01-37-27.png
 

Ericloewe

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Irgendjemand5

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Sounds like the model number of the controller. Seems to be a USB/SATA bridge chip.
Ok,

And is that potentially problematic that truenas doesn't recognise it as an SSD?

t's over a usb 2.0 (no 3.0 available)

Should I get another ssd to usb connector part?
 

Ericloewe

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What kind of special recognition do you expect it to need? The real question is whether SMART data can be queried without hassle.
 

Irgendjemand5

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What kind of special recognition do you expect it to need? The real question is whether SMART data can be queried without hassle.

I was thinking that maybe if truenas thinks that the SSD is a HDD it might talk different to it and might destroy it in the process? That's why I was asking.

So I will check of the smart data can be read out fine. If yes I leaf it,
If no I get another sata to usb
 

Ericloewe

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was thinking that maybe if truenas thinks that the SSD is a HDD it might talk different to it and might destroy it in the process?
No, that's not really a concern in any sane environment.
 

Irgendjemand5

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thanks everyone for the help!
 
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