Planning to build a NAS

[bibloks]

Greets, this look nice and thanks to all guys/lads who share their knowledge.

I am planning to use my old P4 2.8Ghz, 2GB RAM, Asus motherboard to build meself a NAS. I would appreciate if you could direct me at the beginning.
I use linux for years now and I think this would enrich my linux experience now :)

Thanks in advance.

Best,

bibloks

 

[Kimba]

The big issues is that you should have at least 4 GB of Ram and a dual core processor if you are using FreeNAS 8.x.

Other things to keep in mind is when you build a RaidZ1 or RaidZ2 try and keep the hard drives all the same size. That will make it easier to figure space and when you upgrade it will make the process easier.

Many use a USB as their boot device and if you do just spend the bucks and get at least a USB 2.0 thumb drive. Others (like me) use a Compact Flash as their boot disk with a IDE to CF converter. They are generally faster and Geekier.

I have been using FreeNas since 7.x and been happy with it -- and the only problems I had have been located between my ears and/or in the hardware.

In my boxes I have small pools of 3 x 2TB, 3 x 1TB, 3 x 360 GB HD drives in a raidZ1 configuration that way if I upgrade I start from the largest pool and upgrade their drives to a larger one moving the replaced drives to the next pool and so forth.

At the end of the day you can say that "I am my own Cloud"

 

[bibloks]

Thanks a lot for the reply m8 and sorry for late reply from me.

I was reading as much as possible for freeNAS and ZFS file system seams great. I have knowledge on Linux as I am using it for years now and also I have configures samba shares on my home network.

OK let me tell you what are y intention to use freensas for and what machine I have atm for this purpose:

1. I installed v. 8.0.4 and is running fine but still did not start testing file transfers.
2. I will use frenas only as home server, basically I have my family pics/videos and other relevant docs. Also media files, music and movies.
3. . I have a P5LD2-X/1333 motherboard with 3.2Ghz CPU, 1.5 GB RAM (but I can easily get more RAM if needed) 3 x WD discs (two mirroring, for family files and one disk just for media)
4. There will be four (4) users only connected to this machine at home.

questions:

- is it enough power for use only with UFS not ZFS
- can I run ZFS in this machine if I put 4GB ram considering that rarely there will be more than two users making requests at the ame time to this machine.
- what do you propose I can do and what setup with this machine, can you give me your input what you think this machine can serve me as freenas?

Thank you in advance

 

[Kimba]

4GB Ram should be the minimum you should use.

Just for reference I have an Asus P5q Pro motherboard with an Intel D940 processor and 8 GB of Ram. On that machine resides 2 RaidZ Pools of 3 x 2 TB HDs and 3 x 1 TB HDs. My file transfer rates are anywhere from 40MBS to 90MBs with 50-60 MBS normal. My wife plays videos all the time using a media player and I watch different videos on the computer downstairs. The issues I have is the large MKV files so I shrink them using Handbrake (eg. 32GB MKV file shrunk down to 8GB or less) to transcode them into .MP4s.

I use my machine as you are planning to use your machine so I would suggest that you just use the pool and don't create a DataSet.

I have another FreeNas Box that has 1 RaidZ pool of 3 x 320GB and that backs up my critical info on it and then I turn off its power.

Have fun and FreeNas is just great.

For your situation I

 

[bibloks]

OK lets make it clear, you are talking of using ZFS thats why at least 4GB ram.
What about using solely UFS?

can you giveme input if I stick only with UFS file system ?

Thanks again m8

 

[Kimba]

Soley using UFS you might as well use FreeNas 7.2. and when I had mine they were single drives with no raid. BTW FreeNas 7.2 requires only like 386 MB of Ram.

ZFS forces the memory requirement to 4GB.

ZFS is critical when you need redundancy which is why I went to 8.0.x.

Remember a copy of the stuff somewhere else is a backup so if you are diligent you can use FreeNas 7.2 with no problem.

I would not use UFS on FreeNas 8.0.x but not for technical reasons just it is too big of a machine.

Also be warned that FreeNas 7.2 is an old fork off of BSD 7.x and thus limited on hardware drivers.

 

[Kimba]

I have been using FreeNas in 7.x and never had a problem with it. I just never tested the transfer rate because I did not use it as a Media Server. I also used some really old old old box and it worked like a champion.