Running Windows Backup Fubars FreeNAS?

[Bensam123]

So, I made a thread a week or so ago with some conflicting issues.

I'm using FreeNAS 8.0.3p1 on a 1.3ghz Athlon with 512mb of memory.
I setup a raid 3 array using 2x200Gb and 1x160Gb drives using UFS.
I have the array shared over CIFS
I'm using Windows Backup in W7

In windows I setup windows backup to backup to the CIFS share. It starts backing up and about five minutes into the transfer dialogue it causes FreeNAS to lockup, drop a disk from the array, and reboot. It then started to rebuild the array. This was on a older 667Mhz Celeron with 384Mb of memory. After running into this multiple times I replaced the hardware including the PSU and upgraded from a raid 1 UFS array to a raid 3 UFS array.

It currently still does this now. The drive it drops seems to be ada3, but after shuffling the drives around a couple times, the drive it drops seems to be completely random. Furthermore trying to stress test it I've done multiple simultaneous copies to the computer through windows and it's rock solid for hours on end. It only seems to exhibit this behavior when trying to use windows backup.

 

[survive]

Hi Bensam123,

Personally I think you just don't have enough memory in the system.

Add some & see if the behavior changes.

-Will

 

[Bensam123]

Alright, so after a bunch of testing it appears as though Raid 3 is unstable. I personally do not know why Raid 3 is even in FreeNAS 8 as it's a ghetto version of Raid 4, which is in in turn a ghetto version of Raid 5. I switched to ZFS and did RaidZ, which definitely has performance issues on my hardware. After doing so the system was stable transferring data, but I then ran into memory issues where ZFS would nom all the memory and the system would have a kernel panic. After doing more searching here it appears as though that is actually quite common.

In the end I ended up downgrading to FreeNAS 7 and did Raid 5 on UFS. FreeNAS 7 appears to be a bit less user friendly, but when 8 is unstable and/or doesn't get the job done it really isn't a choice any more. It's rock solid, I have more then enough memory, and CIFS transfer rates are pretty good. I am not going to nor do I need to upgrade to 16GB of memory to run a minimalistic OS that is built around a file system. I appreciate what you guys are doing here, but FreeNAS 8 is just a dog of a performer and is extremely temperamental.

This is a three week debacle I fixed simply by downgrading. It took all of two hours to figure out the OS and set everything up right after doing so. I suggest anyone who is having issues with FreeNAS 8 to downgrade to 7 until they get the bugs figured out and features ported to it. FreeNAS 8 itself is currently a beta IMO.

 

[BobCochran]

For the record, I have 8.03-p1 (64 bit) running on two hard drives configured as separate UFS volumes for a friend of mine. Each volume is a CIFS share. The Microsoft Backup software that is bundled with Windows 7 Ultimate backs up to this with no problem at all. A different machine backs up to the second CIFS share. FreeNAS has been happily running for 3 weeks straight now accepting nightly backups for that person. It just happens to have a little more than 3 Gb of memory.

Unfortunately, the same version and architecture of FreeNAS on a different system experiences dropped network connections. I'm using ZFS on that one. I've been discussing this (and whining a bit!) in a few different threads here. I just listen to the advice I get, implement it where possible, and keep trying. FreeNAS has given me an appreciation of just how complex network storage can be. And since I like mucking with hardware, it appeals to me in that sense, but I want to see some results in terms of ZFS volumes that are working and have correct data on them without breaking a sweat.

More memory does help.

Bob

 

[BobCochran]

Another thought -- maybe ZFS version 28 will prove more stable when it is implemented in a forthcoming version of FreeNAS. I think user "ProtoSD" already has it available in alpha mode for anyone to play with and test.

Bob

 

[Bensam123]

Your font is huge. Besides that. What version of raid did you use? I was using UFS Raid 3 on FN 8.0.3p1 x86 and then on 8.0.4 x86 to see if it fixed the issues. The array would always drop a disk though for some reason under heavy load. Why they actually have raid 3 and no raid 5 is pretty peculiar. UFS did transfer faster then both ZFS and UFS I got working on FN7 too, but only slightly so 20Mbit/s

I tried setting up ZFS in FN7 0.7.5.9496 without success as it required me to use special command line parameters as my drives weren't the same size. The latest version of FN7 does support ZFS 28 though, which is even more odd as it's further up to date then FN8.

IMO needing 3 Gigs of memory to run a filesystem is unacceptable. The filesystem should be able to use less if there is less installed. Heck the OS should be aware there is less memory and set ZFS parameters accordingly. Building a beast system just so you can transfer files to it is stupid. I could just buy a perc 5 off ebay for cheaper and less work using Windose with better performance.

 

[BobCochran]

If you can do it better than FreeNAS, why not go do it? Storage is a very complex, competitive market. Post photos of your successful rig here and the system details.

I'm not using RAID in any way in the UFS volumes on my successful FreeNAS box. They are just CIFS shares. They work.

Bob

 

[Bensam123]

I was comparing FreeNAS 7 to 8. You don't need a beowulf cluster to run FN7. You shouldn't need one to run FN8. Unless I'm mistaken, the point of FN is to have a small compact OS that just works on pretty much any computer, bringing a software raid solution with it. When comparative software solutions are almost completely horrid, such as W2000/2003/2008. If I need to buy $400 worth of hardware to make this work, it completely negates the point. For instance for the same price as your rig in your sig you could get either a enterprise level raid card or a couple of percs and operate them in a cluster... something FN can't even do.

Comparatively speaking, why would you want to run FN instead of FreeBSD when it comes down to it then?

Aye, I needed redundancy in my application... it's kinda pointless to use FN and not use any level of raid. You can setup pretty much any computer with XP on it and a single drive and it works as a fileserver too...

I did get it working though and my specs are on the top of the page. I'm successfully running FN7 with the above drives in a UFS software raid 5 array and getting a solid 100Mb/s over the network to it. I could get a unsteady 130Mb/s in FN8 with UFS and r3 and ZFS did the etch-a-sketch transfer spikes in FN8 (which is apparently common), neither of which were stable.

 

[joeschmuck]

I think you're complaining just to hear yourself. Feel free to buy a commercial NAS as you indicated above. The minimum RAM specs for FreeNAS 8.x are 6GB, not 512MB. This will not change. You can get by on 4GB but it's still below the recommended minimum. This project was designed for people who have older hardware laying around to create a NAS with minimal costs (lets face it, many of us have older hardware laying around that might only be a few years of age), not go out and buy new hardware, although many do just that.

 

[ProtoSD]

I agree with the other's also. The minimum requirements are documented. If you choose to ignore them and get crappy results, don't blame the software. Using 384MB of RAM to run any kind of server is unreasonably unrealistic. There's bloody cellphones with more memory than that, get real...

 

[Bensam123]

Welp, I'm glad you guys went out of your way to read my posts before jumping on the band wagon, but truth is FreeNAS 8 wouldn't work right and had a bunch of stability issues (outside of the ZFS kernel panic because of too little memory). Thats generally what happens in betas or even alphas. FreeNAS 7 works fine.