TrueNAS OS disk - using onboard RAID1 for redundancy?

[Old_DEC_guy]

I'm beginning design of a "home NAS" using an HP Z420 Xeon E5-based workstation with 16GB ECC memory... planning to add 5400RPM SATA3 drives (via SAS/SATA extender) for "slower" pool storage, configured as ZRAID2 - my goal is data integrity/protection first, performance second. Eventually, I will get a 10Gbit fiber network going for my client systems (1 Linux, 1 Windows) and this NAS system to make things fairly "zippy".

Now for my question: For the TrueNAS "OS" disk, I'm planning on doing a RAID1 mirror (for redundancy reasons) of a pair of 120GB 2.5in SSD SATA3 drives, using the motherboard RAID controller. My prior systems experience, plus study of the TrueNAS Community Hardware Guide would suggest there's no problem in doing this from a "best practices" standpoint, but I just wanted to ask here anyway.

I understand that using any RAID controller is a BAD idea for the storage pools... there should be only one master chef in the "storage pools kitchen" and I want the TrueNAS ZFS to fill that role!

This is my first post here... I'm attracted to "building my own" TrueNAS home NAS due to my hardware & systems background (a lot of it with DEC, which no longer exists... sniff...), plus a fair amount of ZFS experience from working on Sun Solaris V10.x Unix operating system.

Thanks!

Lee

 

[Ericloewe]

What’s “on-board”? PCH SATA? That’s not going work as RAID, it’s two drivers in a trench coat who sneaked in to see Predator because their buddy firmware looked the other way.

So you have two options: a RAID controller or just a plain ZFS mirror. Advantages both ways, but I’m partial to just rolling the dice with ZFS mirrors for boot.

 

[Old_DEC_guy]

... but I’m partial to just rolling the dice with ZFS mirrors for boot.

That works for me... since I haven't yet dug into the install doc I wasn't aware that ZFS mirror was an option for the OS disk(s).

Thanks!

Lee

 

[Old_DEC_guy]

Re: Ericloewe

On my HP Z420 workstation motherboard:

Integrated 6-channel SATA controller: 2 ports 6 Gb/s + 4 ports 3 Gb/s, RAID 0, 1, 5, 10 capable; Optional SAS controller: LSI 9217 -4i4e 8-port SAS/SATA 6 Gb/s, RAID 0, 1, 10 capable

Well, since PCI controllers with this chipset can be had for as low as $19 on Ebay... yeah, probably not all that great of RAID.

 

[Ericloewe]

The SAS 9217 is a fine HBA, but it doesn't support RAID anyway. I suspect it can be easily crossflashed in the wrong direction, into a low-end RAID controller, but nobody actually does that sort of thing.