Unable to create a new ZFS pool on fresh install

[t-grave]

Hi all

I'm having some trouble creating a new ZFS pool from the GUI.

After a fresh install of FreeNAS (latest stable version):

I try to create a pool with my 4 WD Red's 3TB (these have been used before in a ZoL setup, but I labelcleared and partition wiped them), the disks show up fine but when I click create, FreeNAS shows a loading indicator which keeps running indefinitely (I've waited for 10 minutes without success). It makes no difference what type of pool I try to create (tried all of them already, striped, raidz2, etc..)

Once I refresh the page and go to pools, this page keeps showing the loading indicator as well, also indefinitely and my disks cannot be selected again to create a new pool neither can I load the disks page (it keeps showing loading indicator).

The real fun starts when I open the shell and perform the `zfs list` command. This command never finishes (the CLI becomes unusable until reboot) and sometimes even the web service becomes unresponsive and I am not able to open it up anymore (it keeps saying Connecting to NAS...) without hard resetting.

Rebooting FreeNAS actually results in the pool being shown with status UNKOWN and the disks now show "Unused" under the pool column. During startup FreeNAS tries to import the pool but without success. All I am able to do is remove the pool again.

I've also ran gpart list and this tells me FreeNAS did actually create the freebsd-zfs partitions on the disks.

Is there anything else I can try to troubleshoot this issue? I've got loads of experience with Ubuntu/Debian/ZFS, but none whatsoever with FreeNAS/FreeBSD.

Setup for context:
Proxmox running on a 32GB DDR4 regECC / 2x Intel Xeon E5-2680v3 (24 cores / 48 threads total).
I will be upgrading to 256GB memory coming monday since 32GB is on the low side for my total ZFS poolsize + VM's etc

I've been running a Ubuntu VM with 8x8TB (raidz2) and 4x3TB (striped mirror) using QEMU direct disk pass-through, this VM was responsible for managing the ZFS pool as well as exporting it over NFS and Samba.

Currently experimenting with FreeNAS since it offers built in monitoring and management dashboards when deploying a ZFS pool (as opposed to my current ubuntu managed ZFS pool).


The FreeNAS VM has been assigned 8GB of RAM, uses the host CPU flags (since I won't be doing any replication or migrations to other nodes of this VM), a single 32GB RAW virtual disk as boot drive and now uses the 4x3TB disks that used to be connected to the ubuntu VM (also using the same passthrough technique)

I've destroyed the previous pool that was hosted on them on the ubuntu host before disconnecting the disks using `zpool destroy`

Thanks in advance

 

[Basil Hendroff]

Please detail your FreeNAS hardware and software.

 

[t-grave]

Please detail your FreeNAS hardware and software.

Alright, makes sense! I've updated my original post, if there's anything else you'd like to know, ask away!

 

[Chris Moore]

Use FreeNAS to clean the disks before trying to create a pool. There is probably something left on the disks from the previous pool that is causing an error. I have seen this before, even when doing a replace with a disk that was previously used.

latest stable version

Please use numbers as the latest stable version could be different six months from now when someone is searching for a solution to their problem. It just makes the forum more readable for everyone, no matter when they come along and find this later.