Small Business DIY NAS help

Hi All,

I have been asked by my boss to upgrade our backup storage which at this point is a QNAP-209 with 2x2TB running in RAID1. This is however not enough, so we need to upgrade it. Also, it's too slow

I have been looking for another QNAP, Synology, Thecus and so on, but when I read about their hardware specs, I get a bit nervous because no one of them are using quality components (ECC memory and reliable file systems). Reliability is VERY important.

Because of this, I have been searching the net for information regarding building our own NAS and I have found these components so far:

Case: Fractal Design Arc MiniTower with Fractal Design 400W PSU (because it has room for 6 HDDs)
CPU: Xeon E3-1225
http://ark.intel.com/Product.aspx?id=52270

Motherboard: Intel S1200BT
http://www.intel.com/products/server/motherboards/S1200BT/S1200BT-specifications.htm

Memory: 2Gb ECC (maybe more than 2gb)

Sata-Controller: INTEL SASUC8I
http://www.intel.com/products/server/raid-controllers/SASUC8I/SASUC8I-overview.htm

3x2 TB WD Green

I want to use ZFS (Openfiler?) and software raid. Am I right, that I need to change the firmware on the Intel controller in order change it to a HBA controller?

The motherboard and CPU is mainly chosen because I gives us the ability to use ECC-memory.

The case is pretty small because it is going to be placed inside a small safety box (don't worry about ventilation, this is not going to be a problem).

I'm not sure about the SATA-controller. Do we really need this? Does it make the system more realiable than using the onboard ports?
If a controller is really important, is there a better controller in the price range of this controller?

Give me your thoughts guys, I could really use some input on this on

Nobody who wants to comment on my setup? My price range is ~$1000-$1500 if you guys have a better alternative to the setup I have been looking at.

Another question I cannot seem to find an answer for: What about an UPS? What would happen to the data on the server, worst case scenario, if we aren't going to use a UPS?

You say your server is too slow. What is the limiting factor?

Your price range is about twice what I would expect to pay, but it is hard to know without some performance goals.

The Mobo,& cpu you have are fine, just add more ram (atleast 8 gig), install solaris 11 express & Napp-it & you got a fine nas, add 6x 2TB drives in raid Z2 , that gives you 8TB of really good storage

SE11 is not free for business use, go with OpenIndiana instead. Kyoko is right about more ram 1gb per tb of storage is good goal.

axan said:

SE11 is not free for business use, go with OpenIndiana instead. Kyoko is right about more ram 1gb per tb of storage is good goal.

Click to expand...

Oh yeah.. forgot about that.. OpenIndiana is a close 2nd indeed

Our current backup-server can only read/write ~35mb/s which is too slow. We are hoping that we can get the performance so high that it will be the 1Gbit network that is going to be the bottleneck.

So you guys think the motherboard and CPU is okay? I guess I am going to upgrade the ram to 8Gb instead.

What about the controller?

Is it very important for reliability to purchase an UPS or how vulnerable is the server going to be if the power is cut off while, for example, the server is under load.

I generally frown upon DIY servers for business, however ZFS loves RAM so bump that to 4 GB at least, and you won't need the SATA HBA, the onboard SATA controllers on Intel server motherboards is fine. I run a 5x 2TB ZFS array on a dual core Xeon with 4GB on the Intel controllers and it will saturate gigE ethernet with ease.

Agree with most of the comments. At least 4GB ram, preferably 8! And it won't be wasted - zfs will use it to cache file data...

tdg: Okay, so you think I wouldn't get much by adding the SATA Controller? I am a bit unsure whether or not to drop this, because everyone in here love HBA Controllers. I hope someone would tell me the difference.

I have been looking for some alternative components which are:

Controller: INTEL SASUC8I (??)
Bundkort:SUPERMICRO X8SIL-F
CPU: Xeon X3430 boxed (What if I chose a L3406 Instead?)
Case: Fractal Design Arc
PSU: Fractal Design Integra 500W
Ram: Kingston 2x4Gb ECC
Harddrives: Western Digital AV-GP 2TB X 6 (Maybe adding a small one as OS)

What about this setup instead. Is it worth the extra $$ to buy the Supermicro motherboard instead of the Intel board?

Are the harddrives okay or?

Btw, I really appeciate the help I get in here, so thanks alot!

EDIT: Remember reliability is the absolute most important thing in this setup

Instead of the sasuc8i you can get the ibm1015 on ebay for well under $100 new...

As long as you have enough sata ports on the motherboard you don't need hba, you won't get any performance improvements over intel sata ports.
the sm mobo is nice + you get ipkvm which makes managing the server a lot easier.
I would ditch the wd drives in favor of Hitachi 5K3000

MaxIImus said:

tdg: Okay, so you think I wouldn't get much by adding the SATA Controller? I am a bit unsure whether or not to drop this, because everyone in here love HBA Controllers. I hope someone would tell me the difference.

Click to expand...

There won't be anything to gain by using an add-on SATA controller other than more ports which your original configuration wouldn't have taken advantage of. I think a lot of people use add on SATA controllers because many use desktop motherboards which lack enough ports, or use the ICH controllers or a combination of different SATA controllers, whereas the server grade motherboards which use the far better C20x controller like the one you listed. Adding extra parts adds complexity and more points of failure, usually best to keep it simple unless you need the additional features.

I would go with 8GB ram. Only other thing, hot swappable Hard drive bays would be nice as well. Also get a case that has room to grow. Are you/ can you rack mount this case?

tdg: Okay, I guess we won't be needing the SATA controller for now.


Vengance_01: I am going to use 8gb of ram. How swap could definately be nice, but as the case it's going to be placed in a small case which is very restrictive I am not able to use a rack case - unfortunately

then I think you are good. That setup should max out 1GB Ethernet with ease.

Vengance_01 said:

then I think you are good. That setup should max out 1GB Ethernet with ease.

Click to expand...

Great, then I'm all set (regarding the hardware)

BTW, did anyone have something to say about using a UPS?

Then I guess I need to figure out how to setup the server regarding the software. I have only worked with mdadm on a linux Debian server before, but I hope I can find some good information about this and hopefully some guides and tutorials

A UPS would definitely be a good investment with a RAID'd system, imo.

UPS is not necessary with zfs; however, it's always a good idea to let the server shutdown gracefully in case of power failure + a decent ups with AVR will also clean the power and prevent reboots in case of brownouts.

axan said:

UPS is not necessary with zfs; however, it's always a good idea to let the server shutdown gracefully in case of power failure + a decent ups with AVR will also clean the power and prevent reboots in case of brownouts.

Click to expand...

I did read somewhere that ZFS is not that vulnerable to power failure but will it corrupt the data or the OS (worst case) if we don't invest in a UPS? (Just a small one to make sure the server is shut down correctly)

EDIT: This is such a great forum when speaking about storage! I appreciate you guys taking the time to help us take alot of the decisions that needs to be made

ZFS has two features to be very robust against power failures:

1. copy on write
A date block is written to disk correctly or the action is not done at all ex in case of a power failure
-> your disk state is always consistent

2. overall checksums on data level
if anything happens, example a silent data-failure (already stored datablocks change their value
for whatever reasons like radioactivity, magnetic fields or due to pure statistic) ZFS can discover
and repair such errors on reading or with the help of the online scrubbing function for the whole pool.

This will not help to avoid data loss of a open file in case of a power lost, but you will be informed about
and can regain data from last snapshot, so make snapshots regularly (OS-pool and datapools)

A ups will not help in these cases unless you have a ups for desktop and switches too.

In case of hardware failures you will be happy with ZFS.
Just move your disks to another ZFS server with any controller and import your pool.