FreeNAS Upgrade

[NSimone621]

Hello,
I currently have a Dell 2950 with 6x1TB drives running FreeNAS, I've had it for a few years and am looking to go with a quieter setup, so I plan on migrating to a Dell r510. My question is should I opt for some form of server array and get a low end r510 or r610 since it won't hold disks? How does a storage array connect to a single server such as this? I see some cheap units on ebay, but they have fiber out or SAS cable out, I'm new to this whole side of things. Any advice is appreciated.
-Nico

 

[TiTON]

That is a lot of horse power for a Freenas system, and alot of power consumption if you are running it 24x7.

The decision in NAS really depends on what you want to do with it. Are you planning to use store / backup files and movies, or do you want it to host VM's? As for adding additional storage to a NAS, you can always add HBA cards. HBA cards can have both internal and external connectors. If you had external connector, you can run eSata to a jBOD for more storage.

For me, I am using Unraid. My setup is like this:

Asrock AM1 Motherboard
AMD AM1 3850 (Quad Core - 25 watt)
(1) 3TB Parity
(5) 2TB Data (10TB of Storage)
(1) 128GB SSD Cache.

Its pretty quiet and energy efficient. At idle, I am pull like 40'ish watts. Load is around 80 watts.

I primarily use mine to store and serve media in the house. With Unraid 6, I am also running a Windows 8 VM, and it also performs various other downloading / home media fuctions.

You might want to take a look at Unraid, I converted a few friends from FreeNas to Unraid.

- Ton

 

[NSimone621]

Thanks for the reply, I currently use it to hold music, movies and files I share between computers in my home, my game plan is to make it remotely accessible down the line. How would something like a Powervault work? I may likely want room down the line to have space for VM's. And in external storage, how do I decide FC vs iscsi/SAS, I've even seen units with copper out. What's the difference?

 

[dandragonrage]

Unless you're looking to learn iSCSI in particular, your idea is not only overkill (in some ways), but worse (in other ways) than direct-attached storage.

SAN (and NAS, really) are great for convenience and if you've got VMs on multiple VM servers and you have stuff like vMotion, it's a great option to easily redistribute server resources and to help deal with hardware failures.

But if you're not setting up multiple servers and you don't use stuff like vMotion, then SAN is a complete waste. You won't be using the benefits it provides, but you will be dealing with MUCH worse latency (and MUCH worse throughput if you've got gigabit SAN - though FC or 10GbE or InfiniBand or whatever can be much less bad than gigabit). Stick to DAS unless you're using these advanced features or, again, if you want to specifically learn to use those technologies.

You're also going to use more power if you use multiple boxes and that seems like a significant waste to me.

 

[NSimone621]

In that case, would it just be better to get a 12 bay r510? I would like something commercially available, as to why I went with the 2950, so I don't have the time to really build something right now, and I prefer rackmount too if possible.
Thanks

 

[dandragonrage]

It's tough to say since we're not sure what you're doing with the hardware other than just storing some things. The R510 could be overkill but I can't say that for sure with the little information you've given about how you use it. How many VMs are you going to run? Are they going to use a lot of CPU? A lot of I/O (either in IOPS and/or in throughput)? etc.

If you aren't doing CPU-intensive stuff, the R510 is almost definitely overkill. Not necessarily a bad thing, but I'd personally try to be more power efficient if I could. Though if you will use the processing power it provides then go for it.

 

[jimh425]

If you want something quieter, consider remounting the MB and drives into a tower with quieter fans and replace the CPU cooler. Many of the larger cases have a lot of room for drives. R510s only have an advantage of the possibility of adding a second processor which mostly will just add more power usage.

 

[dandragonrage]

Oh, and don't expect any commercial rackmount server to be anywhere near quiet. Even if you buy an R510 you'll still have to play around with putting reasonable fans in it.

 

[NSimone621]

It doesn't have to be tower quiet, just quiet enough that my TV will be louder haha. My last IBM was louder than the A/C on full blast. Id like the unit to be rack mount, and have room for at least 8 drives, I'm just going to use it as a NAS, I'll just max out drives in the VM server for now, that'll be plenty. I like the 12 bay r510, and it'll last me a while if I get an H700 so I can appreciate 6gb/s one day. Power isn't too much of a concern, it most likely will be the same or less than my 2950 of now, which is good with me.

 

[TiTON]

Nsimone,

I guess the challenge we are trying to understand is why you prefer a rackmount server. These guys are typically loud and very power hungry, they are made for the enterprise, and not just holding files.

If you are truly set on using that Server, here is how I would do it.

Load ESXi on the box, with like a RAID 5. That would give you 5TB of usable space. Create a VM for Freenas and give it as much space as you like. Make sure to save like 40GB of space for each additional VM you want to make in the future.

If you find a JBOD or Disk Enclousre, you can connect to it with an additional HBA.

I actually did a similar setup before. I had a spare i7 CPU and motherboard. I installed ESXi, and loaded my Unraid as a VM. From vCenter, I passthrough the HBA, so I had direct access to the drive.

I think might be the optimal way for you.

- Ton

 

[NSimone621]

Only reason i'd like rack mount is because all my other equipment is rack mount. I never really chose rack mount in the first place, but I got a lot of my stuff for free, all being rack mount. So I'm choosing to stick to that form factor. My 2950 only runs FreeNas, and my IBM was running ESXi, but I recently sold it and a R610 is on the way to replace it. I do not need one box to run both, I don't always use my VM's but I always use the NAS, so I'd like to keep separate boxes for that reason. That's why I considered the SAN or disk array. Just a matter of finding out how they connect, I'm no expert. I'm in school for Marine Transportation but computing and networking always interested me. Forgive my lack of knowledge, I can get by with server basics but don't know how a SAN or array works. Don't even know if that'd be a good option.

 

[dandragonrage]

SAN, again, is great for convenience. You can have multiple VM servers and use technologies like vMotion to move things between servers and do snapshots very easily. If you're not using the advanced features it provides, it will be worse than DAS because SAN and NAS have a major latency penalty (and a throughput penalty if you're only using gigabit ethernet between your SAN box and your VM box) compares to DAS.

Plan to replace fans with quieter ones. Rackmount servers are all obscenely loud. They do this because they don't want servers to immediately overheat if the air conditioning fails or if some fans die. Of course in a data center, the AC dying could still take out hardware, but more airflow still provides at least some buffer zone on that. Hopefully the power supplies themselves aren't that loud, but they could be.

Edit: Oh, and IMO stay with ZFS as much as possible with your storage. There is nothing else even CLOSE to the greatness that is ZFS.

 

[Netwerkz101]

Hello,
I currently have a Dell 2950 with 6x1TB drives running FreeNAS, I've had it for a few years and am looking to go with a quieter setup, so I plan on migrating to a Dell r510. My question is should I opt for some form of server array and get a low end r510 or r610 since it won't hold disks? How does a storage array connect to a single server such as this? I see some cheap units on ebay, but they have fiber out or SAS cable out, I'm new to this whole side of things. Any advice is appreciated.
-Nico

Thanks for the reply, I currently use it to hold music, movies and files I share between computers in my home, my game plan is to make it remotely accessible down the line. How would something like a Powervault work? I may likely want room down the line to have space for VM's. And in external storage, how do I decide FC vs iscsi/SAS, I've even seen units with copper out. What's the difference?

In that case, would it just be better to get a 12 bay r510? I would like something commercially available, as to why I went with the 2950, so I don't have the time to really build something right now, and I prefer rackmount too if possible.
Thanks

It doesn't have to be tower quiet, just quiet enough that my TV will be louder haha. My last IBM was louder than the A/C on full blast. Id like the unit to be rack mount, and have room for at least 8 drives, I'm just going to use it as a NAS, I'll just max out drives in the VM server for now, that'll be plenty. I like the 12 bay r510, and it'll last me a while if I get an H700 so I can appreciate 6gb/s one day. Power isn't too much of a concern, it most likely will be the same or less than my 2950 of now, which is good with me.

Only reason i'd like rack mount is because all my other equipment is rack mount. I never really chose rack mount in the first place, but I got a lot of my stuff for free, all being rack mount. So I'm choosing to stick to that form factor. My 2950 only runs FreeNas, and my IBM was running ESXi, but I recently sold it and a R610 is on the way to replace it. I do not need one box to run both, I don't always use my VM's but I always use the NAS, so I'd like to keep separate boxes for that reason. That's why I considered the SAN or disk array. Just a matter of finding out how they connect, I'm no expert. I'm in school for Marine Transportation but computing and networking always interested me. Forgive my lack of knowledge, I can get by with server basics but don't know how a SAN or array works. Don't even know if that'd be a good option.

Summary:
- You want a setup quieter than a PE2950
- You want rack mount gear
- You want commercially available (don't want to build your own)
- Power consumption is not a concern

Based on what you want ...

Get a T620 + a Dell tower to rack conversion kit at time of purchase.



NOTE: my response is strictly to give you what you say you wanted...
Having said the above ... i'll echo what's already been said ... this is a waste
of money, resources, and power for a FreeNAS box - only to do basic file sharing!?!?

Did you even consider purpose built commercially available 8-10bay NAS offerings from QNAP or Synology?

I just read you have an R610 on the way ...so I guess your mind was already made up??
If it was free, great..if not .. the T610 or T620 would be a better fit to what you wanted.