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Home NAS/Server ?SSD

B

berrmich

n00b
Joined
Mar 7, 2011
Messages
59
Updated info. My hardware is:

Supermicro x8si6-f-o (still waiting for shipment)
Xenon 3440
8gb Kingston ECC
Norco 4020
Corsair 850AX
5 x 2tb Samsung F4s

I'm going to be running ZFS and possibly windows server 2008r2. Mostly this will just be a media server for my HTPC. I may like to put the ceton in there at some point to share the tuners if I build multiple HTPC.
Should I buy an SSD for the OS? Should I get an SSD for ZIL and/or L2arc. Would this be overkill for what I am using it for?

-Mike
 
I wouldn't worry about running the OS on an SSD, as generally there's very little reading/writing going on, just logs and whatnot. I'd say buying an SSD for ZIL/L2ARC would be worthwhile though. Make sure you get one of the newer SSD's with the supercapacitor for best results.
 
How do I know if it has a supercapacitor? So I would need 2 SSD's then? One for each? Or can I share? What size would I need?

-Mike
 
i very much doubt you will see any, aka, any difference with an ssd zil/l2arc for your usage.

so, to answer your question, no do not buy an ssd for either the os disk nor zil nor l2larc, save your money. your will not see any benefit.

if you are intent on it for cool factor (or are genuinely doing the type of read write operations that benefit from a zil/l2arc ie. not streaming media) then have a read of this and do a google and look at the zfs stat's to confirm youre workload will benefit from an ssd.
http://www.google.com/search?q=zil ...&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq=&pbx=1&fp=7a37b5a818373283

ps. you do not buy an ssd with a supercap for "best results", you buy an ssd with a supercap to reduce the risk of data loss on unexpected power failure. it is a risk decision, and nothing to do with best results.
 
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If your server will be using NFS or iSCSI I highly recommend getting a SSD for zil. The performance increase will not be dramatic, its there to increase the number of transactions you can complete per second.
 
olavgg...it all depends upon the use...yes, with NFS there is value, but with iSCSI under Solaris 11 Express, I see 80 - 100MB/s with iscsi with no ssd (Crystal mark gives ~84MB/s seq. read/write). So for large copies and or media streaming, there is no value in an SSD. Spend the cash on other things...like more hdd's.

If you connect from a windows PC, (ie. you use CIFS), then there is again, no value.

I did see a difference under OpenSolaris 2009.06 for some reason...strange as iscsi is a block device...but ehh...Solaris 11 Express is way better for sooo many reasons I have never bothered to work out why it had issues. Under Solaris 11 Express, I can max out my Gigabit (>107MB/s) to iscsi without a zil.

Having said all that, I do run 2 ssd's as ZIL and L2ARC on my server...but will soon remove them as it's not needed and I'll re purpose them.

You also mention win2008R2...are you planning to run this on the server in a VM? (ie. virtualbox) or are you planning to run ESXi?
Also, you mention tuner cards..are these for the server? If so how are you planning to expose these to the guest vm's?
 
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Wow.. thanks for the info! I think I'll pass on the SSD then.. not all that cheap for not alot (or no) difference in speed.

I mention windows 2008r2 because
1. I wanted to play with it and I have a free legal copy.
2. I was thinking on running a few other programs.. maybe something for servailance, a metadata grabber for my movies, and possibly house the tuner to share to the other HTPCs when I get them. (not even sure that the ceton would run under server 2008.. might need win7)

For now really all I need is a NAS for my HTPC and document backup... but I probably got a little carried away with the hardware for just this purpose. :)

I have no idea the best way to set this up. I was thinking of ESXi but I definately do not want to slow down my ZFS speed.

I've been looking to see how others have set these up but I start to get confused when talking about virtualization....

-Mike
 
Currently I'm running the system above with zfs (5x2tb in raidz) for media server, backups and windows home server. Soon I would like to put surveillance as well.

I'd like to build another for a friend. This has worked so great over the last 3 years that I'd like to do something similar. Any suggestions for a modern equivalent? I was thinking of 6x4tb reds in raidz2.

Thanks!

-Mike
 
Most of the guides I've read state very explicitly that if you have to ask about ZIL and/or L2ARC then you probably don't need it.
 
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