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WHS Upgrade Plan - Feedback Needed
- Thread starter pirivan
- Start date
Hi Xfinity,
Thanks for the words of encouragement! In answer to your question, I did not get a BBU for the Areca 1880i card so I have it set to write-through instead of write back.
In terms of the overall server progress it is more or less finished. I've upgraded the server to 8GB of RAM to give a bit more room for VM's and all of the files are now shared out and living happily on Server 2008 R2. I have 2 E-Sata enclosures (now filled with 1.5TB drives) that are backing up the RAID6 array and go offsite after they have been updated.
So far I am REALLY glad I decided to virtualize WHS v2. My original reason was that I didn't want to lose 10% overhead to some of the 'self-healing' abilities of the new file-system but as it turns out the removal of DE is just another blow/reason NOT to have used WHS v2 for my shares and simply virtualize it for PC backups. So far it has been backing up client machines quite happily and I am reasonably pleased with that. I will replace it with the retail version of WHS v2 when it launches and keep using it for client PC backups but that is about it.
My file-copy performance still isn't as stellar as some of the benchmarks I have seen here but frankly it's good enough for me and I don't feel inclined to try to tweak anything as it is working nicely. I will admit that other than not being able to precisely schedule volume checks, I really do like the Areca web UI. I didn't have to setup a crappy client application or web server/service, it's just there on the card and it looks clean and is quite functional. Compared to some of the other UI's I have seen for RAID cards it's quite good.
Despite some bumps, overall I was able to execute the plan without TOO many issues or delays. Frankly I am glad I took the time and just bought parts people had reported to work well together, rather than trying to save money and buy desktop parts etc. Thanks for all the feedback everyone; INCREDIBLY helpful as usual!
Thanks for the words of encouragement! In answer to your question, I did not get a BBU for the Areca 1880i card so I have it set to write-through instead of write back.
In terms of the overall server progress it is more or less finished. I've upgraded the server to 8GB of RAM to give a bit more room for VM's and all of the files are now shared out and living happily on Server 2008 R2. I have 2 E-Sata enclosures (now filled with 1.5TB drives) that are backing up the RAID6 array and go offsite after they have been updated.
So far I am REALLY glad I decided to virtualize WHS v2. My original reason was that I didn't want to lose 10% overhead to some of the 'self-healing' abilities of the new file-system but as it turns out the removal of DE is just another blow/reason NOT to have used WHS v2 for my shares and simply virtualize it for PC backups. So far it has been backing up client machines quite happily and I am reasonably pleased with that. I will replace it with the retail version of WHS v2 when it launches and keep using it for client PC backups but that is about it.
My file-copy performance still isn't as stellar as some of the benchmarks I have seen here but frankly it's good enough for me and I don't feel inclined to try to tweak anything as it is working nicely. I will admit that other than not being able to precisely schedule volume checks, I really do like the Areca web UI. I didn't have to setup a crappy client application or web server/service, it's just there on the card and it looks clean and is quite functional. Compared to some of the other UI's I have seen for RAID cards it's quite good.
Despite some bumps, overall I was able to execute the plan without TOO many issues or delays. Frankly I am glad I took the time and just bought parts people had reported to work well together, rather than trying to save money and buy desktop parts etc. Thanks for all the feedback everyone; INCREDIBLY helpful as usual!
- Joined
- Apr 7, 2006
- Messages
- 10,477
Glad you have it all working! 
Thanks for your answer Pirivan, your build made me change my mind about what raid-card to use. So I bought a Areca 1880i-card as well. Bought a BBU to be on the safe side and to increase the performance.
If you have any tips on how you set up your Server 2008 R2, please write them
.Cheers and I hope that you get more performance out of your build!