Help me choose a storage file system to use

Frank Jeagar · 20 Aug 2017 at 11:54

Soon I will be building a home server that will basically be used as a Plex server, for network storage, routine back up of PCs on the network and possibly as a router as well. It will be running on pretty pedestrian hardware, just some stuff I've collected over time since they were good deals.

One thing I need to iron out though is the way in which I store all of the data. My original idea was to use a RAID card and run RAID 6, but that introduces extra cost and failure points. Also recovery might be more complex should the card die, and I think there might be more effective ways to store my data. The problem is that I have pretty limited knowledge of all the file systems there are now, and was hoping someone could help me choose the right one.

What I really want is for at least 2 parity disks that errs on safety rather than performance, originally I wanted to use windows for ease of use since I can easily remote into it (not needing peripherals for the system) and I can run all my normal programs, but I am starting to accept that that will not be happening

I will likely be running a dual core Pentium (I happen to have one, can be upgraded if needs be), a Gigabyte Z87X-UD5H motherboard, 8Gb of RAM and will likely boot off of a small SSD (might run a couple in RAID 1 using the motherboard RAID controller).

Thanks to anyone who helps out, this isn't an imminent problem, I don't even have the hard drives yet, I just want to get this down before I go much further

Frank Jeagar · 23 Aug 2017 at 10:28

lude1962 said:
unraid ?

I don't really want to pay for the software when there are very good free options out there. I was thinking of going with ZFS/BTRFS.

I'm leaning towards ZFS running on FreeNAS, but now I'm wondering if it will run in a HyperV virtal machine on Windows 10

Frank Jeagar · 23 Aug 2017 at 11:02

pc-guy said:
VM is no good with the hardware you have.

I figured I could use HyperV in Windows 10, it worked well enough to setup pfsense, but from what I have found running multiple drives on FreeNAS That way is problematic.

Frank Jeagar · 23 Aug 2017 at 11:05

So I guess if I wanted to do this I would be using a machine with FreeNAS only, and if I wanted to run pfsense as well I'd be looking to run a couple of dedicated VMs with a quad core CPU?

Frank Jeagar · 23 Aug 2017 at 11:25

It supports virtualisation, so that is a bonus.

So virtualbox will run from within Nas4Free? Very interesting...

Frank Jeagar · 23 Aug 2017 at 11:26

Also, my plex library maxes out at 1080p. It isn't an extensive library haha

Frank Jeagar · 23 Aug 2017 at 11:39

I can see how it goes, I don't use plex too much, but was looking to use it more.

Frank Jeagar · 23 Aug 2017 at 11:40

skyripper said:
Look at NAS4FREE (FreeNas offshoot before it was sold to new developers). That will let you run VirtualBox Virtual Machines on it so you could host pfSense in one of those.

Considering I'm running NAS4FREE, on top of ESXi on a lowly HP Microserver N54 which has some low power AMD processor, a dual-core pentium on a Z87 platform would probably breeze with the minimal load you're putting on it.

Would it not be easier for me to just use ESXi to run separate VMs for each?

Frank Jeagar · 23 Aug 2017 at 13:04

pc-guy said:
That is probably the suggestion I was going to make.
1 VM for Nas
1 VM for pfsense.

1 CPU each VM should be decent provided you don't end up with multiple streams on Plex.

Aye, and that shouldn't happen, I can't see more than one Plex stream being necessary at all

Frank Jeagar · 23 Aug 2017 at 13:07

skyripper said:
If you run NAS in a VM, then find out if you can access the disks natively, which will depend on the hardware controller being supported. Otherwise you will have to present Virtual Disks to your NAS VM, then use redundancy inside the VM.

Would accessing them natively require Vt-d from my cpu?

Frank Jeagar · 23 Aug 2017 at 13:46

skyripper said:
Don't believe it cares what the CPU is, just cares what the disk controller is.

Alright, and is there any way to check if it's supported?

Frank Jeagar · 23 Aug 2017 at 16:20

lude1962 said:
had a look, cant see freenas supporting 2 parity drives

Running ZFS in FreeNAS you can setup RAIDZ, RAIDZ2 and RAIDZ3

Frank Jeagar · 23 Aug 2017 at 16:44

FreeStream said:
I use UnRAID for exactly this.

Yes it isn't free, but I've got multiple VMs (inc pfsense), dual parity, docker support (Plex!) and much much more.

Yes it isnt free but there is a free version to play around with (not sure what the limitations are).

Not used FreeNAS or equivalents but I'm 100% happy with UnRAID.

Thanks for the input!

I think the free version is only for 30 days, so maybe if I have trouble with a free solution I will try it out to see if it works and if it does I can think about paying

Frank Jeagar · 23 Aug 2017 at 17:32

AmateurExpert said:
Regular scrubs will reduce the chances of UREs occuring during recovery reads, and if the data is that important, one should also have a separate set of backups anyway!

Right, but doesn't that not really protect against drive failure? Just errors.

Frank Jeagar · 23 Aug 2017 at 18:04

AmateurExpert said:
Of course. However, the link megatron posted says "RAID5 should never be used for anything where you value keeping your data" based on the manufacturer specs on URE rates and sizes of RAID arrays these days. My point is that the raw advice doesn't take into account other factors such as scrubs and backups, which are important in their own right; once you have these, then you might consider RAIDZ to be good enough for your use case. Also consider that a URE on a RAIDZ will put at risk rather less than what a RAID5 failure would - see the top answer here.

Oh okay, I see your point now. Whereas I agree with you on all points, 1 parity disk still scares the hell out of me, I just wouldn't be comfortable with it.

Regular scrubs and an actual backup will definitely be a part of my storage setup though.

Frank Jeagar · 24 Aug 2017 at 07:36

FreeStream said:
I use UnRAID for exactly this.

Yes it isn't free, but I've got multiple VMs (inc pfsense with NIC passthrough), Win 10 VM (steam streaming with a RX560 as a test), dual parity, docker support (Plex!) and much much more.

Use brtfs on cache drives if you need (I use xfs across the board).

Yes it isnt free but there is a free version to play around with (not sure what the limitations are).

Not used FreeNAS or equivalents but I'm 100% happy with UnRAID.

Out of interest, what hardware are you running this on?

Frank Jeagar · 24 Aug 2017 at 07:46

AmateurExpert said:
If you're keen on addressing risks to your data and choose to use a filesystem that checksums and validates your data (like ZFS) then also consider whether your RAM is reliable enough too.

Hmm, are you suggesting reliable consumer-grade RAM or going all the way with ECC?

Frank Jeagar · 4 Sep 2017 at 17:43

Fore some reason I didn't get these updates, which is really annoying because the discussion got great!

Frank Jeagar · 4 Sep 2017 at 17:46

As for RAM, I have absolutely no intention right now of going for ECC. It would involve a large change to the setup which is designed to be a cheap project that provides a network storage system, not a survive the apocalypse server haha

Frank Jeagar · 4 Sep 2017 at 17:49

Praetorian said:
OpenMediaVault (OMV) is my recommendation - https://www.openmediavault.org/

Runs on Debian, so lightweight, and also has ZFS baked in. I'm running it virtualised with 4gb of RAM running on ESXi and it flies along. Admittedly it's only running 2x HGST 6TB drives but that's all I need.

Now this is an interesting suggestion, thanks I'll definitely look into it!

But 4Gb of RAM for 12TB of storage? Are you personally using ZFS or something else?