TR Forums

Losergamer04 wrote:

ZFS is awesome.  It's my understanding that Oracle won't open up the license and that's what's really holding it back.  I remember using it with Solaris 10 and zones.  It's awesome stuff.

I'm glad you got what you wanted, Rapster.  Best of luck on your new and future system.

Thanks for the well-wishes Losergamer04.  A box of WD 6TB Reds showed up yesterday so i'm getting the itch to build it.  A friend's son who is interested in computers is gonna "assist" with the build so I can pay it forward.

End User wrote:

FreeNAS is a viable route to ZFS.

http://www.freenas.org

Edit: one option moving forward is to use the Synology as the primary server (ease of use) and then setup a ZFS based server for backups.

FreeNAS is still a path fraught with peril if you aren't careful.

I'd probably go Red Pro drives instead of Red, get a bit more performance from the 7200rpm hard drives and a longer warranty.

Personally, I use a server for my home storage, and a 4-bay NAS to back up the server.  I'm using Hitachi NAS 7200rpm drives, and a caching RAID controller.  However, Synology does make good NAS devices.  If it's your primary storage, attach a large external drive and set the NAS to back up to it via rsync to keep a backup copy.  RAID isn't backup; it's just fault tolerance.

Waco wrote:

End User wrote:

FreeNAS is a viable route to ZFS.

http://www.freenas.org

Edit: one option moving forward is to use the Synology as the primary server (ease of use) and then setup a ZFS based server for backups.

FreeNAS is still a path fraught with peril if you aren't careful.

So is ZFS. If you value your time you spend $ to buy a viable solution.

LoneWolf15 wrote:

RAID isn't backup; it's just fault tolerance.

We fracking know that already. Enough!

End User wrote:

LoneWolf15 wrote:

RAID isn't backup; it's just fault tolerance.

We fracking know that already. Enough!

Thank you for such a polite response.  Your wonderful, sunny attitude has made my day.

LoneWolf15 wrote:

End User wrote:

LoneWolf15 wrote:

RAID isn't backup; it's just fault tolerance.

We fracking know that already. Enough!

Thank you for such a polite response.  Your wonderful, sunny attitude has made my day.

If I had a dime for every time some post that I would be rich.

End User wrote:

Waco wrote:

End User wrote:

FreeNAS is a viable route to ZFS.

http://www.freenas.org

Edit: one option moving forward is to use the Synology as the primary server (ease of use) and then setup a ZFS based server for backups.

FreeNAS is still a path fraught with peril if you aren't careful.

So is ZFS. If you value your time you spend $ to buy a viable solution.

FreeNAS is one of the better routes to ZFS storage, IMO. There's an up-front learning curve, but I very rarely touch my server these days with the exception of installing updates (which is a single step through the GUI).

If you value your data, there aren't many alternatives to running ZFS that I'm aware of.

If I have to build a NAS, I would love to go for a regular PC, built it myself because I can handle many things, like the power of system. I agree that Synology NASs are perfect and very good for users who love all in one solutions. However, it won't convenience for me at all.

anhbloginc wrote:

If I have to build a NAS, I would love to go for a regular PC, built it myself because I can handle many things, like the power of system. I agree that Synology NASs are perfect and very good for users who love all in one solutions. However, it won't convenience for me at all.

Once upon a time I was like that too. Over the years, I have gotten tired of tweaking and maintaining higher-maintenance systems. Because they always require fixing and tweaking left running long enough. For that reason, I vastly prefer purpose-built stuff these days, because it Just Works so much more often, and requires significantly less of my time to keep it going.

For example, that's why I switched over to a Ubiquiti Unified Security Gateway appliance for my internet gateway. It just works. Very little fiddling or maintenance. It doesn't bother me; it just does its job.

I still have a Ubuntu storage server that I want to change over to a storage appliance at some point, for exactly the reasons specified above.

That said, rolling your own can be a good learning experience. But when getting older and been there done that, you tend to grow tired of revisiting the temperamental thing that should just be doing its job; you have better things to do!

Buub wrote:

That said, rolling your own can be a good learning experience. But when getting older and been there done that, you tend to grow tired of revisiting the temperamental thing that should just be doing its job; you have better things to do!

For data storage, if you care about it, the appliances can be far worse in many very easily measurable ways.

Waco wrote:

For data storage, if you care about it, the appliances can be far worse in many very easily measurable ways.

Measurably different, how so?
All the scenarios I could think of sound equivalent. E.g.,  A zfs/btrfs build vs appliance; a raid 1/5/6 build vs appliance; redundant PS build vs appliance etc. What am I missing?

rayleech wrote:

Waco wrote:

For data storage, if you care about it, the appliances can be far worse in many very easily measurable ways.

Measurably different, how so?
All the scenarios I could think of sound equivalent. E.g.,  A zfs/btrfs build vs appliance; a raid 1/5/6 build vs appliance; redundant PS build vs appliance etc. What am I missing?

Most appliances don't ensure data integrity (they assume disks are infallible). Most appliances will default to "most space" and not "most protection against disk failure". Most appliances don't have safe write semantics during power loss. Most appliances are hard to find parts for when they fail in non-obvious ways. Many appliances store data in a non-portable format that is hard to recover from down the road. Many appliances don't support snapshots. Most appliances are underpowered for doing anything else other than storing data (badly).

You can buy great appliances, but in general, they're almost entirely not on par with any ZFS-based build when looking at consumer-marketed products.

I'm more anal about storage than most, it's my day job, so I have a bit of a skewed perspective.

I feel like this article is appropriate to share.  It explains why ZFS (and similar file systems) are the "next gen."  They verify the integrity of the data on the disk.  A single bit flip could be nothing, or it could be everything.

http://arstechnica.com/information-tech ... lesystems/

Waco wrote:

Most appliances don't ensure data integrity (they assume disks are infallible).  Most appliances will default to "most space" and not "most protection against disk failure".  Most appliances don't have safe write semantics during power loss.  Most appliances are hard to find parts for when they fail in non-obvious ways.  Many appliances store data in a non-portable format that is hard to recover from down the road.  Many appliances don't support snapshots.  Most appliances are underpowered for doing anything else other than storing data (badly).

You can buy great appliances, but in general, they're almost entirely not on par with any ZFS-based build when looking at consumer-marketed products.

I'm more anal about storage than most, it's my day job, so I have a bit of a skewed perspective.

Waco, no offense intended, but comparing an improperly configured appliance to a correctly configured build isn't honestly a "measurably different". I agree your point of possible custom hardware, but not everyone has a spare PS or CPU for their custom build either. Not having spares for a critical machine is just irresponsible of the owner, not and indictment of the hardware.
My question was, given equivalent proper configurations, what are the measurable differences? I'd exclude processing, because I'm sure I would never purchase a Storage NAS as a replacement for a heavy processing server.

ZFS on my FreeNAS machine has been practically bomb-proof, surviving:

4 separate drive failures (at different times, of course)
1 power supply failure resulting in about a dozen random power offs for about a week
1 controller coming undone taking out 4 of the 8 drives in the array (the array was immediately offlined but returned to online status as soon as I reconnected the missing drives and allowed it to resilver)

All this on a fairly crusty array of 8 x 1 TB WD Blacks aged between 6 months and 6 years old.

If you're using more than 4-5 drives I'd always recommend raidZ2 (2 'parity' drives) over Z1.

rayleech wrote:

Waco, no offense intended, but comparing an improperly configured appliance to a correctly configured build isn't honestly a "measurably different". I agree your point of possible custom hardware, but not everyone has a spare PS or CPU for their custom build either. Not having spares for a critical machine is just irresponsible of the owner, not and indictment of the hardware.
My question was, given equivalent proper configurations, what are the measurable differences? I'd exclude processing, because I'm sure I would never purchase a Storage NAS as a replacement for a heavy processing server.

I'm not trying to misrepresent this, but I'm not sure we're talking the same language.

My rebuttals -
1. Spares: my point was that replacement may not be possible for appliances that are no longer produced. A storage array can always be moved to a newer commodity server.
2. Proper configuration: many NAS appliances, in my opinion, are not capable of being properly configured for safe data storage. Without a filesystem that distrusts HDDs your data isn't even close to safe.
3. Processing power: this is a freebie from building a proper NAS, IMO. You get processing power to spare for other tasks, like running a Plex server, serving iSCSI to multiple hosts, running backup software, etc.

Measurable differences:
1. Data safety (this one is really key, the rest are just gravy)
2. Performance
3. Ease of repair / replacement down the road
4. Ease of migration to new hardware
5. Ease of security patches / updates


You only need to lose data once and take a hard look at what NAS appliances are available to distrust essentially all of them.

Buub wrote:

anhbloginc wrote:

If I have to build a NAS, I would love to go for a regular PC, built it myself because I can handle many things, like the power of system. I agree that Synology NASs are perfect and very good for users who love all in one solutions. However, it won't convenience for me at all.

Once upon a time I was like that too.  Over the years, I have gotten tired of tweaking and maintaining higher-maintenance systems.  Because they always require fixing and tweaking left running long enough.  For that reason, I vastly prefer purpose-built stuff these days, because it Just Works so much more often, and requires significantly less of my time to keep it going.

For example, that's why I switched over to a Ubiquiti Unified Security Gateway appliance for my internet gateway.  It just works.  Very little fiddling or maintenance.  It doesn't bother me; it just does its job.

I still have a Ubuntu storage server that I want to change over to a storage appliance at some point, for exactly the reasons specified above.

That said, rolling your own can be a good learning experience.  But when getting older and been there done that, you tend to grow tired of revisiting the temperamental thing that should just be doing its job; you have better things to do!

I know that building and running a DIY NAS is harder than purchasing an AIO machine. It would be perfect if these AIO NAS machine allow us to replace/upgrade CPU or RAM, to make it more powerful.

anhbloginc wrote:

I know that building and running a DIY NAS is harder than purchasing an AIO machine. It would be perfect if these AIO NAS machine allow us to replace/upgrade CPU or RAM, to make it more powerful.

Building? Yes.

Running? If you did things right, it should be *easier* than an AIO machine.

Waco wrote:

1. Spares: my point was that replacement may not be possible for appliances that are no longer produced.

One should look into that before one buys. Look for a good warranty period (3-5 years). My NAS is no longer made and out of warranty but spares are available.

Waco wrote:

2. Proper configuration: many NAS appliances, in my opinion, are not capable of being properly configured for safe data storage. Without a filesystem that distrusts HDDs your data isn't even close to safe.

I can only base my reply on my real world experience. If I pull a drive out of my Synology NAS it will still function with no data loss. I assume any NAS manufacturer worth their salt would offer the same functionality.

Waco wrote:

3. Processing power: this is a freebie from building a proper NAS, IMO. You get processing power to spare for other tasks, like running a Plex server

Storage server for storage. Application server for applications. Never the two should meet.

I run a Plex server at home. Muliple 20 Mbps streams can push an 8 core VM to its max. I don't want that kind of CPU load coming anywhere close to something that manages my storage.

Waco wrote:

1. Data safety (this one is really key, the rest are just gravy)

Can you be more specific?

Waco wrote:

2. Performance

https://www.synology.com/en-us/products/RS18017xs+

Waco wrote:

3. Ease of repair / replacement down the road

- HD or SSD replacement is the same
- PSU replacement the same
- Memory replacement the same
- Motherboard replacement the same (under warranty)

Waco wrote:

4. Ease of migration to new hardware

No difference

Waco wrote:

5. Ease of security patches / updates

No difference

Waco wrote:

You only need to lose data once and take a hard look at what NAS appliances are available to distrust essentially all of them.

Complete BS

End User wrote:

Waco wrote:

1. Spares: my point was that replacement may not be possible for appliances that are no longer produced.

One should look into that before one buys. Look for a good warranty period (3-5 years). My NAS is no longer made and out of warranty but spares are available.

And the disk format is portable? A homebuilt will migrate to any new hardware without much issue.

End User wrote:

Waco wrote:

2. Proper configuration: many NAS appliances, in my opinion, are not capable of being properly configured for safe data storage. Without a filesystem that distrusts HDDs your data isn't even close to safe.

I can only base my reply on my real world experience. If I pull a drive out of my Synology NAS it will still function with no data loss. I assume any NAS manufacturer worth their salt would offer the same functionality.

I said distrust HDDs. If you get bitrot on anything in the off-the-shelf NAS world, you'll lose data. Just as a note, I can pull 6 drives from mine without data loss and I'd know exactly which files I lost if I lost sectors on another with those 6 drives pulled.

End User wrote:

Waco wrote:

3. Processing power: this is a freebie from building a proper NAS, IMO. You get processing power to spare for other tasks, like running a Plex server

Storage server for storage. Application server for applications. Never the two should meet.

I run a Plex server at home. Muliple 20 Mbps streams can push an 8 core VM to its max. I don't want that kind of CPU load coming anywhere close to something that manages my storage.

Meh. This is a matter of choice. My NAS is powerful enough to host all of my storage as well as run a few services within jails without any real impact on data availability or performance. I'm not sure how you're measuring performance of VMs without stating the host, since that matters a bit more. I can run an 8 core VM on an Atom, it doesn't mean it's fast. I also don't really understand why a CPU load should be scary for a storage box...

End User wrote:

Waco wrote:

1. Data safety (this one is really key, the rest are just gravy)

Can you be more specific?

There are precious few (and by few, I really mean basically none) consumer NAS appliances that support filesystems that checksum your data. If you have data corruption on disk, you'll never know it. Reference of what can happen: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lEWhd_ielUY That video got murdered by Google a few years back.

End User wrote:

Waco wrote:

2. Performance

https://www.synology.com/en-us/products/RS18017xs+

That's not exactly a consumer NAS. It does run BTRFS, which is better than most alternatives, but it still hasn't become stable enough under duress for me to want to trust it. It's also over $5k.

End User wrote:

Waco wrote:

3. Ease of repair / replacement down the road

- HD or SSD replacement is the same
- PSU replacement the same
- Memory replacement the same
- Motherboard replacement the same (under warranty)

You're clearly not talking about consumer NAS boxes any more, since many go EOF within a few years of launch and don't have user-replaceable motherboards.

End User wrote:

Waco wrote:

4. Ease of migration to new hardware

No difference

Unless the NAS appliance uses a weird format for their disks, which many do.

End User wrote:

Waco wrote:

5. Ease of security patches / updates

No difference

BS. Many consumer NAS devices go for many months to years (if ever) for security patches.

End User wrote:

Waco wrote:

You only need to lose data once and take a hard look at what NAS appliances are available to distrust essentially all of them.

Complete BS

If you say so. I'll keep running what I trust and you can say that consumer NAS devices are safe. You can conflate a few hundred dollar consumer boxes with $5k dedicated servers if you like, but I won't.


I will note that storage is literally my job. I'm not just making things up here.

Some of the higher end Synology devices support btrfs, but I don't remember offhand how many features of the filesystem they expose to the user. It's probably a moot point anyway since the experimental state of btrfs might cause your data to perform an impromptu disappearing act anyway.

Redocbew wrote:

Some of the higher end Synology devices support btrfs, but I don't remember offhand how many features of the filesystem they expose to the user. It's probably a moot point anyway since the experimental state of btrfs might cause your data to perform an impromptu disappearing act anyway.

Exactly.

Waco wrote:

Rapster wrote:

Waco wrote:

I'd build my own at that price point.  I wouldn't trust my data to a RAID 5 with a standard FS either...

Many folks here seem to have *lots* of hardware sitting around, making this a viable option for them.  But I'd have to buy everything. When I looked into this, it seemed like I'd save about $300-400 on a DIY project, but it could well eat up a week or two of my evenings researching, setting up, and then tuning and testing.  I'd rather pay the cash and have my evenings free.
The only caveat to this is that it seems like a DIY NAS would have much more power, be more flexible, and more upgradeable.  The commercial offerings seem to generally be underpowered for much "real" work.  To compensate for this, I might have to eventually add some type of transcoder box.

I bought mine straight up, and yes, the huge advantage is the flexibility and power.  That, and running FreeNAS (which is fairly straightforward) lets you run ZFS, which is awesome.  If you care about your data, ZFS is the only filesystem that I'd personally trust.  I have about 40 petabytes of ZFS-backed storage at work and it's saved my ass (and by my ass, I mean my user's data) more times than I can count.

I suppose you're joking

Waco wrote:

And the disk format is portable? A homebuilt will migrate to any new hardware without much issue.

Ah, ok. So you can migrate your drives to a Synology unit with a config of SHR and Btrfs?

Waco wrote:

I'm not sure how you're measuring performance of VMs without stating the host, since that matters a bit more. I can run an 8 core VM on an Atom, it doesn't mean it's fast.

My Plex VM runs on a dual X5650 box that I built myself.

Waco wrote:

End User wrote:

- HD or SSD replacement is the same
- PSU replacement the same
- Memory replacement the same
- Motherboard replacement the same (under warranty)

You're clearly not talking about consumer NAS boxes any more

The original post did not mention "consumer" products. The only person who started using the term "consumer" was you on the second page.

This thread is about the RS1815+. A unit that supports Btrfs, has a 3 year warranty, and has user replaceable parts. Based upon Synology's track record it will receive both security and OS updates well beyond its warranty period.

Waco wrote:

End User wrote:

Waco wrote:

5. Ease of security patches / updates

No difference

BS. Many consumer NAS devices go for many months to years (if ever) for security patches.

Come on. You seriously tell people that? QNAP and Synology do a great job of maintaining updates for many years. Let's use the DS112j as an example. It is now in its 5th year of existence and it can run the latest Synology OS.

Waco wrote:

End User wrote:

Waco wrote:

You only need to lose data once and take a hard look at what NAS appliances are available to distrust essentially all of them.

Complete BS

I'll keep running what I trust and you can say that consumer NAS devices are safe.

You are the only person using the term "consumer" as it fits your narrative of pushing people to home brew solutions.

Waco wrote:

I'm not just making things up here.

Just burying your head in the sand.

Dude, seriously.  You have a Synology unit and you like it.  That's ok.  Really.

I have one also, and I like it too, but it's not much more than a SATA enclosure which knows how to speak ethernet.  It's not the same thing as a real server built to the task of serving files and providing reliable storage on a network.  That's ok also, because I understand that.  If it dies tomorrow, I'll say "crap, it died", but my data would be fine, because there would still be multiple places where I could get it if needed.

Redocbew wrote:

 If it dies tomorrow, I'll say "crap, it died", but my data would be fine, because there would still multiple places where I could get it if needed.

It sounds as if you have an awesome backup/recovery strategy in place.

Being awesome all the time is hard, but it pays off when stuff dies.

Currently, I am my only user. That makes everything a lot simpler.  It means trouble when users begin to multiply.

Waco wrote:

anhbloginc wrote:

I know that building and running a DIY NAS is harder than purchasing an AIO machine. It would be perfect if these AIO NAS machine allow us to replace/upgrade CPU or RAM, to make it more powerful.

Building?  Yes.

Running?  If you did things right, it should be *easier* than an AIO machine.

For new guys, it isn't quite simple

End User wrote:

The original post did not mention "consumer" products. The only person who started using the term "consumer" was you on the second page.

This thread is about the RS1815+. A unit that supports Btrfs, has a 3 year warranty, and has user replaceable parts. Based upon Synology's track record it will receive both security and OS updates well beyond its warranty period.

No, this thread is about the DS1815+. An 8 bay consumer NAS appliance.

We get it, you like Synology. I don't, as a rule, like appliances. They do at least seem to have shifted to BTRFS, but again, it's lost enough data for people over the years due to little fault of their own I can't recommend it yet. It's certainly better than running something unaware of disk bitrot, but ZFS is still king there (and stable).