Best use of these disks?

TrueNAS General
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Hi all.

I’m new to the NAS game and have a Gen 10 HP Microserver that I would like to use as a NAS for home data storage as well as running JellyFin to serve content to our smart TV. I’m running TrueNAS on an SSD in the old DVD drive bay and have 3 storage disks that I would like to use which would leave a slot free for future use.

I have 2 x 4TB disks and 1 x 12TB disk. What would be the best configuration for them?

Am I able to create a striped array on the 2 x 4TB disks to give me 8TB of storage and then mirror/backup to the 12TB? Would that let me add another 4TB in the future if needed?

Thanks!

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In your place, i would mirror those 4tb and let the 12tb alone: the mirror pool to storage more evaluable data, the stripe one just for re-downloadable content.
For run apps, Is also very reccomended grab a medium/small SSD-nvme

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Thanks.

How difficult would it be to add another 4TB disk in the future? Would I need to convert to RaidZ1?

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If you wanna use another 4tb disk and a raidz1 layout, the pool must be destroyed and created from scratch. But if you have space on the 12tb spare disk to replicate data from the old pool to the new one, i didn’t see any headache.
Also, mirror pool are flexible: you can also add another 2 disks into the pool to increase space, and disks can be larger. If you just add a single 4tb you will end with the same space available but with encrased redundancy (afaik)

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We really can’t give you advice without more information from you.

How much space do you need?

Do you have a backup plan?

What is your tolerance for data loss or the data being off line? (Is the data ephemeral or would it’s loss be life changing?)

Can you really not afford to purchase another 4 TB drive given that you can get a used one with a three month warranty for $30 on Amazon?

The latter path seems to me to be the obvious one. Buy another 4 TB drive, create a RAIDz1 pool for 8 TB of space. Back up to the 12 TB drive.

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That’s what I was thinking. Another 4TB drive and retire the 12GB one as it’s making lots of noise.

8TB of space should give me plenty of room to grow.

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Just remember, RAID is not a backup.

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From my experience, I know that it is better to make periodic backups instead of a 12TB mirror — it gives more flexibility. I also sometimes created a striped pool of 2×4TB, and used 12TB as a separate disk for backups. I also planned to add one 4TB in the future, the main thing is that the pool expansion is enough.

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