So I have an old NAS box that runs via USB. I connected to my TrueNAS, and want to simply have it show up as a folder to access the files.
It won’t be on all the time, but when it is on, I want to see it in the network list, and handle the files within on it’s own - TrueNAS only being the in-between.
I believe I have to set this up as a Pool, but the Stripe warning is making me jitter.
Am I going the right direction on this?
How many HDDs are in that box?
Is it a raid box with its own raid controller, or just a case that passes through the HDDs to the OS?
How is it formatted? (What raid level, if any, is it Linux or Windows Filesystem?)
Is there any valuable data on it right now?
Does it matter? The NAS is a RAID box that when you plug into a computer, it shows up as a single drive. So TrueNAS sees it as a single drive.
My limited grasp of the situation: I did something similar with a SATA SSD which is plugged into a USB3 caddy. The caddy is connected to TrueNAS by USB and I set it up as a single disk pool, no striping, and I ignored all of the warnings so that it simply appears:
This is permanently connected and I am not sure whether TN will get agitated if you plug and unplug your USB disk (USB NAS).
Yeah - that’s what I’m concerned about. There is no way to say “No Striping” on the config in that dropdown. I cannot “X” it out, either.
I was going to show the screen, but I don’t have permission to post images
Indeed not; stripe is the only possibility for what presents as a single disk.
Also, a device that connects via USB to supply storage is not and can not be a NAS. NAS = Network Attached Storage.
What is described here appears to be a DAS, Direct Attached Storage.
USB attached storage with ZFS can be problematic. Not saying it will happen in this case… But this forum and the old forum are littered with sad stories of people having trouble due to USB attached storage. Some even with data loss. Below is what I wrote on the subject, but again not all will apply to all cases:
You are going in the wrong direction in multiple ways.
TrueNAS is not designed to be a client and mount storage; it’s designed to own and serve storage.
TrueNAS only uses ZFS. No ext3/4 or NTFS from your old NAS.
ZFS does not work well with unreliable connections, such as USB.
If you were to wipe the old NAS box and set up a pool in it, what’s in the box would matter.
“Does it matter?”
It certainly does.
TrueNAs (And ZFS in general) does not play well along with USB storage.
(bitter experience)
The timings/delays, coming from the USB protocol are too high for ZFS, so expect that your system will be full of time-out failures.
“The NAS is a RAID box that when you plug into a computer, it shows up as a single drive. So TrueNAS sees it as a single drive.”
As others told below, that is a DAS.
Also, as I asked, does that DAS contain any important data?
If yes, then first back it up, before you attach to the system.
Also, if it is formatted to other than ZFS, I never tried to attach such storage to my TrueNAS boxes ever.
Another important thing is, that are the HDDs in the DAS SMR or CMR drives.
SMR drives are really bad with ZFS (resilvering will take forever because of their mode of operation (it is literally even weeks)
Not to pile on the issues, but using ZFS on top of other RAID, (Linux MD-RAID, Linux LVM-RAID, hardware RAID, etc…), is not supported by TrueNAS. And generally a bad idea for ZFS in specific.
To be clear, in the Data Center Enterprise space, we routinely use SAN attached LUNs, (with it’s own RAID, like EMC or Hitachi Storage), for our Solaris 11 servers. (Solaris 11 uses Solaris ZFS for it’s normal file system.) These however use redundant paths, redundant controllers, (with ECC), and even redundant power.
The issue is that consumer software RAID, (like Linux MD-RAID or LVM-RAID), or consumer hardware RAID, (like Adaptec, LSI MegaRAID, or USB chip type), does things ZFS is not expecting. This mostly works fine, until it does not. People say, “Hey, it’s working and has been for weeks / months”. So what? The intent of a NAS based on ZFS is to be reliable for years, for tons of people.
Agreed.
External RAID enclosures have their place - I have used them for offsite backups - but they should be only be used in conjunction with other, more reliable backups… especially if the external RAID uses inexpensive port multipliers like those from JMicro that may not sustain continuous throughput as reliably as a dedicated and well-ventilated HBA from LSI.
Basically, ZFS does best when it has bare metal access to the drives in question. A SATA connection to HBA off our lists set to IT mode, a direct SATA / NVME connection on the motherboard, etc. fulfills that, drives abstracted into a single DAS RAID pool via USB do not.
ZFS may not have any insight into what the RAID controller or port multiplier is doing to the external USB pool. For example, the external controller may have rudimentary scrub / resilver / etc. capabilities built in but the controller may not communicate the status of same to ZFS.
So it may not be apparent when a external pool rebuild is going on… or if the external controller encountered a SMART issue. The user may thus turn off the external DAS while it is still transacting stuff they are not aware of and thus potentially cause harm to the DAS pool.
If this had to work reliably, I’d use a DAS that allows each drive to be addressed individually via SATA / SAS and a HBA with a / multiple external SAS/SATA connector(s). Here is an DIY example with 25 drives. but smaller, complete solutions exist also.
OK. So this NAS will have to be set up on another device. Not impossible, but it would’ve been nice if I could keep it all together. Thanks.
The easiest way is to use an old desktop or even notebook computer, you or any of your family members are having laying around.
INstall any OS on it, attach the DAS to it share it, and set up a push backup task from your TrueNAS box.
YOu can also set up this PC to wake up on Ethernet Magic packets, and set up to shut down after the backup is done.
