Hi,
I want to migrate from my Synology to TrueNAS. My new system has 6 SATA 3 ports. I’ve currently two about 3 years old Western Digital Ultrastar DC HC550 16TB (WUH721816ALE6L4) from the Synology system.
I want to start with 4 drives with the option to increase to 6. I’m unsure if i should buy another two of these HDDs or start with new ones. Also, in the past, with hardware raids it was suggested to use the same drives. Is this also suggested for ZFS Raids?
Best Regards
Tina
There is no requirement to have identical drives. Some users go to geat lenghts NOT to have drives from the same batch in their pool…
Now the question is what you want to store, how you want to access it, and what kind of resiliency you want. The answers shall indicate how to layout your pool (mirrors or raidz2) and how to proceed.
Note that if your Synology drives still hold data you cannot convert them into a pool while retaining the data!
Hi @etorix,
I’m aware of fact that the Synology data cannot converted.
I’ storing my regular backups from my desktop/laptop there, also the Proxmox backups should be stored there. Another use case is to store my Documents/Music/Movies and make them accessible via different protocols.
Finally i’d like to create some icsi targets for some of my vms, but i’m not sure if the drives are “fast” enough or if i should create another pool with ssds.
So bulk file storage (= fine on raidz2) with some iSCSI block storage which would be better on mirrors:
2 or 3 mirrors with 16 TB drives may be fast enough, and flexible, but not very secure.
If size allows to put the VMs on a pair of SSDs and the rest in the spinning rust pool, you have the option of a raidz2 pool (enlarged through vdev expansion in Electric Eel) for better resiliency and, ultimately, 4 drives worth of space.
The Idea wasn’t to use the Storage for the VMs directly, but the have (shared) data witch i want to store on the NAS. I think my N305 System (with 48GB) would not be powerful enough to handle this.
So a RAIDZ-2 with four 16TB drives. I also have an 4TB NVME SSD, is it possible to add the drive as Cache?
And if i plan to use it for VMs directly a RAIDZ-1 with SSD drives would be better?
Absolutely advised AGAINST if you mean L2ARC (min. 64 GB RAM, and L2ARC ≤ 10*RAM).
And even more strongly advised against if you mean “special vdev” for metadata because this requires redundancy.
Raidz deals badly with small writes, which iSCSI will do. Keep it to mirrors.
If your current hard drives are in good condition (pass a SMART Long test, no too high temperature values) then I would use the two drives you presently have and add new drives to that. Your current drives may outlast a new drive that has infant mortality. Also, your new drives need to be CMR, not SMR.
As @etorix said, the drives do not need to be the same. My feeling is they don’t need to be from the same manufacturer, they don’t even need to be the same rotation rate, however I feel it is best practice to use similar drives (same capacity, rotational rate, interface speed) if possible.
I though about Toshiba Enterprise Capacity MG08ACA 16TB, 24/7, 512e / 3.5" / SATA 6Gb/s (MG08ACA16TE) which has same capacity, rotation rate, interface speed.
Extended S.M.A.R.T. Tests are running (about 1960 minutes per drive Synology said ^^)
I meant L2ARC, but than, thank you for the warning.
You meant for the SSD drives?
Yes. Use mirrors for a pool serving iSCSI, SSD or HDD.
After two weeks, I’ve finally managed to backup all files. Now I’m at the point of pool creation. Any suggestions about the vdevs? I think about adding slog vdev, any suggestions?
Unnecessary, you haven’t mentioned any usage case were you would benefit from a SLOG, unless you need to use sync writes with your VMs, do you?
And using sync writes might well be indicated to enure VM integrity. SLOG requires a drive with PLP; low write latency and high endurance are desirable; capacity is not relevant, 100 GB is plenty. Intel DC S3xxx/S4xxxx SATA drives, or equivalent DC drives from other manufacturers are adequate; Optane DC P4800X, or 900p/905p, is ideal.
