Seeking Advice for Setting Up TrueNAS Scale on an Old Computer

TrueNAS General
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Hello everyone,

I’m planning to set up TrueNAS Scale on an old computer I have lying around, and I’d love to hear some advice from the experienced members of this forum. Here are the details of my setup and a few specific questions I have:

Hardware:

  • CPU: Intel Core i7
  • RAM: 32GB
  • GPU: GTX 1080 (though I don’t think it’s relevant for TrueNAS)
  • Boot Drive: 256GB SSD
  • Storage Drives: One 2TB drive and two 1TB drives

Goals:

  • Access the TrueNAS server from outside my network to use it as a cloud.
  • Use it for Plex to stream movies lightly.

Questions:

  1. Drive Recommendations: Given that I’m not looking to spend money on new drives, what kind of drives should I use? Are there any specific brands or models that work particularly well with TrueNAS Scale?
  2. Mixed Drives: If I use different models and sizes of drives, will that be a problem? Are there any best practices for managing a setup with mixed drives?
  3. RAID Configuration: What RAID configuration would you recommend for a setup with mixed drives? Are there any specific configurations that work better in this scenario?
  4. Performance Considerations: What performance issues should I be aware of when using older hardware and mixed drives? Are there any optimizations I can make to ensure the best possible performance?
  5. Future Expansion: If I want to add more drives in the future to expand my pool, will that be a problem? What should I keep in mind when planning for future expansion?
  6. General Tips: Any general tips or tricks for someone setting up TrueNAS Scale for the first time on older hardware? What should I look out for to avoid common pitfalls?

Thank you in advance for your help! I’m looking forward to getting this project started and learning from your experiences.

Best regards,

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  1. You have to use CMR drives, SMR is known to cause issues (or to be incompatibile at all with ZFS).
  2. It’s best to stick to same sizes, and to distribuite the models depending on your layout: read the following point.
  3. ZFS does not use RAID. Read this and this.
  4. If you are not going to use new drives you want to really be sure the used drives you have are not toasted… and want to have considerable parity; about performance, you should set the datasets block size according to the files you want to store… and read point 3.
  5. Read point 3.
  6. Avoid cheaping out on the PSU and the HDDs. Read a lot… you can find things here.
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  1. Make sure that your drives are NOT SMR drives. SMR drives are completely unsuitable for redundant ZFS vDevs.

  2. Mixed drive sizes are not great for TrueNAS. ZFS expects all drive sizes to be the same in a vDev and uses the minimum of the drives.

    So a RAIDZ1 with the 2x 1TB and 1x "TB will effectively be a RAIDZ1 with 3x 1TB giving you 2TB of useable storage.

    If you go manual (or use a different NAS O/S designed for mixed sized drives) you could probably create 2x mirrors using 1/2 of the 2TB drive for each mirror, but that would still give you only 2TB.

  3. I assume you are asking about what ZFS RAIDZ to use. As @Davvo has said, hardware RAID (e.g. on your motherboard) is not supported and ZFS needs to see each drive as-is. For RAIDZ with only 3 drives limits you to RAIDZ1 and with 2x 1TB and 1x 2TB this will effectively be a RAIDZ1 with 3x 1TB giving you 2TB of useable storage.

  4. No performance considerations - an i7 and 32GB is way more than you need for normal NAS + NextCloud + Plex and 2TB of storage.

  5. Pool expansion is either by:

    • Replacing existing disks with larger ones (one by one allowing resilvering inbetween); or
    • By adding a new vDev; or
    • (in the next major version of TrueNAS SCALE) by adding new disks to an existing RAIDZ pool.

    The problem you have is that you only have sufficient disks right now for RAIDZ1, and if you add another vDev or several more drives to the existing vDev you will increase risks of failure causing the entire pool to be lost, so you probably should use RAIDZ2 when you expand, however you cannot change a vDev from RAIDZ1 to RAIDZ2 later.

    My advice would be:

    • Maybe buy another 2TB drive now and create a RAIDZ2.
    • Replace the 2x 1TB drives with 2x 2TB drives at a later date resilvering them one by one giving you 4TB of useable disk space. (3x2TB in a RAIDZ1 is probably still within the acceptable level of risk for your home environment, but RAIDZ2 would be better.)
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Thank you both for your detailed and insightful advice!

Based on your suggestions, I’ve decided to start with the 2x 1TB drives and plan to expand later. I have a couple of additional questions:

  1. I already have a 750W PSU in my old computer. Would this be sufficient for my current setup and future expansion?
  2. Is it possible to create a separate pool with the remaining 2TB drive apart from the other drives?
  3. How secure will it be to open my system to the outside world in order to upload files to the cloud?

Also, I made sure that none of the hard drives are SMR.

I appreciate your help in guiding me through this process!

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  1. Yes.
  2. Possibile, but not advisable.
  3. Without a reverse proxy, not so much.
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Do not expose your NAS: TrueNAS is not hardened for that.
Set up a VPN and access your home network remotely through the VPN.

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