I am new to the TrueNAS system. I have taken an older 16 Core with 128 RAM, 24T of fast drives Mac Tower and loaded Scale. 24.0.4. Added a compatible non-Apple (10T & Boot NMDE). The thing flights until I save/open a FCP data file on it. I have read high and low about truning on DO/DON’T turn on TimeMachine. Those don’t work. Then have tried tons and tons of other features. I need to back and look though everyone, because I have tried so many.
The think I keep seeing over thand over with the tweak is that 24 doesn’t allow that feature anymore. I think I am just looking at only ideas from 23 or possibly before. They only solid answer I did get from a FCP user I really trust is FCP doesn’t line any version before sambe 4.3.4.
Side note here: I did test he thought with an old RaspberryPI and sure enough. Samba works without tweaks once I update after 4.3.4. Slow as dirt but it worked. Funny enogh, I even started a 20 only on server and it still handle it. Slower than dirt. Did the same message ask it did with TrueNAS (some thing about bad SMB value)
I started this project because I need a macine I can bouce between, 2 laptops and a Mac mini. The new macines would suck for massive storage (fast speed) and I need to push and pull stuff all day. I can’t be hoping I remembered to save a database file. Then why would I need a File Server.?
A few small notes. First, a 16 core processor isn’t doing you much favor. Smb is single threaded, you want strong single thread performance.
Second, your network is most likely the bottleneck here. You didn’t mention it but I’m assuming only gigabit and wireless which is generally half as fast as gigabit at best unless you’ve gone out of your way to improve it.
Third, we don’t know how your zfs pools are constructed. I think pairs of mirrored vdevs in pools are max read speed but there is a chart somewhere.
Lastly, you are not constrained by which version of truenas is serving smb. You can spin up an app or virtual instance of a full blown OS of your choice and use the latest bleeding edge version you like. Then you point it back at your pools so it’s not bottlenecking at the network level. Less convenient but way more flexible.
I’m sure some others will chime in but these are decent considerations. You will want to come up with a methodology for benchmarking performance as well.
I like using the TrueNAS simple IP interface for a quick overview. I played with a Debian release that seemed to work on anything. I think I was Mint. The drive started any Intel Windows Box and Mac. I will be retiring an M2 24core in a couple years. It is an Silicon Apple (ARM) so maybe by then they will have everything worked out with those by then. I was impressed my but what over head it does take up?
I skip the third question, which is this ZFS systems just going to me hell? This TrueNAS seemed like the perfect fit but maybe it isn’t a good fit. I don’t know if you play with 4K or 6K video but the file are huge. I need massive throughput with and redundancy.
-Thanks
Free cpu? That’s the right price. Lots of cores for multithreaded work sitting idle won’t hurt. Adequate RAM for a fat ARC cache too.
10GB is nice. I am too now, because I was chasing raw speed. Went from gigabit to 2.5gb and kept outrunning the NAS. Now I don’t, on 10gb fiber.
With regards to ZFS, it is a file system, and one of the biggest strengths of Truenas. Data safety and flexibility along with speed, if you build it right. I think something is lost in translation here, so I will keep it simple.
ZFS is absolutely critical in how you build your pools. The structure is like this. Top level, a pool. Pools are made of vdevs (virtual devices I guess). Vdevs are groups of storage drives, in differing configurations. You can build a very slow pool or a very fast pool depending on how you structure these things. You can have a lot of data available to you or very little (and lots of safety) if you build it another way. There is a youtuber called Techno Tim which does a lot of Truenas experiments and goes into detail on his pool/vdev/drive configurations, because he wants max read, max write, and medium overall storage space; there is a good and a bad for each configuration style. None are absolute, except for an absolutely dangerous pool, which you can definitely set up if you want. The point is, there is probably performance waiting to be unlocked at the pool level, with some planning. Look closely at raidz10 and raidz2. z10 is faster but shrinks the pool.
Hopefully you got some snacks and have the stamina to read a few more sentences; I know I write too much. Truenas could be the perfect system for you, or the worst. It is up to you and what you can put together with some help. Your network sounds capable, your resources are there, so 2 big problems are solved. Your third big problem, catering to the needs of a single application being picky with a protocol version, you can also solve within Truenas, maybe not the official “from the factory” configuration, but with apps and/or virtual machines.
Yes I deal with 4k files in Blackmagic Davinci and big audio files at 24/192 or higher, so NAS speed matters to me also, read speed of course.
I will need to look at Techno Time and see his ideas. Sounds like a time spend.
I didn’t really look at TrueNAS Core. Is that still an OS level install that can be custom tweaked? If that something I can update Samba, and I can tweak ZFS pools/vdev/drive configurations just tike or similar to Scale.
-Thoughts
Holy Sh*^, it work with a small file without a hiccup. I need to go back and look at how I setup my pools and stuff but YES, it worked like a champ. I am going to do a little test tonight with a couple of 4K cards but before I couldn’t get it work with no to little attach video.
–Thank You (Pictures are Coming)
