Hi all, have anyone ever lost data on your NAS due to harddisk failure or file system corruption? I would like to hear it from you and the setup you have when you experienced the failure.

Your office NAS seems to have an interesting problem. Have you tried renaming or move the problem files to lower folder down the tree before deleting them? Could be due to long filename that OS unable to handle.

Are either of your NAS aftermarket brands such as Synalogy, QNAP etc or own-build NAS? If we can share these info, we may be able to safeguard our data better either by avoiding buying problem NAS models or better data management practices.

This post has been edited by mrbob: Oct 23 2013, 07:52 AM

Hmmm... Useful for people who don't populate their NAS in one go.

I think the "people" are generally data center admins and know the reality of hardware failure and handle them on a daily basis. Data backup to them are for archival purpose where the original data are meant to be kept and restored at a later date. Hence the usage of tape backups as the archival process takes away the usual hardware failures out of the equation.

A dual NAS is just a hardware redundancy solution akin to a hot/warm/cold standby servers we see in DCs.

ZFS does have some very nice build-in features that ensure data integrity. Microsoft is taking a page out of the ZFS playbook with the introduction of ReFS in Windows Server 2012 Storage Spaces. It's still too early to see how ReFS is impacting the real world as it is still undergoing heavy development. It will be some time before we see a truly workable NTFS replacement.

That was a good game plan there. My previous NTFS-based box used to be unable to handle Unicode filenames. Had to rename and remove the unicode characters before I could access or delete the files.

This post has been edited by mrbob: Oct 25 2013, 10:00 AM

I'm just sharing what I went through. Not necessarily the same problem you are facing.

Hmmm, hope you're not being overly sensitive cause I've just rereading my last posting again whether there is any insinuation that ReFS is better than ZFS. Didn't see anything there.

Anyway, there are a growing initiative to make ZFS more accessible to the general public in the likes of NAS4Free, FreeNAS etc.

I think it really depends on what you want to do with your NAS. At least now you have figured out the hardware side of the storage solution, you need to also consider the software and workflow. The NAS features will depend largely on the OS and software you decide to run on the box.

If MS solution then there's no worry bout HW compatibility. You will have the advantage of testing out ReFS. Its supposedly an improvement on NTFS with build-in redundancies. Just note that Windowz is more resource hungry compared to other OS executing the same tasks plus you will need to defrag the HDDs every now and then. If you are proficient in Linux, you can do quite a fair bit with this HW spec. If ZFS is not your cup of tea, why not try Ubuntu/Mint with ext3/4? Runs more efficiently compared to Windowz.

For storage engineers, there's the consideration for capacity, performance, durability, reliability, power consumption and cost. You will have to find a balance between capacity and performance - the bigger the HDD, the slower the speed. And of course generally speaking, it will cost more to build redundancies and durability into the solution.

HW RAID card can help improve RAID performance however do get a UPS to protect against the write hole problem. In the worst case for the write hole problem, you can lose the entire RAID group in the event of a catastropic power failure and if the server happened to be writting to HDDs at that time. A UPS won't cost much and is a sure protection against this. Needless to say that if the RAID card fails, you will need to replace with the same model to access your data. If you don't want to mess around too much with RAID and just want minimal problems with max performance and still offers some reliability, then just stick with RAID 1.

Once you start hitting 8 HDDs, your box is not going to be running < 100W anymore. Don't worry too much bout the ZFS 1GB ram per TB recommendation. Just pop in 1x 8GB 1600MHz ram should be more than enough for your experimentation.

Yep I'm also having a tough time sourcing for server grade ITX mobo. Hard to find even on Newegg. Sigh... HW RAID cards are not that expensive if you know what you want and where to look. I'm just going to try a few more leads in Malaysia and Singapore before deciding whether to order my HW from the US. Do note also that the clearance between the mobo and drive cage in UNAS is < 40mm so the bundled Intel CPU cooler will not fit in there.

FYI the Asrock C2750D4I/C2550D4I mobo with built-in Intel Avoton processor that you mentioned is currently the most anticipated mobo in the NAS community. There is no date of released yet. You may get a better chance finding Asrock E3C226D2I/E3C224D2I instead.

LSI has several options to add 4-16x HDDs, but the external HDD enclosures will cost you.

No. SAS Expander. Look for external SAS ports.

And since you have brought up DAS, it is a cheaper but slower option...

What are you running on your N40L?

Another cheaper option

http://www.icydock.com/icy_tip/ICY_DOCK_To...ver_icytip.html

All depends on what you plan to do with the NAS and how much space you will need in the next X number of years that the NAS is online - whether just for pure storage or if you plan to add apps for torrenting, downloading, web page serving, media serving etc. Just note that if you torrent 24/7 on a desktop, your electric bill is gonna rise. My advise - keep torrenting on a separate low-powered Linux-embedded NAS like Dlink or Synology etc and keep the NAS powered on when you need it.

The 500GB HDD seems minuscule, if you plan to host media files on the box. FYI MP3/FLAC albums runs 150-250MB each and 1080P movies runs around 5-9GBs each. Also if planning for RAID 1 redundancy (easiest to setup and fastest to replicate) you will need a free SATA port and a HDD bay on the box. I'm not familiar with Lenovo Thinkcentre Edge 72 (SFF model). How many 3.5"/2.5" drive bays, SATA ports and PCIe slots does it have? Seems like a small box. Depending on the current mobo spec and what you want, there are ways to expand the storage space.

On the software side, you will do better without NTFS for your NAS. Linux file systems are more efficient. 2GB RAM is a great place to start with any Linux distro. But if you are looking into ZFS or Win Storage Svr 2012, you will need more RAM.

The Newegg link on the icydock webpage shows US$97 for the 6 SSD/SATA model. You will still need SAS/SATA Expander cards for this to work.

Only 2x 3.5" HDD bays? Then you only have RAID 1 (mirror) option available which I think will be fine. You don't want to be running a NAS without any form of redundancies or parity as you will be running the NAS at a great risk of loosing your data in the event of HDD failure.

Actually your SFF would be a good candidate for Ubuntu XBMC media PC. You will still be able to play your media on the TV. Spend your money to build a proper 4-8 bays NAS which will likely last longer as you don't need to move your data around too much when you run out of space.

Hello weirdguy,

Instead of buying external and internal HDDs as a bandaid to patch an open wound, let me suggest a 2-phase solution.

Phase-1

Buy the following parts :-
- Dlink DNS-320L RM250
- 2x WD AV Green 3TB RM818
Setup DNS-320L as RAID1 (mirrored). This will provide you some breathing space while you work on completing phase-2.

Total investment for phase-1 RM1068

Phase-2
Buy or build a 4-8 bays NAS which will address your storage needs in the next 3-5 years.

Estimated investment for phase-2 RM2800 to RM10000 depending on the solution. Note that 60-75% of the cost will go into buying the HDDs. Start reading up on NAS and RAID technologies so that you can make informed decisions later.

What do Synology, QNAP, Dlink, Thecus and Asustor have in common, they are all Taiwanese-based companies that manufactures NAS. Nowadays the techonology behind NAS is just pretty much the same across the board due to the close competitiveness among these TW companies. From what I have seen on the forums, HW failure rates are almost the same among these manufacturers.

However the key difference is still user experience. Many end users prefer and swear by Synology's sleek GUI, hence Synology's popularity and price. As for me, as long as the NAS supports NFS and SMB/CIFS, I don't care how the GUI looks like as it will just be a box where I will throw all my data into from my Windows PC. I don't have the time to spend 8 hours everyday staring into a nice NAS GUI. So for me a Dlink-320L is as useful as a Synology DS-213SE which cost over twice as much just as a storage box on the network.

Since DSL-320L only have 2 slots, you are limited to RAID 0 or 1. RAID 1 offers HDD mirroring redundancy and protection from 1 HDD failure but doesn't protect your data from NAS HW failure. Stay away from RAID 0 as you run a great risk of loosing data if any HDD writing glitch, electrical glitch, HDD failure etc happens.

Go for Synology for the ease of setup, peace of mind and if you don't mind paying extra for all the bells and whistles. And if you are technologically inclined, build your own and you are more likely to end up with a more powerful box that does all the same things that Synology does at a cheaper price.

Both AV Green and Red are designed for 24/7 operations and comes with 3 years warranty. You can use either for RAID 1, however only Red is designed for RAID 5 & 6 setup and is generally more expensive.

Hmmm, I'm not sure you really need a NAS judging from your response above. NAS is essentially a server that holds and makes available all your data on the network for you. IMO if you just need a place to store/archive your data and only access them occasionally, then external HDDs may be the best fit and value solution. WD MyBook external HDDs are quite affortable and reliable.

This post has been edited by mrbob: Nov 15 2013, 10:43 AM

Imation releases Nexsan E-Series V that squeezes 240 Terabytes in 4U space while consuming less than one-third the power in typical arrays.



http://online.wsj.com/article/PR-CO-20131118-904157.html

Actually Synology DS213J only have 2 slots which means you can only do RAID 0 or 1. Forget about RAID 0 as it is the most risky setup.

You can use any HDDs for RAID 1 (mirrored) WD Green AV is a good candidate as wwgoh has pointed out esp if you will be torrenting from your box.

WD Red is useful when you are building RAID 5, 6 etc which will need 3 HDDs and above.