Posted August 20, 2014 So I'm looking into making my own FreeNAS box. I'm thinking of going RAID 1 but also thinking of RAID 5. Advice? So atm I'm looking at pricing of HDD. I can buy refurbished drives but I won't know what type, RPM nor cache will come with it. Also, I've heard that the 4GB drives fail a lot. True? WD 4GB Red: 160euroGreen: 140euroRefurbished: 130euro WD 3GBRed: 130euroGreen: 120euroRefurbished: 99euroWD 2GBRed:110euroGreen: 95euroRefurbished: noneSeagate 3GBBaracuda: 155euro NAS: 130euroRefurbished: noneSeagate 2GB Baracuda: 125euro NAS: noneRefurbished: 85euro Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Posted August 20, 2014 If you data is important to you, I would not touch refurbished drives Also as far as raid goes it depends how much redundancy you require, and how many drives you need as well as how much storage IMO raid 10 > Raid 5/6 > Raid 1 > Raid 0 - as far as redundancy goes Desktop - Corsair 300r i7 4770k H100i MSI 780ti 16GB Vengeance Pro 2400mhz Crucial MX100 512gb Samsung Evo 250gb 2 TB WD Green, AOC Q2770PQU 1440p 27" monitor Laptop Clevo W110er - 11.6" 768p, i5 3230m, 650m GT 2gb, OCZ vertex 4 256gb, 4gb ram, Server: Fractal Define Mini, MSI Z78-G43, Intel G3220, 8GB Corsair Vengeance, 4x 3tb WD Reds in Raid 10, Phone Oppo Reno 10x 256gb , Camera Sony A7iii Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Posted August 20, 2014 Also, I've heard that the 4GB drives fail a lot. True? I have seen no credible hard data which points to larger drives being inherently less reliable than smaller ones, only hearsay and nothing more. Until I see some solid numbers on this, I will presume it to not be true. As for refurbished drives: On one hand, an HDD is a mechanical device, and as all other mechanical devices it has a finite lifespan. A refurbished drive has already "used up" some of that, so to speak. However, I can't really say what HDD manufacturers actually do to get refurb drives up to snuff again (for example, if they replace the bearings and other parts liable to wear and tear, the HDD might actually be as good as a new one, but as said, I have no idea if that is actually done, or if they just do a drive validation and if it still works they slap a sticker on it and done). On the other hand, if you have a proper backup plan in place, then a refurb drive failing a bit earlier than a new one won't really have any effect on the security of your data, and since you didn't pay as much for it as you would have for a new drive, it lasting not quite as long seems like an acceptable tradeoff (depending on how much use you get out of the drive and how much you paid for it, naturally). In the end, if your data is important to you, you should have a good backup of it anyway (or several), so going with less reliable drives (at least for a home setup) doesn't seem like such a big deal to me (and hey, depending on how many drives you have, you could put some of the money saved on cheaper drives towards a good backup solution). Having said that, so far I tend to buy my drives in new condition, less because I'm afraid for my data and more because dealing with drive failures and such is just a bit annoying. BUILD LOGS: HELIOS - Latest Update: 2015-SEP-06 ::: ZEUS - BOTW 2013-JUN-28 ::: APOLLO - Complete: 2014-MAY-10OTHER STUFF: Cable Lacing Tutorial ::: What Is ZFS? ::: mincss Primer ::: LSI RAID Card Flashing TutorialFORUM INFO: Community Standards ::: The Moderating Team ::: 10TB+ Storage Showoff Topic Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Posted August 20, 2014 If you're going with refurbs in a RAID I'd be cautious. At best I'd pair a new drive with a refurb that way you won't lose anything if they prematurely fail. (assuming that you're not being foolish and doing RAID0) As for type only use NAS drives like the RED or the Seagate NAS drives. Not Barracudas or Greens. Sir William of Orange: Corsair 230T - Rebel Orange, 4690K, GA-97X SOC, 16gb Dom Plats 1866C9, 2 MX100 256gb, Seagate 2tb Desktop, EVGA Supernova 750-G2, Be Quiet! Dark Rock 3, DK 9008 keyboard, Pioneer BR drive. Yeah, on board graphics - deal with it! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Posted August 21, 2014 Well first thing to consider is that WD greens will effectively turn off when not in use after "x" minutes. They'll stop the platters spinning and basically go to sleep until the next request comes along. This does mean they take some time to spin up and get going again, which means they have slower performance on the whole then other drives. However once they've spun up and are active, the experience is just like any other drive over a network. Say for when streaming a HD video to a tablet. I personally like this since I don't access my NAS several times a day and prefer to have the drives "off" when not in use. There are a lot of people I've seen curse the WD greens up and down(since the red came out...oddly) and they've even go so far as to say that the WD reds are more power efficient, which is completely subjective and total bollocks for my usage. Since the WDReds("NAS" drives) are always on, spinning and ready to go. So if you're going to be active with the use of your NAS I would not recommend Greens since you'll be looking at your screen for about 5 seconds while the drives kick into gear each time you go to access it. However if you're going to jump in once or twice a day tops, greens are worth considering. With the above in mind, now consider their unit costs and choose. BTW, I've never had good luck with refurbs, always bad and do not recommend it. But the dice are in your hands. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Posted August 21, 2014 Author Thanks for the reply's. No refurbished drives then As MoonSpot said, I wont be accessing the NAS to much. It's will mainly be used as a media box for 6 users, and will function as a backup drive for pictures and documents.And possibly for some other stuff in the future. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Posted August 21, 2014 Hi there, All of you seem to have a good point. I will add just a few things.You should know that the WD recertified drives are fully functional drives that go through the extensive testing, made on the brand new drives and meet all the quality standards.Regarding the RAIDs, RAID5 may be the better option, but requires more drives, which should be taken in consideration. As I see it, your best scenario is to do RAID5 with WD Red drives.I would not choose the Green drives. They are designed for storage purposes and may not perform well in RAID configuration, because of their longer error recovery time. On the other hand, the WD Red line is meant to be used in NAS devices. I leave you some more details about WD drives and RAID configurations. http://wdc.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/3272/ - What are recertified drives http://wdc.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/2767/ - The advantages of different RAIDs http://www.wdc.com/en/products/internal/desktop/ - the WD drives http://wdc.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/1397 – Difference between desktop edition drives and RAID drives. Hope this helps WD Representative www.wdc.com/en/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Posted August 21, 2014 Author Well I found a nice little blog. Pretty solid numbers.They would advice Hatachi drives but that's a piece of history.So now they advice 3TB WD RED and no refurbished ones.https://www.backblaze.com/blog/what-hard-drive-should-i-buy/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Posted August 22, 2014 We can not be 100% sure if the numbers or the information on this website are correct. Either way, the advice is good. The WD Reds really are the solution for NAS and the capacity is up to you WD Representative www.wdc.com/en/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Posted August 22, 2014 Well I found a nice little blog. Pretty solid numbers. They would advice Hatachi drives but that's a piece of history. So now they advice 3TB WD RED and no refurbished ones. https://www.backblaze.com/blog/what-hard-drive-should-i-buy/ We can not be 100% sure if the numbers or the information on this website are correct. Either way, the advice is good. The WD Reds really are the solution for NAS and the capacity is up to you Ah yes, that caused quite a ruckis when it came out. Here's a contrary POV: http://www.tweaktown.com/articles/6028/dispelling-backblaze-s-hdd-reliability-myth-the-real-story-covered/index.html And a rebuttal of that one: http://www.zdnet.com/trust-backblazes-drive-reliability-data-7000025575/ Personally, I'm a bit on the fence. Yes, Backblaze's data is real-world data, no disputing that (unless you just assume they're lying, which I have no cause to at the moment), no fancy controlled test environment and so on. Upside of that: It's real-world data. Downside of that: I'm not really sure how their data would translate to my own needs to be honest. Having accurate(-ish) data on the conditions under which the different drives run would be useful to draw some conclusions IMHO. Also interesting articles about drive reliability: Google study on drive failures and what they are influenced by http://storagemojo.com/2007/02/19/googles-disk-failure-experience/ http://storagemojo.com/2007/02/20/everything-you-know-about-disks-is-wrong/ BUILD LOGS: HELIOS - Latest Update: 2015-SEP-06 ::: ZEUS - BOTW 2013-JUN-28 ::: APOLLO - Complete: 2014-MAY-10OTHER STUFF: Cable Lacing Tutorial ::: What Is ZFS? ::: mincss Primer ::: LSI RAID Card Flashing TutorialFORUM INFO: Community Standards ::: The Moderating Team ::: 10TB+ Storage Showoff Topic Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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