Unraid vs Flexraid VS FreeNAS ZFS

[Hikaru12]

I've been toying with the idea of a file server for a while now. I've always wanted one because my 3TB HDD can only hold so much and I want to keep a catalog of my anime and Bluray's. I've been researching and I've been really stuck on unRAID for the following features:

 

-powers down drives that aren't in use and only powers up ones that are

-dead simple to set up

-set it and forget it

-stable

-parity

 

However, I've recently been researching other options including FlexRaid and FreeNas. If I installed FlexRaid on top of a WHS I'd be able to get back up computers directly from WHS and have it's ease of use while having the power to assign multiple parity drives and get snapshots of different files.

 

FreeNas has scared me away because of the amount of options you have to go through in setting up different features. ZFS seems to be the best type of RAID even over UnRaid's similar but not really JBOD + Raid 6 combo. It seems pretty hard to set up and I don't like that you have can't expand the original drive pool to add more drives. That being said, FreeNAS does have a whole host of configurability.

 

So my question is this, what server OS should I go for to get the following features:

-ease of use

-little to no maintenance

-parity with fault tolerance up to 2 HDD's

-mix/match drives

-expand size of drives as you see fit

-multiple drives are seen as one large drive pool

 

Thanks! If you need further info just let me know. 

[Qpm5]

I can reccomend free nas after i setup the accounts i have been streaming things from it and using it a lot. It is very easy to use and i ahve not really done anything to it since i started and it runs fine. Not sre about the storage stuff as mine only uses one drive and I have no raid array for it yet.

[Vitalius]

TBH, I would use these to describe FreeNAS' basic features:
 

-powers down drives that aren't in use and only powers up ones that are

-dead simple to set up

-set it and forget it

-stable

-parity

It offers all of that. It's installing plugins, setting up jails, and managing permissions that gets hairy. But that doesn't affect drive redundancy, stability of the OS, or anything similar. You can set each HDD in a pool to a power state, so that they will either power down when not in use (making seek times longer), or stay spinning (though there are 4 power states). The rest is easy.

[Hikaru12]

 

TBH, I would use these to describe FreeNAS' basic features:

 

-powers down drives that aren't in use and only powers up ones that are

-dead simple to set up

-set it and forget it

-stable

-parity

It offers all of that. It's installing plugins, setting up jails, and managing permissions that gets hairy. But that doesn't affect drive redundancy, stability of the OS, or anything similar. You can set each HDD in a pool to a power state, so that they will either power down when not in use (making seek times longer), or stay spinning (though there are 4 power states). The rest is easy.

 

I didn't know that. I always figured when the drives were in an array the entire array would have to power up when accessing a file from one of the drives. If you believe it covers all those features then I may have to give another look. Is ZFS easy to set up?

[Vitalius]

I didn't know that. I always figured when the drives were in an array the entire array would have to power up when accessing a file from one of the drives. If you believe it covers all those features then I may have to give another look. Is ZFS easy to set up?

It's as easy as: "Oh, I see you are setting up a new Pool. Do you want it to be UFS or ZFS?"

That's basically the question asked by FreeNAS when you set up a new pool. ZFS has advanced features that you can access in the GUI, which require a bit more knowledge/effort to actually use correctly, but actually setting up ZFS itself is easy as an option choice.

One example of these features is called a "Scrub" which basically corrects any errors made while copying the data in a RAID system (it compares parity bits to the data). 

The problem with that is that if you want to use the Scrub feature safely, you literally need ECC RAM (which means an AMD or server grade motherboard). ECC RAM is RAM that actively double checks itself to correct errors that occur when it is reading. 

If your RAM has an error while doing a Scrub, it's the equivalent of taking your data and putting it through a paper shredder. It's rare. But it happens. And you won't know it's happening until you try to access something and it's corrupt. In which you are screwed. 

So, ZFS is nice, but not necessary. It's for people who handle very sensitive and important information, or who care about their media and other data way more than they probably should.

[Hikaru12]

It's as easy as: "Oh, I see you are setting up a new Pool. Do you want it to be UFS or ZFS?"

That's basically the question asked by FreeNAS when you set up a new pool. ZFS has advanced features that you can access in the GUI, which require a bit more knowledge/effort to actually use correctly, but actually setting up ZFS itself is easy as an option choice.

One example of these features is called a "Scrub" which basically corrects any errors made while copying the data in a RAID system (it compares parity bits to the data). 

The problem with that is that if you want to use the Scrub feature safely, you literally need ECC RAM (which means an AMD or server grade motherboard). ECC RAM is RAM that actively double checks itself to correct errors that occur when it is reading. 

If your RAM has an error while doing a Scrub, it's the equivalent of taking your data and putting it through a paper shredder. It's rare. But it happens. And you won't know it's happening until you try to access something and it's corrupt. In which you are screwed. 

So, ZFS is nice, but not necessary. It's for people who handle very sensitive and important information, or who care about their media and other data way more than they probably should.

 

I won't be using this as my primary storage device so ZFS may not be necessary. I always try to keep important backups somewhere else and on the cloud. I have 8GB of ECC Ram in my Newegg wishlist with a SuperMicro server board ready to go. However, since ZFS eats up so much RAM and ECC is expensive it might not be worth it to go that route.

 

Thanks for the info!