Help with FreeNas

[Evyatar]

Hello guys.
So we've gotten some 'old' server - Dell Poweredge 2950 with raid conroller Perci 5/i and I'm having problems installing FreeNas on it.
At the first time It worked just fine, but I did it wrong... I've installed the Nas on all the HDDS (6 in raid5) and so, I had problem to make a new storage device.
I've looked in to it, and what it's looks like, the Freenas uses 'the whole stroage' that It's been installed on.

I've re-raided the 6 hdds, and made Raid 5 out of 5 Hdds, and left one empty.
Tried to install the FreeNas - It's only seen' the "raided" hdds, and not the empty one.

Next, I've pluged some old Hdd to the Internal Sata output of the server, installed it just fine on the old hdd.
BUT, When I'm trying to boot in to the one Hdd, where the freenas is installed, it's just "stuck". 

I really don't know what to do.
Any suggestions? 
I've seen some other alternative, like " Nas4Free / OpenMediaVault / Rockstor / Zfsguru.

What should I do?

Thank you for your help guys!

 

[Huntsman]

One thing about FreeNAS or rather any ZFS NAS OS is that they really don't like dishonest hardware. Don't create RAID before you install FreeNAS, use FreeNAS to create the RAID instead. Should work fine.

 

Also, related with the OS doesn't like dishonest hardware thing, set the RAID hardware to JBOD mode or just totally disable any form of hardware RAID.

[Evyatar]

53 minutes ago, Huntsman said:

One thing about FreeNAS or rather any ZFS NAS OS is that they really don't like dishonest hardware. Don't create RAID before you install FreeNAS, use FreeNAS to create the RAID instead. Should work fine.

 

Also, related with the OS doesn't like dishonest hardware thing, set the RAID hardware to JBOD mode or just totally disable any form of hardware RAID.

Ok, thank you sir, I will try that. 
by the way, why not make the raid thru the raid controller if I may ask? 

[Huntsman]

Hardware raid made using raid controller are "transparent" to the OS. The OS doesn't know that the volume that are being presented to it is actually consist of multiple drives. So a few things will happen:

1. The OS assumes it is a single disk so it will be treated as one. Some drive formats will exhibit weird behaviors and or fails.

2. OS doesn't have full control of the actual hardware, this may lead to errors as data might be mishandled.

3. RAID controllers usually have their own way of handling data which are incompatible with how the OS handles them so errors will occur too.

4. And many more...

 

Generally, if it's not Windows Server with suitable drivers it is not recommended to use hardware RAID. Also, since you're running FreeNAS, they have very good software RAID and those are in my experience more reliable and easier on you when shit happens.

 

Let's say if you are running hardware RAID and the RAID controller dies, you have absolutely no other choice but (in worst case) get the EXACT same model of controller to connect your array to get back your data. IMO that's just stupid since you can't just grab another controller and recover your files. On the other hand if you're running software RAID like ZFS (included in FreeNAS), you could just connect your array to another system and it will just work.

 

So in summary don't use hardware RAID unless you have a specific need for it. Some special features you like or something.

[Evyatar]

1 hour ago, Huntsman said:

One thing about FreeNAS or rather any ZFS NAS OS is that they really don't like dishonest hardware. Don't create RAID before you install FreeNAS, use FreeNAS to create the RAID instead. Should work fine.

 

Also, related with the OS doesn't like dishonest hardware thing, set the RAID hardware to JBOD mode or just totally disable any form of hardware RAID.

So nice to know that, Thank you for your explianition.

I've tried to do what you told me, boot from the cd and installing without any raid on,
And now it's not recognize any hdds. 
I went thru the FreeNas forums, and some people suggested that there are problems with dell servers, so i might try Installing Nas4Free. as you can see here:
https://forums.freenas.org/index.php?threads/installed-with-dvd-cant-see-harddrive.23461/

Any other tips that you can give me? maybe other OSs that I should try? 

Thank you so much, again, for your help.

 

[Huntsman]

Hmm.. have you tried disabling the RAID or setting it as JBOD? JBOD will present the HDDs are individual drives to the OS. The idea is to "bypass" the RAID controller.

 

NAS4Free is a fork of FreeNAS so I doubt there will be any differences. Mind sharing your mobo or server model number?

[Evyatar]

19 minutes ago, Huntsman said:

Hmm.. have you tried disabling the RAID or setting it as JBOD? JBOD will present the HDDs are individual drives to the OS. The idea is to "bypass" the RAID controller.

 

NAS4Free is a fork of FreeNAS so I doubt there will be any differences. Mind sharing your mobo or server model number?

Sure.
This is Dell server, PowerEdge 2950.
Not sure about the CPU model, but that's xeon.
Got 4GB of ram,
Perci 5/i controller

I don't know how to disable the raidcontroller, I just know how to disable the whole raid. 

[Evyatar]

On 7/5/2016 at 4:04 PM, Huntsman said:

Hmm.. have you tried disabling the RAID or setting it as JBOD? JBOD will present the HDDs are individual drives to the OS. The idea is to "bypass" the RAID controller.

 

NAS4Free is a fork of FreeNAS so I doubt there will be any differences. Mind sharing your mobo or server model number?

Hey man, I just wanted to let you know I've manged to install the Freenas!
All I had to do is:
1. Disable the raid controller from the bios
2. Add and internal hdd (From the sata of the mother board, diffrent than the rest of the hotswaps
3. Install the FreeNas on the Internal sata
4. enable the the raid controller and configure it
5. Done!


Thank you so much for trying to help me man!
 

[Huntsman]

No problem.. Mark the thread as solved.