NAS/Storage Megathread: What is this "File Deletion" You Speak of

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Serious Hardware/Software Crap > NAS/Storage Megathread: What is this "File Deletion" You Speak of

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mcbexx: Jul 4, 2004; British dentistry is
not on trial here!

Slightly off-topic, but I don't see a more fitting thread:

Are there any downsides using NAS drives, like the WD Red series, as normal-duty desktop drives?
I'm planning to swap out an old 750GB drive for a 3 or 4 TB drive to be done with it for a while and the WD Red WD30EFRX/WD40EFRX are attractively priced as far as I can tell (4 GB at 159 Euro, while other 4TB drives with 7200rpm are >220 Euro across the board).

Edit: It's mainly for storage.
I already have an SSD for the OS, Applications and the occasional game.

mcbexx fucked around with this message at 21:01 on Apr 16, 2014

# ? Apr 16, 2014 15:29

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# ? May 10, 2024 18:42

eddiewalker: Apr 28, 2004; Arrrr ye landlubber

Isn't "Intellipower" on the Reds marketing-speak for 5400rpm?

# ? Apr 16, 2014 15:44

Count Thrashula: Jun 1, 2003; Death is nothing compared to vindication.; Buglord

I got my N54L in about 20 minutes and already have Xpenology up and running. Holy hell this software is impressive. I've never used a Synology box before, but I didn't realize how much MORE than just a simple NAS it was!

I'm in love :haw:

# ? Apr 16, 2014 16:15

BlankSystemDaemon: Mar 13, 2009

eddiewalker posted:

Isn't "Intellipower" on the Reds marketing-speak for 5400rpm?

You're correct, it's ~~PR bullshit~~marketing speak.

mcbexx posted:

Slightly off-topic, but I don't see a more fitting thread:

Are there any downsides using NAS drives, like the WD Red series, as normal-duty desktop drives?
I'm planning to swap out an old 750GB drive for a 3 or 4 TB drive to be done with it for a while and the WD Red WD30EFRX/WD40EFRX are attractively priced as far as I can tell (4 GB at 159 Euro, while other 4TB drives with 7200rpm are >220 Euro across the board).

If you've got an SSD in your system, they're the most-attractively priced disk for $/TB while matching your storage needs, and you don't mind paying the slight premium for an additional years factory warrenty, have at it.
If not, you do want to look around for a good deal on WD Black as there is quite a bit of difference in preformance (or alternatively, buy an SSD as it's the single biggest upgrade you can get for any computer).

BlankSystemDaemon fucked around with this message at 18:20 on Apr 16, 2014

# ? Apr 16, 2014 18:05

John Capslocke: Jun 5, 2007

Looking for suggestions on a mid-range 2 bay NAS, is Synology still one of the better companies for an out of box device?

# ? Apr 18, 2014 16:53

Don Lapre: Mar 28, 2001; If you're having problems you're either holding the phone wrong or you have tiny girl hands.

Id just get a synology.

# ? Apr 18, 2014 17:17

Bonobos: Jan 26, 2004

For those that have tried both, how does Xpenology on the 54L compare to FreeNAS? I am debating my next NAS setup (probably within the next few weeks) for my 54L and was wondering the best route to take. ZFS sounds great, but I hear Xpenology is more user friendly. How is the file security compared to FreeNAS?

# ? Apr 18, 2014 18:08

dorkanoid: Dec 21, 2004

N54L/Xpenology trip report: I can live with these iSCSI speeds

setup was ridiculously easy, and everything seems to work out-of-the-box

EDIT: just testing it now with the included 250GB plus a 500GB and 320GB I found in a drawer. Synology made a 500GB "SHR" RAID out of those three disks (one of which may or may not fail SMART testing), running with the included 2GB RAM stick.

Plan is to upgrade it to 8GB RAM, and a couple of WD RED (or equivalent) disks, plus maybe an old SSD for caching.

_{I think the speeds above were just to some kind of cache, where the actual transfer was happening at a later stage - I don't have a 3.5Gbps network}

dorkanoid fucked around with this message at 20:52 on Apr 22, 2014

# ? Apr 22, 2014 20:46

Count Thrashula: Jun 1, 2003; Death is nothing compared to vindication.; Buglord

Do you have your PC acting as an initiator or do you have iSCSI targets that your N54L is hitting and then sharing out?

I'm new to all this technology :ohdear:

edit-- what's your network setup look like?

# ? Apr 22, 2014 20:50

dorkanoid: Dec 21, 2004

QPZIL posted:

Do you have your PC acting as an initiator or do you have iSCSI targets that your N54L is hitting and then sharing out?

I'm new to all this technology

edit-- what's your network setup look like?

iSCSI LUN and iSCSI Target on Xpenology sharing out a 250GB volume (seems to be implemented as a filesystem-in-a-file), Windows on my desktop is the initiator.

After connecting via the initiator, the iSCSI disk appears as a locally connected HDD in Windows - formatted it as NTFS and mapped it to a drive. Seems (from my quick testing) to work with things that normally won't work with network drives, like CrashPlan backups.

My network is wired Gbit.

EDIT: Copying a file to a share rather than over iSCSI gave a more sane (but still awesome) speed:

dorkanoid fucked around with this message at 21:09 on Apr 22, 2014

# ? Apr 22, 2014 20:57

Geemer: Nov 4, 2010

dorkanoid posted:

Seems (from my quick testing) to work with things that normally won't work with network drives, like CrashPlan backups.

This is pretty much the best part of it. I use it to do network backups of systems with Windows 7 Home Premium, which doesn't allow backing up to network drives normally.

# ? Apr 22, 2014 22:32

dorkanoid: Dec 21, 2004

Geemer posted:

This is pretty much the best part of it. I use it to do network backups of systems with Windows 7 Home Premium, which doesn't allow backing up to network drives normally.

However, they're not meant for sharing between computers - I don't think NTFS supports "cluster awareness"?

# ? Apr 22, 2014 22:39

Geemer: Nov 4, 2010

dorkanoid posted:

However, they're not meant for sharing between computers - I don't think NTFS supports "cluster awareness"?

I've only got one computer that's using it anyway. And I could always make some more targets for other computers if I ever need it. Thin provisioning is pretty cool.

# ? Apr 22, 2014 22:49

evol262: Nov 30, 2010; #!/usr/bin/perl

dorkanoid posted:

However, they're not meant for sharing between computers - I don't think NTFS supports "cluster awareness"?

Yes, Cluster Shared Volumes work with NTFS. Like every other clustering system, though, you have to actually set up a cluster, which spins up a lock manager that handles access. It doesn't just "work", even on gfs2/ocfs/gpfs/vxfs/etc. You have to be part of a cluster, which I don't think consumer editions of Windows support (and in the past, this was handled with filesystem locking on "cluster" filesystems instead of just file/extent locking, but that hasn't been the case for half a decade).

# ? Apr 22, 2014 22:50

Stutes: Oct 13, 2005; Tonight's the Night

Has anyone else come across someone trying to hack (or more likely brute force password guess) their Synology? I got a notification today that an IP address had been auto-blocked due to 5 failed login attempts, and it looks like the IP address is associated with a Tor exit node :tinfoil:

. I guess I don't need to be too nervous since I'm fully patched with reasonable passwords, but it did inspire me to go in and disable the default admin account.

# ? Apr 23, 2014 03:56

eddiewalker: Apr 28, 2004; Arrrr ye landlubber

Stutes posted:

Has anyone else come across someone trying to hack (or more likely brute force password guess) their Synology? I got a notification today that an IP address had been auto-blocked due to 5 failed login attempts, and it looks like the IP address is associated with a Tor exit node . I guess I don't need to be too nervous since I'm fully patched with reasonable passwords, but it did inspire me to go in and disable the default admin account.

Happens every few weeks. More often if you enable something like FTP. That's just the internet.

You can change the number of failed login attempts and window of time in which to autoblock, if you're really paranoid.

# ? Apr 23, 2014 04:02

Don Lapre: Mar 28, 2001; If you're having problems you're either holding the phone wrong or you have tiny girl hands.

Stutes posted:

Has anyone else come across someone trying to hack (or more likely brute force password guess) their Synology? I got a notification today that an IP address had been auto-blocked due to 5 failed login attempts, and it looks like the IP address is associated with a Tor exit node . I guess I don't need to be too nervous since I'm fully patched with reasonable passwords, but it did inspire me to go in and disable the default admin account.

Its bots port scanning and then trying to brute force.

# ? Apr 23, 2014 04:24

BlankSystemDaemon: Mar 13, 2009

dorkanoid posted:

N54L/Xpenology ISCSi

Doesn't Synology/Xpenology support ISCSI device extents rather than file extents? I've heard reports that in userspace file extents are faster for read/write, although it's debatable whether you'll notice it unless you're running 10GbE SFP+, but if placed in kernelspace like it is in FreeBSD (and soon to be in FreeNAS), there's suddenly no difference and you gain other advantages like having one machine attached via iSCSI, and still being able to use cifs/nfs/afp guest sharing along with dlna/plexmediaserver.

# ? Apr 23, 2014 06:15

dorkanoid: Dec 21, 2004

D. Ebdrup posted:

Doesn't Synology/Xpenology support ISCSI device extents rather than file extents? I've heard reports that in userspace file extents are faster for read/write, although it's debatable whether you'll notice it unless you're running 10GbE SFP+, but if placed in kernelspace like it is in FreeBSD (and soon to be in FreeNAS), there's suddenly no difference and you gain other advantages like having one machine attached via iSCSI, and still being able to use cifs/nfs/afp guest sharing along with dlna/plexmediaserver.

It seems to support both:

http://www.synology.com/en-global/support/tutorials/488 posted:

File-Level iSCSI allows the creation of targets on existing storage volumes, so that storage may shared between the two storage systems. This guide will cover how to create File-level iSCSI.

Block-Level iSCSI allows for faster performance, but requires the usage of an entire storage volume. Using that wizard will involve additional steps to create the target compared to File-based iSCSI, and will be similar to creating a RAID volume on the DiskStation.

I guess what I set up was file extents (I even set it up thin provisioned, and expanded the size while it was mounted - there was a 0.5s hiccup in VLC playing from the iSCSI drive when I did this, nothing else).

Windows seems to do caching, and I have plenty of RAM, so the speed of the iSCSI is almost irrelevant - I don't think it's much slower than having a 5400RPM drive locally connected. I'll see if I can run CrystalDiskMark on it later today

# ? Apr 23, 2014 11:51

dorkanoid: Dec 21, 2004

Multipost! :siren:

To sum up everything in a mini-review:

I like this N54L, it cost less than my Synology 211j, has ridiculous amounts of power compared to it, and space for at least double the disks.

Xpenology works nicely - I'm running the DSM 4.3 version, as apparently the 5.0 isn't fully functional yet (I wanted to try iSCSI, which is one of the features not working yet). Installing it was a breeze; create a special boot USB (needed to boot the system "every time", so I used the oldest stick I could find), boot, head to http://find.synology.com/ and install the DSM. Works just like my 211j, just infinitely faster.

The noise level is OK, currently it's in my living room, but it's clear that it's slightly too noisy for that; less noise than a regular computer, slightly more noise than the 211j.

CrystalDiskMark indicates that the iSCSI (and general network) performance is excellent (especially compared to my 211j, which barely hits 20MB/s).

code:

           Sequential Read :  105.778 MB/s
          Sequential Write :  101.400 MB/s
         Random Read 512KB :   99.701 MB/s
        Random Write 512KB :   47.742 MB/s
    Random Read 4KB (QD=1) :    7.967 MB/s [  1945.0 IOPS]
   Random Write 4KB (QD=1) :    8.154 MB/s [  1990.8 IOPS]
   Random Read 4KB (QD=32) :   95.775 MB/s [ 23382.6 IOPS]
  Random Write 4KB (QD=32) :   31.391 MB/s [  7663.9 IOPS]

Interestingly enough, the random read figures are significantly better than my locally connected WD Black 3TB drive:

code:

           Sequential Read :  148.020 MB/s
          Sequential Write :  137.971 MB/s
         Random Read 512KB :   35.362 MB/s
        Random Write 512KB :   65.322 MB/s
    Random Read 4KB (QD=1) :    0.338 MB/s [    82.6 IOPS]
   Random Write 4KB (QD=1) :    0.217 MB/s [    53.1 IOPS]
   Random Read 4KB (QD=32) :    0.821 MB/s [   200.4 IOPS]
  Random Write 4KB (QD=32) :    0.396 MB/s [    96.6 IOPS]

...I'm thinking of buying another N54L to replace my faster, but significantly more power-consuming and noisy, Dell-server.

# ? Apr 23, 2014 18:05

Don Lapre: Mar 28, 2001; If you're having problems you're either holding the phone wrong or you have tiny girl hands.

dorkanoid posted:

Multipost!

To sum up everything in a mini-review:

I like this N54L, it cost less than my Synology 211j, has ridiculous amounts of power compared to it, and space for at least double the disks.

Xpenology works nicely - I'm running the DSM 4.3 version, as apparently the 5.0 isn't fully functional yet (I wanted to try iSCSI, which is one of the features not working yet). Installing it was a breeze; create a special boot USB (needed to boot the system "every time", so I used the oldest stick I could find), boot, head to http://find.synology.com/ and install the DSM. Works just like my 211j, just infinitely faster.

The noise level is OK, currently it's in my living room, but it's clear that it's slightly too noisy for that; less noise than a regular computer, slightly more noise than the 211j.

CrystalDiskMark indicates that the iSCSI (and general network) performance is excellent (especially compared to my 211j, which barely hits 20MB/s).
code:
           Sequential Read :  105.778 MB/s
          Sequential Write :  101.400 MB/s
         Random Read 512KB :   99.701 MB/s
        Random Write 512KB :   47.742 MB/s
    Random Read 4KB (QD=1) :    7.967 MB/s [  1945.0 IOPS]
   Random Write 4KB (QD=1) :    8.154 MB/s [  1990.8 IOPS]
   Random Read 4KB (QD=32) :   95.775 MB/s [ 23382.6 IOPS]
  Random Write 4KB (QD=32) :   31.391 MB/s [  7663.9 IOPS]
Interestingly enough, the random read figures are significantly better than my locally connected WD Black 3TB drive:
code:
           Sequential Read :  148.020 MB/s
          Sequential Write :  137.971 MB/s
         Random Read 512KB :   35.362 MB/s
        Random Write 512KB :   65.322 MB/s
    Random Read 4KB (QD=1) :    0.338 MB/s [    82.6 IOPS]
   Random Write 4KB (QD=1) :    0.217 MB/s [    53.1 IOPS]
   Random Read 4KB (QD=32) :    0.821 MB/s [   200.4 IOPS]
  Random Write 4KB (QD=32) :    0.396 MB/s [    96.6 IOPS]
...I'm thinking of buying another N54L to replace my faster, but significantly more power-consuming and noisy, Dell-server.

Just FYI you can use one of these if you have an internal usb header and keep your usb stick internal

http://www.amazon.com/StarTech-Moth...ternal+usb+port

# ? Apr 23, 2014 18:29

dorkanoid: Dec 21, 2004

Don Lapre posted:

Just FYI you can use one of these if you have an internal usb header and keep your usb stick internal

http://www.amazon.com/StarTech-Moth...ternal+usb+port

I read somewhere that the USB stick has to be removed for the disks to spin down? That may have been for an earlier version though...

# ? Apr 23, 2014 18:38

eightysixed: Sep 23, 2004; I always tell the truth. Even when I lie.

dorkanoid posted:

I read somewhere that the USB stick has to be removed for the disks to spin down? That may have been for an earlier version though...

My disks definitely spin down while the USB flash drive is plugged in.

# ? Apr 23, 2014 18:59

eddiewalker: Apr 28, 2004; Arrrr ye landlubber

dorkanoid posted:

I read somewhere that the USB stick has to be removed for the disks to spin down? That may have been for an earlier version though...

I've never removed my USB stick and the drive seem to be spinning down appropriately.

As I said a page or two ago, the N54L has a full USB port inside the case to the left of the drive slots, so there's no need for one of those header adapters.

The vertical silver line is my boot stick

eddiewalker fucked around with this message at 19:04 on Apr 23, 2014

# ? Apr 23, 2014 19:00

dorkanoid: Dec 21, 2004

eddiewalker posted:

I've never removed my USB stick and the drive seem to be spinning down appropriately.

As I said a page or two ago, the N54L has a full USB port inside the case to the left of the drive slots, so there's no need for one of those header adapters.

The vertical silver line is my boot stick

Ah nice; might just have been with the version in the random tutorial I used - I think it was this one.

Now to find something useful for the optical bay - I'm thinking either a single 3.5", or one of those 4x 2.5" and just stick old laptop drives in there.

...it's also a bit tempting to put a low-profile Geforce GTX 750 in there!

# ? Apr 23, 2014 19:10

Minty Swagger: Sep 8, 2005; Ribbit Ribbit Real Good

dorkanoid posted:

Now to find something useful for the optical bay

People use these all the time to get 2 3.5s in the ODD bay. http://www.frozencpu.com/products/1...852&id=SfosX7sd :getin:

In the end you can actually get 7 drives into an N54L, 6 3.5s and then you can slip a 2.5 under the drive bay like so:

Lots of people steal the esata port from the back and feed it back in before they start getting SATA expansion cards.

I've been on the fence about downsizing my loving huge CMSTACKER case I've owned since forever to one of these. Maybe someday. :allears:

# ? Apr 23, 2014 19:19

dorkanoid: Dec 21, 2004

Minty Swagger posted:

People use these all the time to get 2 3.5s in the ODD bay. http://www.frozencpu.com/products/1...852&id=SfosX7sd

Shipping costs 3x more than the adapter :frogout:

# ? Apr 23, 2014 19:28

mcbexx: Jul 4, 2004; British dentistry is
not on trial here!

After updating from Win7 to 8.1, my external hard drive in a hot-swappable dock is no longer flagged as removable. It's connected via the eSATA port of the mainboad (Asus P8Z68-V Pro), so I can no longer unmount and swap it out without shutting Windows down completely.

Is there a way to make it removable again?
I checked the BIOS settings and could not find any options besides switching the JMicron controller for the eSATA port on or off/turning the OPROM on, which seems to be required if I wanted to boot from eSATA. I tried both settings, but the drive can still not be removed safely.
There is no "hot swap" option for the eSATA port in BIOS, just for the drives that are connected via the internal SATA ports.

Google points me to a ton of posts with the exact opposite problem - internal hard drives being shown as removable.

# ? Apr 23, 2014 23:38

DrDork: Dec 29, 2003; commanding officer of the Army of Dorkness

If it worked before, you should not have to make any changes to your BIOS, and should keep it with whatever you had it set to before. It sounds like you're missing some motherboard-specific driver to enable the functionality: go check out the driver download page for your motherboard.

# ? Apr 24, 2014 00:02

Minty Swagger: Sep 8, 2005; Ribbit Ribbit Real Good

dorkanoid posted:

Shipping costs 3x more than the adapter

I'm sure you can find an alternative, the main takeaway is you can fit 2 for sure.

# ? Apr 24, 2014 00:06

mcbexx: Jul 4, 2004; British dentistry is
not on trial here!

DrDork posted:

If it worked before, you should not have to make any changes to your BIOS, and should keep it with whatever you had it set to before. It sounds like you're missing some motherboard-specific driver to enable the functionality: go check out the driver download page for your motherboard.

Well, I did update the BIOS in the process, but I went through every option that would even be remotely related to this issue.

There are no specific drivers for the motherboard or the JMicron-Controller, there's only Intel Rapid Storage Solution available for download, but since I don't use RAID, I figured the Windows drivers would work fine (I went the same route with Windows 7 before). I installed IRSS anyway and rolled it back, since it did not solve the problem at hand.

I'll revert to the old BIOS revision to check if that changes anything.

# ? Apr 24, 2014 00:10

frailimbnursry: Feb 14, 2004; my roommate touches me

I'm planning to build a homemade mini-ITX FreeNAS system that will primarily store media files and a some critical files. I read back through a couple pages and read the debate on the importance or lack thereof of ECC RAM and ECC capable motherboards. I wasn't able to determine if it was worth the price difference. This article would indicate it's critical.

I had originally planned to purchase an ASUS H87I-PLUS motherboard ($104.99) and 8GB G.Skill Ares RAM ($69.99). After reading through the thread I started thinking it might be worth it to instead purchase the ASRock E3C226D2I Mini ITX Server Motherboard ($216.99) and 8GB Crucial (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM ECC Registered DDR3 1600 ($112.99).

What is general opinion? I had hoped to keep the total cost (including 2 4TB disks) below $800. Are ECC capabilities worth the extra $150 when using FreeNAS?

# ? Apr 24, 2014 03:19

DrDork: Dec 29, 2003; commanding officer of the Army of Dorkness

Depends on how "critical" those files really are. It's not like if you don't use ECC you are guaranteed to lose all your data on a regular basis, but it could happen. The likelihood of it happening is an open question, though.

If you can deal with a slightly larger 'board, you can get a uATX board that supports ECC for $125 or so, and the C224 version of the motherboard you listed is available for about $190.

RAM is also available cheaper: 8GB Crucial ECC 1600 for $99.

So that can drop your cost delta down as low as $50.

# ? Apr 24, 2014 04:30

BlankSystemDaemon: Mar 13, 2009

You also need to make note whether the memory you're getting are unbuffered or buffered ECC memory and what the motherboard supports. KVR16E11/8 which is on the Memory QVL can be had as low as $93.99.

# ? Apr 24, 2014 07:21

AlternateAccount: Apr 25, 2005; FYGM

Minty Swagger posted:

In the end you can actually get 7 drives into an N54L, 6 3.5s and then you can slip a 2.5 under the drive bay like so:

This requires a card to add additional SATA ports, right?

# ? Apr 24, 2014 07:43

Don Lapre: Mar 28, 2001; If you're having problems you're either holding the phone wrong or you have tiny girl hands.

Minty Swagger posted:

People use these all the time to get 2 3.5s in the ODD bay. http://www.frozencpu.com/products/1...852&id=SfosX7sd

In the end you can actually get 7 drives into an N54L, 6 3.5s and then you can slip a 2.5 under the drive bay like so:

Lots of people steal the esata port from the back and feed it back in before they start getting SATA expansion cards.

I've been on the fence about downsizing my loving huge CMSTACKER case I've owned since forever to one of these. Maybe someday.

Jesus, Just buy a DS380 and do an itx build

http://www.silverstonetek.com/product.php?pid=452

# ? Apr 24, 2014 17:20

Minty Swagger: Sep 8, 2005; Ribbit Ribbit Real Good

Haha, yeah there are better builds of course, and that case is NICE, but not much can really beat the bang for the buck you can get with that little HP server. The amount of flexibility it has out of the box is pretty good!

# ? Apr 24, 2014 21:17

DrDork: Dec 29, 2003; commanding officer of the Army of Dorkness

Yeah, considering you can often find the N54L for under $350 out the door, while the DS380 is $150 for the case alone...it's really hard to argue with the N45L, especially for people who only need 4-6 drives and aren't planning on having it do 87 CPU-intensive tasks at the same time.

There's also something to be said about having the N54L "just work" out of the box--no assembly required.

# ? Apr 24, 2014 22:42

Krailor: Nov 2, 2001; I'm only pretending to care; Taco Defender

I keep trying to find some way to be able to justify getting a DS380 and an 8-core avoton board but there's nothing I've wanted to do that the N54l couldn't handle.

# ? Apr 24, 2014 23:07

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# ? May 10, 2024 18:42

Avenging Dentist: Oct 1, 2005; oh my god is that a circular saw that does not go in my mouth aaaaagh

If only the drive trays on the DS380 were less crap...

# ? Apr 24, 2014 23:59

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Serious Hardware/Software Crap > NAS/Storage Megathread: What is this "File Deletion" You Speak of

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