Need Help Building NAS

[Dougshell]

First off, thanks to everyone for there help on this forum, there is such a wealth of knowledge here its amazing.

Ok, i am trying to decide on a possible NAS build but i have some basic questions on the hardware i am attempting to use. My goal is to have a 4TB RAID 0 (would like to do 5 RAID5) with (relatively) low cost drives on a FREENAS System. This system will be used to elevate stress on my main rig that currently houses 3TB of multimedia storage feed to 2 desktop and 2 laptops.

CASE - ANTEC 300

PSU - Aspire 500
NOTE: This PSU is a spare that i have laying around link is only for reference

RAM CRUCIAL 1066 DDR3 2GBx1

MOBO/APU - AMD E350

I am still undecided on what drive to use. I currently have a WD BLACK 2TB that i coudl take from my pc and add to the NAS, but then i would have to buy 1 or 2 more, and at $140 its a bit steep. I am hoping to use Caviar green drives but i know they sometimes have issues with raid.

Drive suggestions are needed/welcome

Please let me know what you guys think about this build.

Major concerns are:

Can this processor handle 2-5 2TB Drives in RAID0/RAID5 over GigaBit?
Do I need a RAID card for this build or will the onboard be enough?
(If raid card is not needed, should I install an Intel 100/1000 nic i have spare?)


Any suggestions are welcome even if it is an entirely new build idea. No single part is a must for this build as long as it meets my goal inexpensively.

Thanks a lot guys, i really need the help.


EDIT:

Ok, so one of the hardest parts of this build has been deciding on what HDDs to purchase. I have been leery of getting Caviar green drives because of issues with TLER and the drives dropping out of raid. But in my search for answers i came across this thread...
Linux Not Effected by TLER

Since i will be using FREENAS, does it mean pretty much any drive will be ok for raid, (aside normal wear and tear, and the occasional dead drive)

 

[tachi1247]

Personally I would never do a RAID 0 on a drive I intend to use as a storage server. You will see almost no benefit to striping a drive if you are then streaming data from it over your network.

For me, the whole point of NAS would be a reliable storage space which can be accessed from all your other devices. Striping the drive exponentially increases your chances of losing all your data which is the opposite of what you would want in a storage server.

There isn't a whole lot of benefit to buying a RAID card unless you are going to get a serious hardware raid card. A cheap software supported RAID card won't be any better than the RAID support built into your mobo. If I was building this system I would save the money you were going to spend on RAID and invest it in a good external backup drive.

 

[Dougshell]

Thanks for the advice, i read up on RAID5 some more, and i think that is the best solution. I cant spend a fortune on drives so to have half my total storage (raid1) is a bit impractical. I would like to find a case that is a bit smaller, but one that still has decent airflow, but i think without getting an actual retail NAS they dont get much smaller and still ahve 4+drive bays.

this backup drive your talking about, that would just be a place to dump my desktop backups correct, or do you mean a backup for the NAS itself. because i cant afford to put 4tb into my nas then another 4tb to back it up

EDIT: BTW it is still very important that i find out if the info in the OP is correct about TLER not causing issues on linux. Because if so i am going to get 3 2TB Caviar Grean EARX/EARS drives and call it good.

 

[tachi1247]

whenever using any type of software based raid I would backup any critical data as there is always a chance your mobo fails which could render your entire array unreadable.

it is up to you to determine how much backup space you need. Depending on what you are storing, the data can be compressed so you may not need a full 1:1 ratio of backup storage.

 

[Dougshell]

there wont be any data in the array that i cant live without. I know people always recommend it but i have been buying my own hard drives for the last 9 years and i have had 1 DOA, and no drives that when bad. I really think i wold just claim a new drive through warranty and then re-download everything from usenet. Downloading by the season i could rebuild my entire array in a couple of days.


BTW: I just found 4 RE4 1TB drives in my house. My roommate has a stalker/lover/friend that is a First Class Nuclear Machinist mate. (navy google if you need a ref) and he just reenlisted for 90k. He built her a computer which is fine and dandy. Nice specs, 12gb ram, amd x6, nice for photoshop. Then i looked in there and saw the RE4s. I guess what pissed me off is two of them are not plugged in. I think i might offer to trade her my 1 and 2TB caviar black and put those in an array. (jealousy sucks)

 

[Dougshell]

So I have decided to go with a Seagate 2TB drive for my array

No TLER Issues - SEAGATE

Now i just need to decide whether or not i am happy with the choice of case, and i am ready to checkout.

 

[Dougshell]

Well seeing as I am retarded, that board doesnt even support raid.

So maybe this build wont be as cheap as i hoped.

 

[Automata]

You don't need to do RAID for FreeNAS. It uses ZFS and puts the drives in a pool. It will handle all the calculations through software.

When it comes to the drives themselves, TLER/whatever does not cause issues in software RAID. Meaning, the "reviews" you linked are worthless. Regardless, it should work fine. I would still suggest Hitachi over them, though.

 

[Dougshell]

You suggest the hitatchi for failure rate, or something else. And what your saying is i can in theory get ANY drive for use with FREENAS since it isnt actual raid.

 

[Automata]

ZFS is technically a type of software RAID. "TLER problems" only show up when the RAID controller (software or hardware) drops a drive from the array after a period of unresponsiveness. Since software RAID usually waits for a disk forever, this isn't a problem as the drive will eventually respond once it hits the TLER time limit.

I suggest Hitachi because they work well for me. I'm currently running 25 TB of raw disk (7x 1TB, 9x 2TB) and I'm using a real hardware RAID controller. I've been running the 1TB drives for over two years and they are still working great. There are many on these forums (and even more on others) that prefer Hitachi for server usage because they are cheap and respond well to RAID environments compared to other drives.