building a new NAS for a small business

[skgan]

Hi have an old OptiPlex 745 with Intel Core 2 Duo processor and 4 GB of RAM that I would like to convert into a NAS system. There are only two SATA ports on the motherboard. I would want to implement it using NAS4Free (FreeNAS) OS

Requirements of the NAS
1) atleast 6 TB of storage
2) allows simultaneous access by at least 3 windows systems
3)

Questions:
1) is the NAS4Free the easiest way to implement it (I am new to entire NAS implementation)
2) Which RAID gconfiguration gives me best of performance and redundancy
3) Do I need a SATA card to increase the ports, if so which card would you recommend
4) Are WD RED HDD's the best hard drives for such a NAS configuration
5) Will I need a small SSD for installing the OS?
6) how can I increase the write speeds in such a system.

Thank you

 

[manofchalk]

1. I wish I knew the answer, thinking of making a NAS myself. Far as I can tell, FreeNAS and NAS4Free are both basically the same.

2. Given you only have two ports (which may or may not even support RAID) then your options are RAID 1 and 0. RAID 1 gets you redundancy at the cost of halving your storage capacity, RAID0 gets you double performance but at twice the risk of losing data due to hardware failure. Your probably best off with a RAID 10 array, which is two RAID 0's in a RAID 1. You get performance and redundancy, but not without some cost.
This might help.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RYBtmVMtH1g
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TuwjadbtUCY

3. If you want more than two drives yes. Get any card that supports however many ports you want and uses SATAIII, its not until your spending big money where theres any difference.

4. WD Red's are optimzed for RAID'ed use, if thats what your after then their a good option.

5. From my understanding your fine to run the OS off a flash drive just plugged into the machine, no need to buy an SSD.

6. RAID0 or RAID10, or faster drives.

 

[skgan]

Thank you for the quick response.

Will this card work for my purposes of having 4 HDD in software RAID using FreeNAS
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816124064
or
http://www.amazon.com/IO-Crest-HyperDuo-Brackets-SI-PEX40057/dp/B00AZ9T264/

1. I wish I knew the answer, thinking of making a NAS myself. Far as I can tell, FreeNAS and NAS4Free are both basically the same.

2. Given you only have two ports (which may or may not even support RAID) then your options are RAID 1 and 0. RAID 1 gets you redundancy at the cost of halving your storage capacity, RAID0 gets you double performance but at twice the risk of losing data due to hardware failure. Your probably best off with a RAID 10 array, which is two RAID 0's in a RAID 1. You get performance and redundancy, but not without some cost.
This might help.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RYBtmVMtH1g
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TuwjadbtUCY

3. If you want more than two drives yes. Get any card that supports however many ports you want and uses SATAIII, its not until your spending big money where theres any difference.

4. WD Red's are optimzed for RAID'ed use, if thats what your after then their a good option.

5. From my understanding your fine to run the OS off a flash drive just plugged into the machine, no need to buy an SSD.

6. RAID0 or RAID10, or faster drives.

 

[choucove]

I would highly recommend staying away from those cheap add-in SATA cards. First, the quality is quite abysmal for supporting RAID, meaning you are putting your data at serious risk for corruptions or complete loss if the RAID controller fails. Trust me, I learned this the hard way. Additionally, each of these cards you linked to is only a single PCI-Express x1 slot, which means that you may very well be hindering your performance because there is not enough throughput. If you are concerned with protecting your data in a RAID array, then you should invest in a decent RAID controller capable of handling what you are needing to do.

The Dell Optiplex 745 utilizes PCI-Express 1.0a, and has a single x1 and a single x16 slot. To get a decent throughput you would need to put an add-in card into the PCI-Express x16 slot, even if the card is only an x4 or x8 physical card. However, if you already have an add-in card occupying that slot (such as a graphics card) then this option really isn't possible.

Depending upon your needs and overall budget to complete this, you can find many pre-configured NAS devices for not much more than a decent RAID controller may cost. Just another option to consider depending upon what you are looking for and what you intend to spend.

 

[skgan]

I finally decided to buy Synology DS413 unit with 4 WD RED HDD's and use it on a static IP.

 

[FireWire2]

I guess my post is too late, but maybe for other member who look for DIY NAS.
Yes you can make a NAS out of OptiPlex 745 can be up to 32TB of storage and can be fast!.
most of the NAS on the market are software RAID (Fake RAID), you can implement hw raid on the DIY NAS.
Get SPM394 http://www.amazon.com/Port-Multiplier-SATA-hardware-controller/dp/B004JPHAF0
Create a 6TB RAID5 with HS from 5x 2TB or
6TB from 3x 3TB
8GB USB pen, install Openfiler to it
Connect SPM394 to MB's SATA port, the remain SATA port can be use for expansion
Boot from USB
Login the GUI you should see a 6TB volume readily to configure.

The performance is depend on the NIC.
Worst case add a Intel GbE PCIe
Easily transfer data @ 94MB/s sustain in Gb network

 

[popatim]

You keep leaving out the fact that if their sata controller doesnt support port multiplication then this device is useless.

 

[FireWire2]

Popatim
Where that you learn this controller needs SATA host with PM? It does not

That is the beauty of this driver-less hardware raid controller !

Please allow me explain.
Once the HDDs configure as a RAID, practically the WHOLE five drives become ONE HUGE SINGLE SATA drive with build in redundancy.

A HUGE SINGLE SATA drive, therefore ANY SATA host will work and no drivers required.

Just plug in and it shows up in the BIOS, freely moving from system to system.

Example: it was using in Windows Vista 32, now plug to Windows 8. You won't have ANY problem seeing RAID's data

Only when you need to see 5x individual drives, then PM host is required.

- W/O PM SATA host protocol is ONE to ONE
- With PM SATA host protocol is ONE to ONE and/or ONE to MANY

Here is my 40TB NAS/iSCSI with these controllers
http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/265641-32-40tb-server-performance-issue