[SOLVED] NAS QNAP TS-431X-2G

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Colin_52

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Jul 30, 2017
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Hello,,

I need to purchase a NAS and a hard drive to go with it. All I'm going to be storing are movies and streaming them by Ethernet. Does anyone have any experience with the QNAP TS-431X-2G? and whats your impression of it?
Can you install different size hard drives in it?
At the moment I have 2x4tb disks in a hard drive enclosure that I'll need to transfer the data onto a 8tb NAS drive. So i'll want to run the NAS drive with 1 hard drive into begin with. I'll probably use JBOD. Can I run a NAS with 1 drive?
 
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USAFRet
I have a TS-453a. It has been absolutely rock solid in over 3 years of 24/7 power on.

Yes you can have different size drives.
Yes you can run it with a single drive.
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i'm about to buy the NAS drive with a Seagate IronWolf 8TB NAS hard drive.
Quick question, i want to begin with 1 hard drive then in a few months add another to act as a back up. If I begin with 1 hard drive as a jbod can I change it to a different raid without loosing the data? I'm sure you can't change raids without loosing data but what about jbod? or is there another way I don't know about?
 
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Colin_52 said:
i'm about to buy the NAS drive with a Seagate IronWolf 8TB NAS hard drive.
Quick question, i want to begin with 1 hard drive then in a few months add another to act as a back up. If I begin with 1 hard drive as a jbod can I change it to a different raid without loosing the data? I'm sure you can't change raids without loosing data but what about jbod? or is there another way I don't know about?
Click to expand...
JBOD, you can add new drives as needed.
Changing to some different type of RAID = a full reformat.

But if you want this second drive to be a "backup" that would NOT be in the same JBOD volume.
You'd just add that drive as its own volume, and cause the QNAP to backup as desired.
 
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Hey,, thanks for replying..

So just so I got this, I add 1x hdd and populate it ,Then when I add the second drive in a few months, I can set the NAS to copy/back up the 1st hdd to the 2nd?
What raid would I set the 1st hdd to, and can I run that raid with a single hdd? just until I get the 2nd hdd..

one last scenario....

After i have 1 full hdd and a second hdd that is a clone of the 1st, i'll need to add a 3rd hdd to start using. Can i add a 3rd disk while hdd's 1&2 are working as stated, then clone the 3rd with a 4th at a later date?
so, disk 2 is a clone of 1, disk 4 is a clone of 3..

sorry for keep going on

much appreciate your feedback!
 
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With a single drive, there is no real "RAID".
You'll be setting it up as a single drive. Look into JBOD, RAID Group 1.

Drive 1 will be a single volume. Later, you add Drive 2 as another Volume, RAID Group 2. You can then cause the QNAP to back up Volume 1 to Volume 2. Daily, or on whatever schedule you wish.
If you want an actual RAID 1 mirror when you put in the second drive, both drives will need to be fully reformatted, and all existing data wiped.
 
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I know this is an old thread, but things came up and the purchase was delayed. Well Christmas is coming up and I've put this on my list.
QNAP TS-431X-2G
4x 8tb Seagate IronWolf, ST8000VNZ004

Plan on running raid 5.

I got a theoretical question.

If the NAS fails but the hdd are fine. Can i place the hdd's in a new NAS the same make and model without loosing the data?

looking forward to getting this set up, not so sure on transferring 7tb of data over lol
 
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Colin_52 said:
I know this is an old thread, but things came up and the purchase was delayed. Well Christmas is coming up and I've put this on my list.
QNAP TS-431X-2G
4x 8tb Seagate IronWolf, ST8000VNZ004

Plan on running raid 5.

I got a theoretical question.

If the NAS fails but the hdd are fine. Can i place the hdd's in a new NAS the same make and model without loosing the data?

looking forward to getting this set up, not so sure on transferring 7tb of data over lol
Click to expand...
"If the NAS fails but the hdd are fine. Can i place the hdd's in a new NAS the same make and model without loosing the data? "

Probably.

But...4x 8TB + RAID 5 = 24TB space.
If this were filled, say, to 16TB....replace a single drive and rebuild that may take 2 full days.
2 days of all drives being hammered continuously.

RAID 5 is contraindicated for large drives like this.
 
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You helped me out of a previous post, i was getting info on what raid to use. My issue is that i want protection and want as much available space as possible. I'm only storing my backed up copies of movies.

raid 0 or jbod, no protection
raid 1, i loose 2 hdd's for protection
raid 5....

Obviously you know your stuff and i don't lol... but you mentioned in my previous post you would run it as:
2 drives in a JBOD volume, to hold the Movie lib
1 drive in a single volume to hold the Music lib
1 drive (10-12-14TB?) to hold an actual backup of the others.

I'm not not sure what to do? i can't get a drive that large enough to back up potentially 24tb of data, rather than a run a raid 5.

Why do you advise against raid 5 apart from the size of disk?

thanks for your help as always
 
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If this is to be a second copy of this data...an actual backup, then maybe a RAID 5.
If it is the only copy, then the RAID 5 is not optimal.

Again, the RAID 5 or RAID 1 only protects against physical drive fail. It still needs an actual second copy somewhere, to protect against all the other forms of data loss.


But, the rebuild time on a RAID 5 with large data space like that will be long.
Lets say we have 4x 8TB, RAID 5. All 4 drives of the same make/model, bought at the same time
One of them dies from whatever.

Put in a new one, rebuild the array.
The remaining 3 originals are potentially going to die of that same thing the first one did. And rebuilding that array is hammering on them 100% for a couple of days, non stop.
 
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I'm buying all new drives, all the same brand and size. The NAS will be the only place i store my movies.

I'm trying to protect against physical drive failure only and if that does happen, be able to get that data back form the remaining 3 drives. If a small part of the data is lost i can replace it, but if a whole drive is lost it's a bigger set back. 7tb is about 450 movies... don't fancy re-ripping all of these again..

Thanks for your help, i do appreciate it
 
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Colin_52 said:
I'm buying all new drives, all the same brand and size. The NAS will be the only place i store my movies.

I'm trying to protect against physical drive failure only and if that does happen, be able to get that data back form the remaining 3 drives. If a small part of the data is lost i can replace it, but if a whole drive is lost it's a bigger set back. 7tb is about 450 movies... don't fancy re-ripping all of these again..

Thanks for your help, i do appreciate it
Click to expand...
A RAID 5 will survive the physical death of 1 drive. All data will be retained.
7TB will take most of a day to rebuild upon insertion of a replacement.
 
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That's true, i meant digitally...

Also,
On the Q-NAP web interface, how do i check what raid it is? I set it up as raid 5 when started the install but from what i can see on "Storage & Snapshot" it says:
Disk Info, Disk health, Action, Raid Group.
Under raid group it says Raid Group 1 ?

any advise?
 
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Storage
Disks/VJBOD
Select one of the drives
Select the RAID group
RAID group information

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