Not sure where to start

[paltomare]

Not sure where to start....type of RAID?

Having a bit of information overload from reading all of the threads.

Is there general agreement on what type of RAID to use for a media server?

I have 7TB of movies/music/photos that I want put on a NAS and share across a home network.

I think I need RAID to get the capacity and some room for expansion and I would like to be able to replace a failed drive on the fly.

Not so concerned with backup because I will have individual 2 TB USB drives with a copy of the data in a fire safe.

Are those enough parameters to suggest the appropriate RAID conf?

Thanks.

 

[JoeJoe]

7TB is a lot of data.

If you go with RAID5, with 4 drives, it will give you the capacity of amost 3 drives of equal size. For example, get 4 x 3TB drives, will give you about 9 TB of storage space.

What is your price range for a diskless NAS?
Depending on how you see your system growing, you might want to consider NAS systems with more than 4 bays.

 

[GregN]

Have you considered building your own RAID box? Do you have a budget?

You should be aware that it is very difficult to transition full drives into a NAS, you'd most likely have to buy more than 7 more terabytes of of storage to move to a NAS, you probably need at least a four bay NAS that supports 3TB drives, or a five bay, which with cheaper 2TB drives will handle just over 7+ TB at Raid 5 ( 1.8 * 4 )

If you choose to build your own, you could save major bucks, if you read the DIY SAN article from page one, you could build a hot swap NAS for around $1.4K or better, that includes the drives to support 14.5TB. You could go FreeNAS, OpenFiler or Nexentastor as a NAS OS, or just run windows with a raid card.

You could also try a WHS box, which might be more amenable to transitioning your 7TB without new drives. Not sure.

 

[paltomare]

Thanks your response.

7TB is becoming hard to manage.

I was hoping to keep this between $500-$1,000 but that might not be realistic.

I would like some room for expansion but do not anticipate huge amounts, the bulk of the ripping is complete. Is double the current amount of data a good rule of thumb?

I've read RAID 5 is no longer recommended with larger disk sizes but I don't understand why to be honest.

Current data is on multiple USB 2TB drives which I thought I would copy over the NAS and keep these drives as backup.

I have built PC's in the past but nothing like like what I need now. I thought having the support that comes with a pre-built system would be important.

 

[thiggins]

If you are concerned about drive failure, higher level RAID (6, 10) can provide a bit more peace of mind at the expense of less available space.

Real-world performance gain will be minimal.

 

[paltomare]

If you are concerned about drive failure, higher level RAID (6, 10) can provide a bit more peace of mind at the expense of less available space.

Real-world performance gain will be minimal.

This kinda gets back to my original post. Since 100% uptime isn't so important would RAID 5 be what most folks recommend for a media server?

 

[JoeJoe]

This kinda gets back to my original post. Since 100% uptime isn't so important would RAID 5 be what most folks recommend for a media server?

I'm just one person, but I use RAID5, and backup the much smaller amount important data to another cheaper NAS that uses RAID1.

Using a 5 or 6 or 8 bay NAS is like putting all your eggs in one basket. The HDs might be fine, but the NAS itself might break. That is why people use multiple NAS systems. It can get expensive if you let it.

 

[stevech]

How do Google, Amazon S3 and all of them deal with the risk of a NAS corrupting whole file systems? Simply off-line storage (are tape juke boxes still around?) At their scale, they can't very well have near 100% redundancy at the file system level, can they?

Smaller data scale, like a large bank or brokerage, might afford brute force redundancy.

 

[stevech]

This kinda gets back to my original post. Since 100% uptime isn't so important would RAID 5 be what most folks recommend for a media server?

I'd say, for home use, a RAID1 NAS with automated/effective backup daily (differential) to an external drive is a good way to go. And a lot cheaper. But beware not having off-site for protecting from theft of computer gear. But if you have an always-on Windows or Linux PC, or a HTPC, just use shares on that.