tstack77

Thank you Strike, that explanation helps a lot. Still one thing I'm trying to fully understand. Is there another option to where I simply want to fill up the array drives based on a folder structure in cache? Let's say I have three drives where #1 is pictures, #2 videos, and #3 apps. Can I write to a picture folder in cache where it will then always write to the picture drive in the array? I'm coming from a long history of muscle memory of manually organizing my data this way and I still like the idea in case I ever need to pull a drive for some reason and have it still work in a different system. I'm sure this will all make complete sense once I'm actually up and running (wasted 2 days copying files to a new 12tb drive only to find out that midnight commander (mc) didn't actually complete a copy as I didn't stay logged into the session (all good now after reading up on tmux and terminal sessions 😆)

"Cache to arrayUse case: Moving files from your high-speed cache to the array for long-term storage. In the share settings, set Primary Storage to Cache and Secondary Storage to Array. Set the Mover action to Cache -> Array. The Mover runs automatically based on your schedule to transfer files. Manual Mover runs are possible but not necessary. " Ok, this is new and worth exploring while I wait the 15 hours for my 8tb drive to transfer to an xfs disk. I'm halfway understanding this and trying to document my situation for future readers. I clearly need to read up on "share settings" and will provide future edits below as I come across questions (might be a bit of stream of consciousness) and provide clarification once I have a better understanding of the machinations here 👍 Edit 1: I am still a bit lost on the difference between array and pool...not that I don't get the idea behind what they offer, but why is a "pool" different than simply having an array cache? "Allocation methodWhen you create a new user share or add any file or folder inside it, the system needs to decide where to store this data. Usually, it will choose the data disk that has the most free space available. However, you can adjust how this decision is made using certain settings. There are three straightforward options you can select for how the system allocates storage for your user share: High-Water (Recommended) Most-Free Fill-Up How it worksThe High-water method progressively fills disks using "switch points" based on half the largest drive's capacity. This balances disk usage while keeping related files together and minimizing drive spin-ups. Example with 8TB, 3TB, and 2TB drivesFirst pass: Fill 8TB drive until 4TB free remains (half of 8TB). Second pass: Fill 8TB/3TB drives until 2TB free remains. Third pass: Fill all drives until 1TB free remains." Edit 2: Ok now thoroughly confused as I'm ultimately going for 3 separate disks and not a single conglomeration (pool?). Am I missing the point of unraid if I want to have an easy rebuild point of each disk in case of failure?

Thank you, Frank! I started the process a few hours ago and already canceled the first parity sync as it was going to take 13 hours to confirm nothing was on two drives lol...great idea to have simply not assigned a parity drive to begin with. In the meantime I've discovered that it's important to also first install plugins and learned of the great preinstalled tool of mc (midnightcommander). The documentation of unraid is missing a comprehensive tutorial (that is easy to find) for someone looking to migrate over from another service... even their getting started page has broken links (Learn more about storage management) 🤪 I look forward to discovering how the cache files are automatically part of the share as I have yet to come to that part of the process, thank you again for the insight!

I currently have a 13+yr running home server setup with OMV on an i3-2100T system with a 240gb m.2 drive and 2x 12tb & 2x 8tb hdds. In the past year I've setup a separate proxmox hypervisor (12th gen i5 with 128gb RAM) to run all compute tasks and have simply used the older OMV system for storage (without the parity insurance). I'm looking to ditch OMV and use unraid, NAS only, and would appreciate any input from the community. After a bit of research my plan is to use xfs for both the cache and the hdd array, use one of the 12tb as parity and allocate the remaining 3 disks (12+8+8tb) as three distinct drives in the array (not a pool?). The three disks will be personal photos/videos/owncloud storage (12tb), media/arr (8tb), and personal business/document backup (8tb). I have a few questions assuming this is the best starting point: Is the 240gb NVME enough for simple initial cache storage before transferring to the array? Is there a real time schedular that monitors folders on the cache drive to immediately send to the array, or is this a function that happens nightly/weekly/etc? If the cache drive is scheduled for a later transfer to the array, how do I access the data between initial cache and transfer? Is the data tagged somehow with the ultimate destination drive or is there a waiting period for accessing until it has transferred to the array? In proxmox is it better to use NFS or samba shares? What are my blindspots to using unraid for this solution and is there a better initial setup for both simplicity and reliability? I appreciate any insight here as I'm either over or underthinking this 😜