I'm a long time Plex fan, and was recently introduced to unRAID as a possible solution to my storage needs.

 

I tried very hard to resist the temptation, but found myself costing up systems, checking specifications and on a recent business trip to Taiwan for Computex, spent about half a day looking at components for a server that my heart wanted to build, but my head (and wife) were trying to resist. I was able to resist while in Taiwan, having decided to have a play with some old hardware once I got home (currently Seoul, Korea).

 

I managed to knock together a system out of an old ASRock P4 Motherboard, a 3.0 GHz Pentium 4, 512 MB RAM, 1 IDE HDD, and two laptop SATA drives. To my surprise, everything worked perfectly, and I was even able to install SSH, Plex and Squeezebox server on the system with just a few hours of playing and browsing forum posts on here. I should point out that due to the need for Plex on unRAID, I'm forced to use 5.0b, which so far seems very stable to me.

 

This was all good so far, but the system I had cobbled together was slow, noisy and very power in-efficient... it was time to give in to temptation.... So this last weekend, I bought and built the following system:

 

• Case: Lian Li PC-P50B
  
• Motherboard: Foxconn H67MP
  
• CPU: Intel i3 2100
  
• RAM: 2 x 2GB Samsung PC3-10600
  
• PSU: Antec Neo Eco 520
  

 

In the past, I had been using Western Digital MyBook Studio II external drives, configured as RAID 1 (hardly efficient!) and connected to Firewire 800 in a chain. I have 7 x 2TB models, and 2 x 4TB models, giving me storage capacity of 11TB; quite a bit, but much less than is possible in a 15 drive unRAID system. I also have 2 x 2TB EARS drives that I was using as backup storage.

 

My plan was to go through the process of moving data off these drives, and onto the new unRAID system, as each MyBook studio empties out, I'll move it's disks into the unRAID array. A slow process, but worthwhile in the long run.

 

The first 4TB MyBook is now de-commissioned, giving me 2TB in the unRAID array (2TB parity, 2TB data), this disk is now nearly full, which has allowed me to de-commission the second 4TB MyBook. One of these drives is now pre-clearing, and ready to increase the unRAID system to 4TB; the maximum I'm able to do on the free licence.

 

I've been using a USB key that by co-incidence, I was given at Computex, but I'll go out and buy a couple of Lexars this afternoon and get my order in for a Pro-licence so I'm not restricted for the future.

 

Now onto my questions....

 

1. The drives in the MyBook Studios that I've been using are EVDS and EADS drives. As I mentioned earlier, I also have a couple of 2TB EARS drives that I'll be adding to the system soon.

 

   - What is the difference between these drives, and what impact will that have on my unRAID configuration if any?

 

2. When I take the drives out of the MyBook Studio, they were formatted HFS+, with GPT partition tables. In unRAID, they don't need to be GPT, and my understanding is that they won't be if they're less than 2.2TB. When I used the pre-clear script on the latest drive, it gave me a warning that GPT was not supported.

 

   - Does it matter that the drives had GPT partition tables?

   - Will the GPT be replaced by MBR by the pre-clear script / unRAID system?

 

3. So far, I'm getting about 35 ~ 40 MB/sec write speed to the array, and arount 85 MB/sec read speed; pretty impressive, especially the read. I've heard that write speeds can be improved by upgrading the parity disk to a 7200rpm drive, and also by including a cache disk. I don't mind buying a new drive to improve things, but I also have a 2nd Generation Intel X25-M 80GB SSD I could use, and a 320GB Western Digital Scorpio Black that might be better. I'm guessing that an SSD cache has no benefit, because the bottleneck will become LAN throughput, not disk.

 

   - What drives are recommended for the parity disk, to improve performance?

   - What drives are recommended for the cache disk, my understanding is that this could be an SSD?

 

4. As I mentioned earlier, I'm using unRAID 5.0b, currently 5.0b7. I've found it to be very stable so far, and I've also found it very easy to add additional features. I've used the /extra/ folder on the flash drive, and I've also modified the bzroot using CPIO as mentioned on the forums. One of the biggest issues that I found during early testing with the P4 rig, is that the web based control of the array can get really confused if you're using some of the array disks for additional software that you've added. I'm reasonably happy working at the command line, and don't feel that I need to use add-ons like unMenu. As v5.0 is still in Beta, there doesn't seem to be a lot of clear information about what works and what doesn't.

 

   - What is the best way to add software to unRAID 5.0?

   - How can I safely start and stop the array from the command line / script?

   - How can I safely power down the system from the command line / script?

 

5. I understand that I'm using a new hardware configuration, and would be happy to run my system through the 'level' testing for hardware compatibility.

 

   - Does the 'level' testing only apply to 4.x software versions?

   - What is the process for submitting my results to have the hardware added to the wiki?

 

Woah, that was a lot of writing, not bad for a first post. I hope I've given enough information, and not bored anyone.

 

Neil.

now that I'm bored to death...

lol joke.

 

#1.

unRAID will not care about the different drive types. Thats a selling point of unRAID.

 

 

If i am not mistaken.. (and i have been before)

EVDS = Green AV drive. Made to run cool and run 24x7 for video recording

EURS = Similar to EVDS but can run at higher temps.

EADS = Standard Caviar green drive.

EARS = similar to the EADS but 4k sectors.

 

#2.

not sure. I did see something mentioned in the beta7 thread.

 

#3.

7200 parity disk wont help to much unless your data drives are also 7200rpm.

in theory there should be a minor boost, but not enough to make up for the extra heat and power to most people.

You are correct about the SSD not helping much. I would use that in a workstation/laptop or HTPC where it will be better used.

the 320gb drive would make a nice cache drive after you load up all of your data.