Seeking NAS Solutions: Advice Needed for Small Operation

[Kiara_taylor]

Hey Community,

 

We're a small crew of about 20 people and our data is currently sitting on a Windows Server DC with some backup measures in place. We don't have a ton of data, but what we do have is super important.

 

After a recent scare with drive failures, I'm thinking it's time to move our data to a separate machine. I've been looking into options, but I'm feeling overwhelmed.

 

Do we need a NAS? Does it have to run on Windows? What about SAS drives?

 

Our needs are simple:

 

- Not a lot of storage required (even 10TB would do)
- Protection against drive failures (daily backups are a must)
- Files need to be accessible on Windows via UNC Path

 

Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

[Miss_Sissy]

I'm going to give you some general advice because it sounds like that's what you are asking for.  

 

If you're feeling overwhelmed, I recommend that you hire a consulting engineer near you who has done this sort of thing before.  When dealing with business-critical data, you don't want to experiment and try to learn on your own.

 

Protection against drive failures is something best accomplished through RAID, not backups.  For example, on our primary NAS, up to two of the six discs can fail without the NAS going offline or losing any data.  On our secondary NAS, which has less valuable data, one of the five drives can fail without data loss.  There are various forms of RAID and they can be configured to survive multiple drive failures.  To use an extreme example, you could buy four 18TB drives and configure RAID so that you would lose no data even if only one of the three remained functional.  

 

Backups are for dealing with a catastrophic data loss, whether through flood, fire, malware, hackers, or some other act of God, Satan, or the Flying Spaghetti Monster.  For that reason, you should follow some sort of backup strategy that puts backups offsite -- possibly in cloud storage or possibly on physical media.

 

Based on what you've shared, my first thoughts would be an Unraid NAS that supports SAMBA protocol and automatic snapshots (snapshots let you roll back disks and directories to their state at some prior time).  Unraid with a single ZFS pool consisting of four physical disks configured as RAID-Z2 would give you the abiliy to have half of the four discs fail simultaneously without any data loss, while supporting the aforementioned snapshots.  

 

My reason for suggesting Unraid is not because this is an Unraid forum.  I'm on the Unraid forum because I've tried multiple commercial and open source NAS solutions and I think that Unraid is the best NAS OS, especially from a user interface perspective.

 

I hope that I have left you with fewer questions rather than more.  But remember that free advice is often worth what you pay for it, so don't trust me and especially don't trust anyone who disagrees with me!

[Michael_P]

14 hours ago, Miss_Sissy said:

Protection against drive failures is something best accomplished through RAID, not backups.  For example, on our primary NAS, up to two of the six discs can fail without the NAS going offline or losing any data.  On our secondary NAS, which has less valuable data, one of the five drives can fail without data loss.

 

14 hours ago, Miss_Sissy said:

Backups are for dealing with a catastrophic data loss, whether through flood, fire, malware, hackers, or some other act of God, Satan, or the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

 

unRaid or RAID(1,5,10,whatever) does absolutely nothing to protect data. RAID is for maintaining uptime - period.

 

It doesn't take a catastrophe to cause data loss, a simple press of the delete key is sufficient. That's why an actual, tested, backup strategy is critical for critical data. 3 copies, 2 on different media, and 1 offsite is the standard. 

[Miss_Sissy]

4 hours ago, Michael_P said:

unRaid or RAID(1,5,10,whatever) does absolutely nothing to protect data. RAID is for maintaining uptime - period.

You are incorrect.  Without redundant RAID, a single drive failure can lead to the loss of all data added or changed since the last full, incremental, or differential backup.

 

4 hours ago, Michael_P said:

It doesn't take a catastrophe to cause data loss...

 

 

Nice strawman.  I never suggested that only catastrophes cause data loss.  When I referred to "catastrophic data loss," I was talking about to the magnitude of the loss, not the cause.  But I think that you knew that.

 

5 hours ago, Michael_P said:

a simple press of the delete key is sufficient.

 

Deleting a file or a directory tree is not a catastrophic data loss on any competently run NAS and network.  It's an inconvenience that needs to be resolved through the use of snapshots, revision control systems, and other tools regularly employed on modern networks.

 

5 hours ago, Michael_P said:

That's why an actual, tested, backup strategy is critical for critical data. 3 copies, 2 on different media, and 1 offsite is the standard. 

 

Had you read the entirety of my post, you would have seen that I addressed the importance of backups, including offsite storage.  

 

What I did not do was propose a one-size-fits-all backup strategy that I claimed was "the standard" (without citations) for critical data.  I'd need a lot more information from the client before devising a backup strategy to fit their business needs.

[ChatNoir]

Please, keep your debates under control and preferably not on a third party's thread.

[TimTheSettler]

On 3/11/2024 at 7:55 AM, Kiara_taylor said:

Do we need a NAS? Does it have to run on Windows? What about SAS drives?

 

Our needs are simple:

 

- Not a lot of storage required (even 10TB would do)
- Protection against drive failures (daily backups are a must)
- Files need to be accessible on Windows via UNC Path

 

First of all I completely agree with @Miss_Sissy's post.  She gives good advice.  I would add that it might be a good idea to hire one of the paid support people to help you through the process (https://unraid.net/blog/unraid-paid-support).

 

I was a Windows guy but Windows was getting too expensive for me and all the software that ran on Windows just as expensive.  I needed a more reliable but cheaper option that had a good GUI (I'm not a Linux guy).  I tried TrueNAS and it's good and powerful but complicated.  I tried unRAID and I really like it.  I think you will too.

 

[Michael_P]

13 hours ago, Miss_Sissy said:

"the standard" (without citations) for critical data.

 

It's well enough known to anyone that 'competently runs NAS and network', but you know that. Here's the citation for those that don't (straight from CISA):

https://www.cisa.gov/sites/default/files/publications/data_backup_options.pdf

 

[_cjd_]

My strategy:

Active shares are on SSD raid 10 - speed is needed and this is still the bottleneck at the moment, but good enough for now. I'm limited by PCI lanes on the current server hardware.

This backs up to same machine spinning disk traditional unraid array with dual parity on a regular cadence. Scheduled so each happens to a different disk - this is an attempt to double down on the ability to lose multiple disks but still get files quickly in a crisis (as the most recent known good target disk can be spun up and read on its own if needed, without an array rebuild first)

This unraid machine syncs to another unraid machine on a slightly different schedule. Still same site but different location.

Off-site backup at the moment is manual (sync to physical hot swap disk and store in a secure off-site location) but backblaze is in the plan if I can do so within the limits of currently available internet speeds...

May or may not be a good strategy, but it's been easy to adapt and change as learning happens.

[primeval_god]

On 3/11/2024 at 7:55 AM, Kiara_taylor said:

We're a small crew of about 20 people and our data is currently sitting on a Windows Server DC with some backup measures in place. We don't have a ton of data, but what we do have is super important.

I will start with a boiler plate opinion of mine which is, unRAID should not be used for business purposes, especially without someone who is deeply familiar with the OS. unRAID is designed for home usage and (in my opinion) the security and support guarantees are not at a level that meets the needs of a business. If you have no experience with NAS devices my recommendation would be to look into a totally off the shelf solution like something from Synology or a similar company. They are more expensive, but the support and reliability are more inline with business needs.

 

On 3/11/2024 at 7:55 AM, Kiara_taylor said:

Do we need a NAS?

It sounds like that may be what you are looking for. A NAS is just a dedicated network storage device, not unlike the windows server you are already using though typically focused on file storage only.

 

On 3/11/2024 at 7:55 AM, Kiara_taylor said:

Does it have to run on Windows?

No, most NAS devices dont run windows and happily co-exist and support windows networks. One word of caution though, typically you should have someone familiar with Linux if you intend to integrate a linux machine on a windows network. This is less important if you are using a NAS appliance solution that just happens to be Linux based (synology, unRAID, etc), but if a generic linux server distro (debian, ubuntu, etc) is something you are considering then you want someone who knows about integrating linux in a windows network environment.

 

On 3/11/2024 at 7:55 AM, Kiara_taylor said:

Our needs are simple:

 

- Not a lot of storage required (even 10TB would do)
- Protection against drive failures (daily backups are a must)
- Files need to be accessible on Windows via UNC Path

 

Any advice would be greatly appreciated!

Here are a few more bits of advice for you (I am not looking to argue with any of the other replies above). It is important to understand the difference between RAID (which in this case includes RAID like solutions like the unRAID array) and the different forms of backup. RAID IS NOT BACKUP. RAID is meant to protect against hardware (specifically disk) failure and keep your data available if a disk should fail (downtime costs money). There are many things that it does not protect against including, corruption, accidental file deletion, filesystem problems, intentional (malicious) file deletion, and others. That is why a good backup strategy is crucial regardless of your hardware redundancies. Some things to consider for backup, you must have multiple physically separate copies of your data. Typically a local copy (on another machine or a removeable disk), and an offsite copy (cloud based or the old disk in a safety deposit box) are recommended. Retention strategies are also important, i.e. how often are backups done and how long are they kept. You might for instance have filesystem snapshots done on you data hourly, which get kept for a week, and daily backups to your local and offsite solution which get kept for a months and weekly backups that are retained for longer (note this is an off the wall example, not advice on a specific solution). Finally an very importantly, you must periodically test your ability to restore from all your various backup locations. You never want to be in a position where you need to restore from a backup only to find that it hasnt been working for some reason.

 

Another thing that you should consider is the type of files you are storing and how they need to be accessed. For instance you NAS solution could look very different depending on if you are storing mostly text files, or media files like video. Also important is how many people/machines need access to the file at once and at what kind of speed. 

[Miss_Sissy]

11 hours ago, Michael_P said:

 

It's well enough known....

As we have been asked by a moderator to cease debating in this thread, I will abide by his direction.

[mavrrick]

I think there are a few very good points made so far based on the posts.

 

There are differences between trying to maintain uptime vs trying to protecting the data. Both are generally wanted in a business environment and both can cause significant issues if not addressed. RAID has allot of flavors now and is mainly used as a way to ensure uptime. Backups can be accomplished using some kind of replication, or a physical device like a removable hard drive, tape backups, or even cloud backups(this has potential security concerns). 

 

I tend to agree with the statement above about using Unraid for a business as it could be problematic. Generally speaking if you want a 24/7 server that gets top teir support I don't think Unraid is the way to go simply as it seems oriented toward prosumers in home use.

 

There are allot of ways to try to address this. Literally you could take three old computers with two spinning drives each. Run Raid 1 between the drives then replicate between two of them in the office. Lastly backup to tape or a remote computer at a different office. 

 

That is like pushing the cheap option to it's limit. 

 

There is allot more that needs to be answered to really give allot of details though. Like budget, do you have multiple offices, what is the appetite for cloud backup, what is the performance level needed. 

 

If you are trying to do best practices though you probably want some kind of raid for all storage along with at least 3 hosts spread between two physical locations. 

 

 

[Kiara_taylor]

On 3/12/2024 at 4:47 AM, Miss_Sissy said:

Protection against drive failures is something best accomplished through RAID, not backups.  For example, on our primary NAS, up to two of the six discs can fail without the NAS going offline or losing any data.  On our secondary NAS, which has less valuable data, one of the five drives can fail without data loss.  There are various forms of RAID and they can be configured to survive multiple drive failures.  To use an extreme example, you could buy four 18TB drives and configure RAID so that you would lose no data even if only one of the three remained functional.  

Thanks for the comprehensive advice, @Miss_Sissy!  We really appreciate the breakdown of RAID for uptime and backups for disaster recovery.  The 3-2-1 backup strategy (3 copies, 2 media, 1 offsite) definitely sounds like a solid approach.

Considering a consultant is a great suggestion, especially for critical business data.  It's good to have expert guidance on our side.

On the topic of NAS options, we've also been looking into StoneFly.  They offer NAS appliances with features like RAID protection and scalability.  Have any of you had experience with StoneFly?  We'd love to hear your thoughts on their solutions compared to Unraid or other options.

Additionally, any insights on factors to consider when choosing between a consultant and a DIY approach would be valuable.  We're still weighing the pros and cons of each.
 

[Kiara_taylor]

On 3/12/2024 at 7:48 PM, Michael_P said:

 

 

unRaid or RAID(1,5,10,whatever) does absolutely nothing to protect data. RAID is for maintaining uptime - period.

 

It doesn't take a catastrophe to cause data loss, a simple press of the delete key is sufficient. That's why an actual, tested, backup strategy is critical for critical data. 3 copies, 2 on different media, and 1 offsite is the standard. 

Absolutely, data backups are essential!  Thanks for reiterating the importance of the 3-2-1 backup strategy.  We completely agree that RAID protects uptime, but backups are crucial for recovering from accidental deletion or other data loss scenarios.

[Kiara_taylor]

On 3/13/2024 at 7:31 AM, TimTheSettler said:

 

First of all I completely agree with @Miss_Sissy's post.  She gives good advice.  I would add that it might be a good idea to hire one of the paid support people to help you through the process (https://unraid.net/blog/unraid-paid-support).

 

I was a Windows guy but Windows was getting too expensive for me and all the software that ran on Windows just as expensive.  I needed a more reliable but cheaper option that had a good GUI (I'm not a Linux guy).  I tried TrueNAS and it's good and powerful but complicated.  I tried unRAID and I really like it.  I think you will too.

 

Sounds like Unraid has a big fan here!

 

Thanks for the recommendation and the link to the paid support (https://unraid.net/support/paid-support).

 

We'll definitely consider that if we decide to go the Unraid route. I hear you on the Windows cost factor.

Finding a balance between affordability, reliability, and user-friendliness is key for us. I have reviewed some options like Stonefly and others.

We'll check out TrueNAS too, but Unraid seems promising based on your experience, especially with the GUI aspect.

Really appreciate the insights! Do you have any idea about StoneFly NAS storage? If so, please share information and thoughts about it.
 

[Kiara_taylor]

On 3/13/2024 at 6:40 PM, _cjd_ said:

My strategy:

Active shares are on SSD raid 10 - speed is needed and this is still the bottleneck at the moment, but good enough for now. I'm limited by PCI lanes on the current server hardware.

 

Wow, that's a very thorough backup plan!  The combination of SSD RAID 10 for speed, a mirrored array with dual parity for redundancy, and syncing between two Unraid machines provides impressive protection at different levels.

This highlights the importance of tailoring a data storage strategy to specific needs.  For your setup, redundancy and speed seem paramount.
While Unraid offers a compelling DIY approach, some businesses might prefer a more turnkey solution.  

 

Have you considered StoneFly NAS appliances?  They offer features like RAID protection and scalability with a user-friendly interface.

We're still exploring options, and your experience with Unraid is valuable.  Would you be willing to share any pros and cons of the DIY approach compared to a pre-configured NAS solution like StoneFly?
 

[Kiara_taylor]

On 3/14/2024 at 8:54 PM, mavrrick said:

I tend to agree with the statement above about using Unraid for a business as it could be problematic. Generally speaking if you want a 24/7 server that gets top teir support I don't think Unraid is the way to go simply as it seems oriented toward prosumers in home use.

 

There are allot of ways to try to address this. Literally you could take three old computers with two spinning drives each. Run Raid 1 between the drives then replicate between two of them in the office. Lastly backup to tape or a remote computer at a different office.

We definitely need both for our business data.  The RAID flavors explanation is helpful, especially knowing it focuses on uptime.  Backups with replication or physical media like you mentioned sound like good options to explore further.

Thanks for the feedback on Unraid for business use.  We'll keep that in mind as we weigh the pros and cons.  24/7 server support is definitely important, so we'll factor that into our decision.

Your "pushing the cheap option" example is a good reality check!  We appreciate the reminder to consider factors like budget, multiple locations, cloud options, and performance needs.

Following best practices sounds like the way to go, so RAID and multiple hosts across locations seem like strong options to explore further.
Thanks for mentioning the need for more details.  

 

We're still figuring things out, so we might come back with a clearer picture of our budget, office situation, and specific needs to get more tailored advice.  Really appreciate your insights!
 

[Miss_Sissy]

4 hours ago, Kiara_taylor said:

Thanks for the comprehensive advice, @Miss_Sissy!  We really appreciate the breakdown of RAID for uptime and backups for disaster recovery.  The 3-2-1 backup strategy (3 copies, 2 media, 1 offsite) definitely sounds like a solid approach.

Thank you for your courteous replies.  

 

Two points:  

1. Redundant RAID is not just for uptime.  It's also the data protection for all of the additions, deletions, and modifications to your data since your most recent backup, all of which you would lose if you had to go into disaster recovery mode and restore everything from the backup.  
2. The 3-2-1 strategy (mentioned by another user) is nearly 20 years old and slowly falling out of favor as more robust, modern strategies with names like 3-2-1-1-0 and 4-3-2 gain prominence.  See this Backblaze white paper and this Stonefly article which go into more detail than would be appropriate in a thread response here.  

 

4 hours ago, Kiara_taylor said:

We completely agree that RAID protects uptime, but backups are crucial for recovering from accidental deletion or other data loss scenarios.

 

Forms of RAID that provide snapshot capabilities, such as ZFS RAID, give you a recovery option without resorting to a separate backup. With a RAID mode that can survive individual drive failures, the snapshot capability relegates backups to something only pulled out when something catastrophic has happened (fire, flood, ransomware, etc.) or when you need to recover old (rather than recent) versions of files.

 

4 hours ago, Kiara_taylor said:

On the topic of NAS options, we've also been looking into StoneFly.  They offer NAS appliances with features like RAID protection and scalability.  Have any of you had experience with StoneFly?  We'd love to hear your thoughts on their solutions compared to Unraid or other options.

 

Unraid and Stonefly are on opposite ends of the spectrum, with Unraid being software aimed primarily at DIY home networking enthusiasts and Stonefly marketing their products as complete "Data Center Solutions."  Stonefly has been around for a long time and is well-respected.  You should talk to one of their reps and get a handle on the true costs, not only the cost of the RAID appliance(s) you would host locally.  Find out the cost of all ongoing services you would need from them, including cloud and support.  Determine what your firm's role would be in installing, configuring, and managing the Stonefly hardware and software.  Then think about whether you have someone on staff who can handle it and has the hours needed.  Not knowing more about your firm, your data, and your budget, that's about all I can suggest.

 

This March 13, 2024 review/article about Stonefly's offerings might be a good place to start.  I do not know the author or whether he has any conflicts of interest.

 

Good luck.

Edited March 18 by Miss_Sissy
Dumb editing mistake.

[mavrrick]

Something @Miss_Sissy started to touch on is that different tactics are used for different kinds of data protection. Here are a few concepts that kind of discuss them.

 

RAID "RAID" is generally thought of as used for Uptime since it is protects against a drive failure. The idea being depending on the RAID level/tech you can survive a certain number of drive losses. It can also under the correct circumstances boost performance over a single drive is capable of. Raid comes in two flavors which are hardware based raid and software raid. The industry is in many ways moving away from hardware raid as it generally isn't much of a benefit when you get into high speed SSD's and even more performant NVME drives. There are some great software raid solutions that also integrate LVM (logical Volume Managers) like ZFS which is a filesystem and raid technology combined. ZFS provides many advanced features that hardware raid can not like Snapshots, and data protection levels against bitrot and such that is hard to match with a hardware raid solutions.

 

Physical backup which is something like writing all your data to tape, drive, or some other medium is generally thought of as a Disaster recovery option. Think of this like what would happen in you had your server closet destroyed by something like a natural disastor, fire, flood, or some other accident in your office that would rendor the entire stack of gear useless. This is why RAID itself in it's purest form a backup. 

 

Snapshots are something that has grown more and more over the last 15 years or so. Think of a snapshot like taking pictures of your data at a given time, but keeping it near by the server so you could just drop it back in place in a moments notice if you needed to. These are clearly not backups perse, but allowing you the ability to return your data to a previous state in either a near in place roll back, or side by side on the same host. This can be great in the case you have a that over zealous employee that accidentally deleted a folder or a few files, or a share. These can also possibly help with recovering from a ransomware attack. Say a employee clicked that bad link and suddenly their computer started to encrypt everything on the shares they have access to. Well you could simply rollback to the most recent snapshot and recover with very little struggle.

 

Lastly there is replication. Replication is great from the standpoint of getting you multiple systems or multiple locations with your data fairly easily accessible, It has the possibility of even giving you a hot spare location so if your main location had a catastrophic event you could fail your activity to the  secondary system, but you always have to remember replication doesn't protect the data in the files themselves. It just means it is the same in two places. So in theory if you get garbage in the main location it is just going to be sent to the second. 

 

I am sure there are scenarios I didn't discuss, but I just wanted to through this out there to show there are so many different concepts to how to backup and protect your data. 

[Kiara_taylor]

On 3/18/2024 at 8:24 PM, Miss_Sissy said:

The 3-2-1 strategy (mentioned by another user) is nearly 20 years old and slowly falling out of favor as more robust, modern strategies with names like 3-2-1-1-0 and 4-3-2 gain prominence.  See this Backblaze white paper and this Stonefly article which go into more detail than would be appropriate in a thread response here.  

I wholeheartedly endorse this perspective. Your recommendation of these articles is greatly appreciated, and I'll certainly delve into them.

Edited March 26 by Kiara_taylor
spelling mistake

[Kiara_taylor]

On 3/18/2024 at 8:24 PM, Miss_Sissy said:

Unraid and Stonefly are on opposite ends of the spectrum, with Unraid being software aimed primarily at DIY home networking enthusiasts and Stonefly marketing their products as complete "Data Center Solutions."  Stonefly has been around for a long time and is well-respected.  You should talk to one of their reps and get a handle on the true costs, not only the cost of the RAID appliance(s) you would host locally.  Find out the cost of all ongoing services you would need from them, including cloud and support.  Determine what your firm's role would be in installing, configuring, and managing the Stonefly hardware and software.  Then think about whether you have someone on staff who can handle it and has the hours needed.  Not knowing more about your firm, your data, and your budget, that's about all I can suggest.

Thank you for bringing StoneFly and their product to my attention. After thorough research, I've concluded that they excel in providing data center solutions. I eagerly await contact with one of their representatives.

I'm grateful for your assistance in resolving my inquiries. Your responses on my thread were greatly appreciated! 🙂

Edited March 26 by Kiara_taylor