I'm thinking about trying unRaid on my little home server. I'll primarily be using it for Plex and general file management. I think the docker containers seem really cool. Right now I have a 1TB hard drive and a 128GB SSD in my server.

 

First question, is it required to use a parity drive? I know it's needed to keep your files safe I'm case of a drive failure but what of I don't care about data loss? Is it possible to not use a parity drive?

 

I'm planning on buying a 4TB Seagate NAS drove tonight. I assume if I use a parity drive this is the one I would want to use for it. So would I then only have 1TB usable from my other drive?

 

I don't have a lot of files right now but I want this to be expandable for the future which is why I'm buying a 4TB drive.

Thanks!

First question, is it required to use a parity drive? I know it's needed to keep your files safe I'm case of a drive failure but what of I don't care about data loss? Is it possible to not use a parity drive?

Not required, and as you already pointed out, there is no recovery from a drive failure without one.

I'm planning on buying a 4TB Seagate NAS drove tonight. I assume if I use a parity drive this is the one I would want to use for it. So would I then only have 1TB usable from my other drive?

Correct

 

Not required, and as you already pointed out, there is no recovery from a drive failure without one.

 

If I chose not to use a parity drive at first can I add one later or would I need to start over?

Not required, and as you already pointed out, there is no recovery from a drive failure without one.

 

If I chose not to use a parity drive at first can I add one later or would I need to start over?

Add it whenever you like.  Nothing needs to be started over.  It just has to be as large as (or larger) than the largest data drive.

I'm excited to get it set up. Do you think unRaid is a good solution for me if all I am using is a Plex server? I plan do do more later but this is all I will be starting with. Right now I am just running on Windows 10, but I thought unRaid would use less system resources and give more more powerful server features should I want to use them later.

 

As far as the parity drive goes, how does one single parity drive ensure the safety of all the other disks? One drive can't possibly store all the data from all the other drives.

 

 

I'm excited to get it set up. Do you think unRaid is a good solution for me if all I am using is a Plex server? I plan do do more later but this is all I will be starting with. Right now I am just running on Windows 10, but I thought unRaid would use less system resources and give more more powerful server features should I want to use them later.

Generally, apps on unRaid would use far less resources than they would on an unRaid box. 

 

For an idea of what you can accomplish with unRaid and various apps, look Here or when you've got unRaid actually running, install this plugin.

 

As far as the parity drive goes, how does one single parity drive ensure the safety of all the other disks? One drive can't possibly store all the data from all the other drives.

See this section in the official documentation.

Thank you for all the help. One last question fo now.

I just installed the 4TB drive in my system. I am running unRaid as a 30 day trial. I have added the 4TB drive to my array. All my data is on my old 1TB drive which is not part of the array. What would be the most simple way to move all this data to my new 4TB drive?

Thank you for all the help. One last question fo now.

I just installed the 4TB drive in my system. I am running unRaid as a 30 day trial. I have added the 4TB drive to my array. All my data is on my old 1TB drive which is not part of the array. What would be the most simple way to move all this data to my new 4TB drive?

Presumably the 1tb is formatted NTFS, so you would install the Unassigned Devices plugin to mount the drive and then the easiest way to copy would be over the network from the 1 to a share on the 4.  The fastest way would be to use rsync or mc  (midnight commander) at the command prompt, or either the dolphin or krusader docker apps.

 

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