I wasn't sure which forum to put this in, as there is no clear obvious choice for n00b who are considering unRaid to post questions in.

 

I'm trying to decide what I should build for my own home storage system.  I've been documenting my journey on HomeTechLab.Com, and I plan to do a review of unRaid next.

 

Anyway, a few questions.

 

1) How does unRaid handle a single disk?  i.e. build the system, insert just the first hard drive.  No parity disk.  Is it usable?

 

I ask because I'm comparing to Drobo, which for some stupid reason attempts to "protect" the data by only letting you use half the capacity of the single drive when it's the only drive in the box.

 

2) I know unRaid can use a large number of drives with 1 parity disk, but can you add a hot-spare?  i.e.  If a drive fails while I'm away on business, can I set it up to automatically start rebuilding so that my data is re-protected in a few hours rather than several days (when I get back)

 

3) Is there any way to remote into the box (i.e. VNC installed in the host OS) or is the web interface the only remotely accessable tool for management?

 

4) Can unRaid be used on a hypervisor based virtualization server?  I'm beginning to think a combination of WHS and unRaid may be the ultimate solution for everything.

 

Thanks in advance!

I wasn't sure which forum to put this in, as there is no clear obvious choice for n00b who are considering unRaid to post questions in.

 

I'm trying to decide what I should build for my own home storage system.  I've been documenting my journey on HomeTechLab.Com, and I plan to do a review of unRaid next.

 

Anyway, a few questions.

 

1) How does unRaid handle a single disk?  i.e. build the system, insert just the first hard drive.  No parity disk.  Is it usable?

Yes, it is usable, but there is no "parity" protection of your data.

I ask because I'm comparing to Drobo, which for some stupid reason attempts to "protect" the data by only letting you use half the capacity of the single drive when it's the only drive in the box.

You get access to the full size of the disk. Not just half.  The disk will be re-partitioned and formatted with a reiserfs file-system if it is not recognized as one partitioned  exactly as unRAID would partition it, and formatted with a reiserfs FS.  If a data disk is added after a parity disk is assigned, the data disk will be completely cleared (zeros written to all of it) before partitioning and formatting unless recognized with a special "pre-cleared" signature.  While the clearing step is being performed, your array will be off-line.  (which is why the pre-clearing is done while the array is on-line, but to a disk that is not yet assigned to the array)

 

2) I know unRaid can use a large number of drives with 1 parity disk, but can you add a hot-spare?  i.e.  If a drive fails while I'm away on business, can I set it up to automatically start rebuilding so that my data is re-protected in a few hours rather than several days (when I get back)[/Quote]No hot-spares.  No auto-rebuild.  You can have a spare drive physically installed, but not assigned (a semi-warm-spare)

3) Is there any way to remote into the box (i.e. VNC installed in the host OS) or is the web interface the only remotely accessible tool for management?

The web-interface is the basic interface.  Some management functions are available at the linux command prompt with add-on scripting, but re-assignment of drives is not.  Stopping the array is possible from linux, but re-starting it not, at least not without a reboot (which is possible from the command line)

4) Can unRaid be used on a hypervisor based virtualization server?  I'm beginning to think a combination of WHS and unRaid may be the ultimate solution for everything.

 

Thanks in advance!

No idea about hypervisor.  It has been run as a host (running WinXP clients) and as a guest (running unRAID) with both VirtualBox and VMWare.  Both with limitations.  It is an advanced topic, not for the linux newbie as at least one of them requires re-compiling linux to add System-5 Inter-Process-Communications.

 

Joe L.

Thank you the help!