At the moment i have a centos fileserver and im copying my stuff off it and im going to switch to unraid.

But before i set it up im just wondering if anyone can tell me what the unraid beta is like in terms of stability and usability.

I'm happy to use a beta, and im happy to fiddle and tinker, my fileserver has gone from opensolaris under xen, to opensolaris native, ubuntu, then centos. But before i install the beta i just want to make sure the basic functionality all works fine, like the raid/parity and smb sharing?

 

oh and is it backward compatible (im asuming it should be even if i have to rebuild the parity drive), atm i use another computer for sabnzbd but i would probably be best not using the beta if i put it on the fileserver

 

thanks for any assistance you can provide

Yes it all works in general.

 

However the rule of thumb is if you have to ask about stability dont run the beta.

 

IMHO it should be called ALPHA since its only the second version

ok that does clear it up a little, just the stability of beta's between different disto's and products varies ALOT. eg redhats beta is probably more stable then a full ubuntu release

I hear you

 

unRAID is always about data safety but V5 is a big change to the front end. the assumption is the backend will be fine but you take your risks

I think I can comment on the 5.0-beta2 version as I'm running it on my newer server.

 

It is a replacement of the user-interface with one written in "php"  and it actually very stable...

 

Yes, there have been changes since beta1.  Yes, there will be more changes in beta3, but so far very few operational issues.

 

There are still some features that do not have a "php" page.  Mostly those dealing with NFS file system configuration.  If you are just using SAMBA (SMB) file shares, it is not an issue.

 

I'm not concerned about my data using it.  That part of unRAID has not changed (or if it has, it is minimally changed).   Just don't be the first to try the next beta3 when it is released... let a few of us with development servers try it first, wait a week or so, then give it a whirl.

 

All the basic functionality works just fine.

Joe knows things listen to him.

 

My point for what its worth. Limetech would be perfectly within their rights to mess with anything during a beta cycle. Typically as always Limetech try very hard to not break data effecting things but Joes statement of the front end has changed whilst valid today might not be valid for any other releases.

 

Unless you are beta testing don't run a beta. There is literally no point.

thanks for the very quick replies.

 

one last thing im unsure about.

 

can i setup the server with sabnzbd (well i know i can) but can i have say one drive on its own for temp files, downloaded files before they are sorted and general storage of stuff i dont need parity for? and have full read/write speed to it?

thanks for the very quick replies.

 

one last thing im unsure about.

 

can i setup the server with sabnzbd (well i know i can) but can i have say one drive on its own for temp files, downloaded files before they are sorted and general storage of stuff i dont need parity for? and have full read/write speed to it?

Short answer is yes, you can have drives that are not part of the protected array.  Many people use the "cache" drive for that purpose, some use the "SNAP" user-add-on for additional drives, I use the disk-management feature I built into the unMENU add-on, others just type the few linux commands needed to partition, format, and mount, and share the extra drive.  It just linux at that point, but some of the add-on applications users have developed make it easier.

 

At some point, these types of extra features will be available through plug-ins in the 5.0 interface.  That is one of the two major reasons for the 5.0 release.  The other being a re-work of the disk and file security permissions to accommodate NFS, and AFP more transparently.

 

Joe L.

Thank you, that makes perfect sence, i can easily mount a disk and share it under linux i dont need anything special for that.

 

I dont think there is anything i need to know, other then what is the limitation of the basic version other then whats stated. I guess i mean can i do anything i want with cli, is it just the web interface thats restricted?

Actually, neither is really restricted very much.

 

You'll need to read more of the 5.0 forum section where we are just starting to work out (and define) how the web-interface and the new capabilities work.  It is an interactive task as lime-tech re-defines how their product user-interface works.  It is changing to a "plug-in" system, and their management interface s the first of the plug-ins.

 

The built-in web-server does not handle cgi scripting (so far) but you can add your own web-server for that if you are capable. It does handle "php" coding.  There is no "X" server, so any kind of desktop you are used to in other distributions is not present.

 

The command line interface in Linux allows just about anything... realize unRAID is a stripped down version of Slackware.  It will not have some commands you might be used to having on other distributions, but you can add most any of them by downloading and installing a slackware "installpkg"  all this assumes you are capable, or follow the lead of another user who has gone through the pain before you.  If you do not desire any add-ons, it is a perfectly fine network storage device that takes minimal work to configure and use.

 

One add-on application I wrote "unMENU" (written almost entirely in "Gnu awk") is a full web-server and enhanced interface, with its own plug-ins and package management scheme.  This is currently used by many to add features to their server.  Its features will all eventually be migrated to the 5.0 plug-in architecture too.

 

 

While i might be able to get your attention i'll ask in this thread.

 

Lets say i have a 3TB of bluray ISO's, a problem i have with unraid is that i then need to spread these across 2 shares. (disk1, disk2)

Is there a way to present the whole storage as one pool? I know you can kind of do this with user shares but it still doesn't really work how i need it to.

 

Thanks.

That is not a problem with unraid, but in your understanding of the product. There is already a unified view of all disks so it looks like a single drive. This is the user shares feature. At the server side, it's the /mnt/user/ directory. Also, disk1 and disk2 do not have to be shares. If both drives contain a /Movies/ directory at the root, then the single share 'Movies' will contain all files from disk1 and disk2. That is to say /mnt/user/Movies/ will show entries from /mnt/disk1/Movies and /mnt/disk2/Movies.

Im still slightly confused from what i read on the lime-tech main site about user shares.

 

But if im understanding correctly now, only the top directory is shared. so disk1/Bluray and disk2/Bluray will show up as //fileserver/Bluray.

 

And if i copy 3TB of blurays ISO's which are inside individual folders themselves onto both disk1 and then when full move to disk2?

 

So while the file structure looks like "disk1/Bluray/Dark Knight/.iso" "disk2/Bluray/Transformers/.iso" i will see it on the smb share as "//fileserver/Bluray/Dark knight/.iso" "//fileserver/Bluray/Transformers/.iso"?

 

Thanks.

It depends upon how you set your allocation methods and share levels.

 

I'm still shaky on the share levels and might be 1 number off....forget if base is 1 or zero

 

Blueray 1

      dark knight 2

      transformers 2

 

 

So if in this case, share level is set to 1, anything under BlueRay will be on same disk

share level = 2, anything under dark knight or transformers will be on same disk

etc etc

 

allocation method will determine when it will try to use another disk in the share.

 

 

 

Yup, with the correct setup you'll get exactly that.

 

//fileserver/Bluray

 

will contain the movies stored in both

 

//fileserver/disk1/Bluray

 

and

 

//fileserver/disk2/Bluray

 

 

Also, no-one has posted that the Beta has caused data loss yet so it seems to be OK in that regard. You're more likely just to find some features don't work right.

 

 

It depends upon how you set your allocation methods and share levels.

 

I'm still shaky on the share levels and might be 1 number off....forget if base is 1 or zero

 

Blueray 1

     dark knight 2

     transformers 2

 

 

So if in this case, share level is set to 1, anything under BlueRay will be on same disk

share level = 2, anything under dark knight or transformers will be on same disk

etc etc

 

allocation method will determine when it will try to use another disk in the share.

 

 

 

 

You got the numbers right but you have the functionality completely backwards. Any directory deeper than the split level will be kept on the same disk and any directory up to that level can be on as many disks as required.  1 means only the Bluray directory can be spread across multiple disks. 2 means the bluray directory as well as the dark knight or transformers directories could be spread across multiple disks. So, you'll likely want to use level 1 for this example.

 

It make no sense to say use level 1 so that Bluray stays on a single disk yet the subdirectories below Bluray could be on multiple disks. How can a subdirectory under Bluray be on disk2 if Bluray is confined to only disk1?

 

Peter

 

yes. I was trying to say the same thing.  Just "poor execution" of the explaination. 

Thanks for your help guys.

 

But i copied a bunch of data to my array overnight, then realized today that i didnt look into the 4k sectors thing with my stupid WD drives .

So now i have to copy everything off, very slowly. Wipe all the disks and install this blasted jumper and do it all again.....