I ran across a post that said that SSD cache is not available for basic unraid, but only on the more expensive options. I tried to find a reference to this in the description of what each level affords one but could not. Is this true?

6 minutes ago, DrSartorius said:

I ran across a post that said that SSD cache is not available for basic unraid, but only on the more expensive options. I tried to find a reference to this in the description of what each level affords one but could not. Is this true?

Look here: Click (at Registration Key Info)

 

In all editions you have all features/functions enabled the only thing that's limited is the number of drives you can attach depending on the license.

12 minutes ago, DrSartorius said:

I ran across a post

Link?

If I had that link I would have put it here when I made the post. It's just one of many different things I have read while trying to decide how to configure my drives. Which are 4, 2 5tb and 2 4.5tb. I have several 128gb SSD drives. I am guessing I should make the 1 of the smaller drives and 1 of the larger for data, then 5tb for parity and slot 4 for cache. The device is a Lenovo EMC PX4-400D NAS appliance. Thank you.

There is no limit on number of cache pools. Personally, I would go for the Pro license for future expandability, but I kept adding drives every few days until I hit 18 devices before my first trial key even expired.

Currently, there can only be one 'Array' pool. Which conventional wisdom suggests should be all your HDDs together.

In your case, the four large drives would be the 'Array' and you can use two of the SSDs to make a single btrfs RAID1 cache pool -- making it so you have redundancy as soon as the data writes to your cache. You can use remaining drives to make more cache pools, or be dedicated for VMs. And if you have even more SSDs to spare you could put them on the data array (a bit of a waste putting SSDs on the array IMO).

Four HDDs is really just a start since you'll probably want to have one parity drive, which takes up nearly 25% of it. This sort of RAID5-ish setup is better suited for having more drives.

Edited November 27, 20205 yr by DougCube
minor typo

On 11/25/2020 at 5:42 PM, DrSartorius said:

I ran across a post that said that SSD cache is not available for basic unraid,

That may have bin true in version 5?

Version 6 has disk limits.

Basic is 6 disks allocate how you wish.

options are yours.

maybe 2 parity and 4 data disks as basic file server?

or 1 parity 1 cache for Docker 3 data disk and 1 unassigned disk for VM.

You chose it's your server.

 

It is going in a NAS appliance with 4 slots. So that's my limit.

If your not using Docker.(Great.loveit)

Then no cache.

If your intent on a Media server I would use a small SSD as cache for Jellyfin, MiniDLNA or Plex

I would also do a cache, but for what is was originally meant for: for cache.. 

So to clarify, does that mean on a Basic license, the cache drive is considered one of the 6 drives? If I have this set up:

 

1x Parity

5x HDD

1x SSD Cache

 

I would need at least a Plus license?

Any disk attached when you start the array counts, including all parity disks, all data disks in the parity array, all disks in any (cache) pool, and any unassigned disks.

10 minutes ago, DMenace83 said:

1x Parity

5x HDD

1x SSD Cache

 

I would need at least a Plus license?

That is 7 disks, so Plus. You will really want Plus anyway if you are going to have 5 data disks just so you have some room to work with other disks as needed.

The Summer Sale, https://unraid.net/summer-sale, lists SSD Caching as a feature unlocked by Plus & Pro licenses.  Did this change at some point?

21 minutes ago, CrimsonChin said:

The Summer Sale, https://unraid.net/summer-sale, lists SSD Caching as a feature unlocked by Plus & Pro licenses.  Did this change at some point?

The only difference between the levels is the number of drives supported so that sounds like a badly phrased marketing messsge.

On 7/21/2023 at 2:03 PM, CrimsonChin said:

The Summer Sale, https://unraid.net/summer-sale, lists SSD Caching as a feature unlocked by Plus & Pro licenses.  Did this change at some point?

Yeah, sounds like a case of mistaken marketing message.

 

How did that happen @SpencerJ?

Or has it been a quiet change made to the basic license' feature set?

Nothing changed with the license tiers. 
 

Paired with the qualifying sentence prior, I don’t think the language is wrong but will adjust for clarity’s sake.