[HN Gopher] Raspberry Pi 2.5 Gbps OMV NAS Performance
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       Raspberry Pi 2.5 Gbps OMV NAS Performance
        
       Author : geerlingguy
       Score  : 67 points
       Date   : 2021-04-02 16:31 UTC (6 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (www.jeffgeerling.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (www.jeffgeerling.com)
        
       | ww520 wrote:
       | Great info in the article.
       | 
       | Had something similar. The firmware update of my sse4200 NAS has
       | stopped and its NetBios version is badly outdated. I was looking
       | for an inexpensive way to reuse the disks to build another NAS.
       | After looking around a bit, ended up getting a RAID capable DAS
       | enclosure for the disks, repurposed an old Chromebox to connect
       | to it via usb, installed Linux, and shared over SAMBA. It works
       | well.
        
       | raarts wrote:
       | The primary reason by far why I haven't done a lot more with the
       | Pi is the lack of large enclosures.
        
         | guilhas wrote:
         | And for 50euros you can get a second hand HP microserver on
         | eBay
        
         | geerlingguy wrote:
         | I mention the Wiretrustee SATA towards the end of the post; it
         | looks like they'll have a laser-cut acrylic case in two sizes,
         | for either 2.5" or 3.5" drives.
         | 
         | I'm hopeful one of the mini ITX or micro ATX boards goes into
         | production soon; at that point, you could mount the Pi securely
         | into any bog-standard ITX/ATX case and even make use of PSU
         | connectors and the PCIe slot!
        
           | tssva wrote:
           | I mentioned it in a comment for your original hardware video
           | but I'll repeat it here. I think another setup worth trying
           | is an eSATA 4 drive enclosure connected to the SATA
           | controller board via a SATA to eSATA cable.
        
       | [deleted]
        
       | rasz wrote:
       | tldr: still worse than store bought NAS, or even 10 year old
       | Lenovo x220 with two mpcie/Expresscard to pcie adapters.
        
         | walterbell wrote:
         | Any recommendations on PCIe adapters which work with both slots
         | on the X220, since only one of them is ExpressCard?
        
         | Naac wrote:
         | Store bought NAS doesn't run open source software.
        
           | tyingq wrote:
           | Some of them can be coaxed into running normal distros.
           | Buffalo Linkstations, for example.
        
       | Youden wrote:
       | Does anybody know why support for NBase-T is so uncommon and
       | expensive in networking equipment?
       | 
       | These 2.5Gbps and 5Gbps adapters look really nice, especially for
       | laptops and other devices with USB 3.2 ports but it appears to be
       | near impossible to affordably connect them to a more-than-trivial
       | network.
        
         | sliken wrote:
         | Dunno, I bought a new cable modem, which has 2.5gbe. Most new
         | motherboards come with 1 or 2 2.5gbe, at least if you spend
         | another $20-$40 over the cheapest. Even raspberry pi like
         | widgets are coming with 2.5Gbe, like the hardkernel odroid h2+.
         | The later has a 4 port 2.5gbe expansion card if you want a
         | total of 6.
         | 
         | What "non-trivial" network is blocked by using 2.5 gbps? There
         | are transceivers that let 2.5 gbe work with 10gb ports on
         | older/common 10Gb switches. QNAP, linksys, and trendnet have a
         | decent number of switches in the 5-18 port range, which seem
         | splenty for most home networks.
        
         | PragmaticPulp wrote:
         | 1G has been around so long that it's cheap commodity hardware
         | now.
         | 
         | 10G was too much of a leap, IMO, so the hardware remains
         | expensive. 10G over regular Cat5e is also relatively power
         | hungry.
         | 
         | 2.5G and 5G arrived relatively recently to fill the gap with
         | the stalled jump to 10G. You can get started with something
         | like a $110 QNAP 2.5G 5-port switch and some cheap 2.5G
         | adapters on the computers you care about.
        
           | cptskippy wrote:
           | > 2.5G and 5G arrived relatively recently to fill the gap
           | with the stalled jump to 10G.
           | 
           | 10G wasn't stalled, it was and is for most completely
           | unnecessary. 10G over copper requires Cat6, most homes have
           | Cat5e if they're lucky.
           | 
           | So why are 2.5G and 5G a thing? Well modern Wifi is faster
           | than 1G, and most homes with Ethernet are Cat5e. Guess what
           | 2.5G and 5G run over?
        
           | wojciii wrote:
           | I have a 10 GE NAS (Truenas) and just bought the parts for a
           | server which has 10 GE network interfaces built in. This was
           | not more expensive than usual..
           | 
           | I'm waiting for the price of switches to get down to a level
           | that I will accept. They are quite expensive now.
        
             | geerlingguy wrote:
             | 10 GbE cards and adapters are still quite expensive (at
             | least compared to cheap $10-20 1 Gbps gear); one of the
             | cheapest ASUS 10G PCIe cards is $99, and the cheapest
             | Thunderbolt 3 10G adapter (both with RJ45 connections) is
             | $149.
             | 
             | If you want to graduate to SFP+ those adapters usually cost
             | a little more (plus the cost of a transceiver for fiber or
             | copper).
             | 
             | Cabling also means many existing installations (like my
             | house) with 50+ ft runs need to be re-cabled if they
             | actually want stable 10G speeds. My home network works
             | great at 2.5G but there are a few Cat5e runs that don't
             | give me 10 Gbps.
        
           | tutfbhuf wrote:
           | > 10G was too much of a leap, IMO, so the hardware remains
           | expensive.
           | 
           | Switches are still quiet expensive, but 10G cards are quiet
           | affordable nowadays. Notebooks can use a Thunderbolt 3 to 10G
           | ethernet, but I think we will see 10G ports one consumer
           | notebooks soon.
           | 
           | I wouldn't invest in a bridge technology like 2.5G since it
           | introduces non-trivial costs an offers only 2.5x speed up
           | instead of 10x.
        
             | gh02t wrote:
             | There are some affordable (relatively) 10 gig switches
             | nowadays, though they are based on SFPs so you have to
             | factor that into the price too. Mikrotik sells a 4 port
             | SFP+ switch for about $150.
        
             | PragmaticPulp wrote:
             | > but I think we will see 10G ports one consumer notebooks
             | soon
             | 
             | Consumer notebooks are moving away from having ethernet
             | ports in general.
             | 
             | 10GBASE-T is relatively power hungry, requiring a couple of
             | watts per port. I don't think we'll be seeing this in
             | consumer notebooks any time soon.
             | 
             | Also, I have one of those Thuderbolt to 10G adapters. It's
             | not small. It's only useful when I'm doing bulk file
             | transfers.
             | 
             | 2.5G is fine for most work. Many consumer NAS boxes can
             | barely saturate 2.5G anyway.
        
         | numpad0 wrote:
         | First standards for 10GE appeared as early as 2002, NBASE-T was
         | as late as 2015. It's a rather new standard, unnecessarily so
         | in hindsight... apparently there were discussions about
         | potential 2.5Gbps and 5Gbps modes while original 10GE was being
         | defined but were eventually not included
        
       | ggm wrote:
       | 8gb pi4, radxa quad sata HAT and zfs, working fine.
       | 
       | The memory thing is a historical misunderstanding about how the
       | arc works.
       | 
       | Sure, it's slow compared to direct pci attached disc controllers,
       | but as a vault, it's working fine.
       | 
       | https://wiki.radxa.com/Dual_Quad_SATA_HAT
        
       | dshep wrote:
       | Pretty neat. I have been thinking about how I can build a tiny
       | NAS, but I would like ECC so that rules out the pi, etc.
       | 
       | Best option I have found so far might be this ASRock 4x4-v2000
       | https://www.asrockind.com/en-gb/4X4-V2000M , it has an 8-core cpu
       | and supports ECC. Would need to get a M.2 to 4x SATA adapter. The
       | hard part seems to be figuring out how to buy the board itself...
        
         | sbierwagen wrote:
         | >a M.2 to 4x SATA
         | 
         | Is that a thing which exists?
        
           | dshep wrote:
           | https://www.amazon.com/Internal-Non-Raid-Adapter-Desktop-
           | Sup...
           | 
           | Haven't tried it personally, but maybe it works? :)
        
             | geerlingguy wrote:
             | I have one of these and have tested it on the Raspberry Pi
             | [1]. It indeed works fine (and IME if it works on the Pi,
             | it works on anything with PCIe).
             | 
             | [1] https://pipci.jeffgeerling.com/cards_storage/iocrest-
             | jmb585-...
        
           | PragmaticPulp wrote:
           | M.2 is a port which can carry different interfaces.
           | 
           | In this case, this M.2 slot carries PCIe, so you can add a
           | PCIe SATA controller. Confirm driver support first, of
           | course.
        
         | cromka wrote:
         | How tiny does it have to be? I would recommend Lenovo P330/P340
         | Tiny. Not _as_ tiny as the Asrock, but very flexible.
        
           | tyingq wrote:
           | I imagine the Lenovo Tiny with a Ryzen CPU would support the
           | ECC RAM that was mentioned. M75Q, M715Q.
        
         | Scene_Cast2 wrote:
         | I've been using a Helios4 for this; it's tiny, has ECC, and
         | plenty of speed for a NAS.
         | 
         | Their new board, the helios64, is bigger, and ECC support was
         | in-progress last time I checked.
        
           | sbierwagen wrote:
           | Doh, wish I knew this existed last month. Just built a NAS
           | around an ITX board.
        
           | mey wrote:
           | Looking on their site, it seems that Helios64 still doesn't
           | have ECC support (isn't advertised).
        
           | vladvasiliu wrote:
           | The Helios64 "Full Bundle" looks nice, but only 4 GB RAM
           | seems limited for ZFS. Plus, for 300 USD, there should be a
           | way to set up a similar x86 system, possibly from second-hand
           | parts. I'm thinking some older AMD Zen with 8-16 GB RAM and a
           | Fractal Design Node or similar case.
           | 
           | Yes, I know that would likely use more electricity, but in my
           | particular case (France), electricity isn't that big of a
           | cost, plus I wouldn't be running this 24/7. More like one or
           | two evenings a week. The only reason why I'm not running
           | recycled "enterprise" servers at home is that my apartment is
           | small and I absolutely cannot stand the noise they make.
        
             | MivLives wrote:
             | I've had good luck buying old gaming pc parts off my
             | friends. If they're upgrading their cpu, they normally have
             | a mobo/ram/cpu to sell.
        
         | sliken wrote:
         | Why not just get a mini-itx ryzen? They often have 2.5gbe,
         | handle ecc memory, and come with 4xSATA without adapters.
        
         | jjeaff wrote:
         | What benefit would ecc have for a nas? Just making sure there
         | are no bits flipped in your data before writing to disk? If so,
         | seems like file integrity checking would be more important.
        
           | goda90 wrote:
           | ECC prevents bit flips in the file integrity checking itself.
        
         | nonameiguess wrote:
         | Try the X570D4I-2T from ASRock Rack:
         | https://www.asrockrack.com/general/productdetail.asp?Model=X...
         | 
         | I built my home NAS on this and it's great. Has Oculink ports
         | built into the board so I can just use M.2 for the OS itself
         | and it supports 10 GB ethernet, so as long as I'm wired in,
         | there is effectively no network latency since that's faster
         | than SATA anyway. The board itself also does video, so I can
         | use a Ryzen CPU without Radeon graphics and not have to get the
         | pro to support ECC.
        
         | rubatuga wrote:
         | A used HP Z230 is a cheap buy, supports ECC, and easily
         | supports five 3.5inch drives
        
       | WhatIsDukkha wrote:
       | Are there performance issues for this with BTRFS as well or just
       | ZFS?
        
         | atmosx wrote:
         | I don't know about BTRFS but ZFS is expensive in terms of RAM
         | and since ram is scarce on RPis, I would expect ZFS to
         | underperform under RPis.
        
           | tpxl wrote:
           | RPi 4 goes up to 8G RAM which is more than enough.
        
       | geerlingguy wrote:
       | One of the little gems I found while I was putting together the
       | video for this post was "Shouting in the datacenter", an older
       | clip (from the pre-HD era) demonstrating the consequence of doing
       | exactly what the title says: https://youtu.be/tDacjrSCeq4
       | 
       | Warning: loud!
        
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       (page generated 2021-04-02 23:01 UTC)