miogpsrocks

SAME issue caused problem with SMR hard drives stalling the writing process with internal drives in my normal RAID system . Does Unraid have the ability to extent the time to live ( TTL) value so it won't be so quick to mark a hard drive as dead? Seem like that would solve a lot of issues. Give the drive a chance to respond . Its sort of like calling customer support and the agent disconnect the call because you took a few milliseconds too long to respond to them. Thanks .

I'm not sure. Maybe? Here is the thing. I am not using it for an enterprise application. Its like once in a while I might need to pullup a excel file or a video file. Its not like I am reading/ writing 24/7. I also use USB external drives in my computer for most everything things. Once the UNRAID server is made, it will be used for 99.9% reading not writing. I can connect all USB external drives to UPS battery backup as well as the unraid server itself. I can fit the drives I need with external USB. I can't fit some monster server type box even know that is more professional way of doing things. Unraid also allowed for a SSD solid state drive buffer right? Do you know if there is a setting that it can verify items are complete before deleting the file? I had a real RAID 5 nas device from a major company crash because I think the hard drive company hide the fact that it was using Shingled magnetic recording (SMR) and it caused problems with the RAID 5 writing. It was also using some new file system that I had not used before which maybe cause the perfect storm. I'm not exactly sure but in any event, I like the fact that with UNRAID you can recover the information from individuals drives if worst comes to worst. Despite the warnings of USB, is it technically possible to add USB external drives in the UNRAID software? Thanks

Can Unraid be used with external USB hard drives ? I know softwares sometimes advance and upgrade so I am hoping the answer may now be yes for the latest version? I asked a few years ago and people were very negative on it. Please let me know if this has changed. I don't have some monster server with 50 hard drive enclosures with advance enterprise level cables and such. I have a normal computer with USB hubs and a lot of external hard *USB) hard drives. DATA is DATA so why could this not work? What does it matter if your connection is SATA or USB ? Thanks .

Can Unraid be used with external USB hard drives ? I know softwares sometimes advance and upgrade so I am hoping the answer may now be yes for the latest version? I asked a few years ago and people were very negative on it. Please let me know if this has changed. I don't have some monster server with 50 hard drive enclosures with advance enterprise level cables and such. I have a normal computer with USB hubs and a lot of external hard *USB) hard drives. DATA is DATA so why could this not work? What does it matter if your connection is SATA or USB ? Thanks .

When you say " unique and unchanging device identification", don't external hard drives have unique serial numbers? I run test of hard drive using software like seatools and crystal disk info and these hard drives have a lot of information that pulls up. The software can't link some kind of unique identifying information on a hard drive as a particular disk in the parity setup? For me, it would be easier to have a shelf filled with external hard drives then trying to piece together some kind of monster system that can fit so many drives then have to tear the external hard drive apart to connect them inside the PC/Server. If you are using this Cache SSD, then it first writes to the cache drive then writes to the array. Understand its not going to be enterprise level performance but for the guy who need archival and available of data, this may be the best bang for the buck but sadly is sound like this software does not support this kind of thing from what I am hearing. Thanks.

So long story short, USB external drives are good enough for desktop storage but not good enough for UNRAID(and probably RAID) setup due to micro disruptions in the connection? That is a shame.

If I purchase a motherboard with 12-USB ports. Can I purchased 12 external hard drives and use unraid with the external hard drives? Is there a reason that USB port with external USB hard drives enclosures will not work? Please let me know Thanks.

Can you only run 1 Y-splitter off a single molex or SATA connection or can you run several Y splitters off other Y splitters off other Y splitters as long as your PSU has enough juice ? Thanks.

Maybe if I build a second one I will use a server case but I already have committed to the PC tower route. One of the problems I ran into was some of the service cases had motherboard what had a 2TB limit or extremely small/loud fans as well as not having a server case to put this 4U size/shape server. Thanks.

Hello. If you are using 2 tower computer cases to house 30 drives for the unraid server, do you use like 2 power supplies with Y splitters to get you to 30 power cables? How is this normally done for people using standard off the shelf multiple computer towers( and not enterprise level professional server cases) ? Thanks.

So the Unraid can support 30 hard drives, how do you get 30 power supply cables to these hard drives? Are you guys just using basic Y-splitters or is there another way of doing this? Thanks. http://www.ebay.com/itm/SATA-Power-15-pin-Y-Splitter-Cable-Adapter-Male-to-Female-for-HDD-Hard-Drive-/131844462950?hash=item1eb28ad966:g:HFMAAOSwfpVZHhWt http://www.ebay.com/itm/Molex-to-SATA-Power-Y-Splitter-Adaptor-Cable-Lead-2-Way-4-Pin-To-2-x-15-Pin-/352060468402?hash=item51f8706cb2:g:VIcAAOSw4CFYprs-

What do you think about this one? LSI SAS3081E-R 8-port Internal SATA/SAS 3Gb/s RAID Controller Card Its $10 on ebay. Thanks.

What do you think about this one? How do you know if it can support over 2TB hard drives? Thanks. PRODUCT DESCRIPTION LSI MegaRAID Storage Controller PCI Express Low Profile Interface w/ 3Gb/s Transfer Speed Controller SAS3081E-R Specifications Model SAS3081E-R Internal Port(s) 36 Pin Dual Mini SAS Host Bus PCIe x8 Manufacturer Cisco Battery Included(YES/NO) No Interface SATA 3GB SAS Data Transfer Rate 300MBps RAID Level Supported RAID 0, JBOD, RAID 1, RAID 10E, RAID 1E Board Form Factor Low Profile MD2 Card Supported Devices Disk Array, Hard Drive Channel Quantity 8 OS Required Microsoft Windows 2000 / XP, Microsoft Windows Server 2003, Novell NetWare, Red Hat Linux 3.0, SuSe Linux, SunSoft Solaris 2.6 - 2.10 Microsoft Windows Server 2008 x64 Edition, VMware ESX 4.1, VMware ESXi 4.1, VMware ESXi 5.0, VMware ESXi 5.1, Microsoft Windows Server 2008 x86 Edition, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 for x86, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 x64 Edition, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6, SuSE Linux Enterprise Server 10 for x86, SuSE Linux Enterprise Server 10 x64 Edition, SuSE Linux Enterprise Server 11 for x86, SuSE Linux Enterprise Server 11 x64 Edition

Can someone recommend an INTERNAL controller card? I realize I have other post asking for a recommendation on external cards however I would also like to have some hard drive in the box of the motherboard as well as the hard drive in the external cases. So I guess I would need a recommendation on an internal SAS card or possibly an SATA expansion card. Thanks.

Are you able to use the slower PCI slot but it just won't be as fast?