Noob Raid help and WD Green vs Red recommendation

[Informant X]

Hey guys, I've been searching around but have some quick questions. I have to protect against HD failure as I have a huge media/movie collection at home. I'm gonna build and run Win7 on a home server i'm building. I'm just wondering what is some good free software that manage a raid 1 array and alert of me of a failure and allow me to rebuild easily? Is there any software that will manage raid and have some HD health diagnostics build into it? I was just gonna run the Windows 7 out of the box raid software, as really I just need something basic

And now for the HD's, wondering if i should go Green or Red WD's. I heard Reds support TLER but i'm not sure if that means anything or would matter to me. I'm looking at 4TB drives the price diff is about 25 per drive.

 

[Informant X]

Just came across NAS4FREE and FREENAS those seem like they would probably meet my needs, but do they have built in health monitoring software?

Still wondering if the Reds and TLER is needed though.

 

[razel]

Get the Reds. Since you are playing around with RAID at the moment, you may need the TLER later. Also if the Reds offer a longer warranty, then it's completely worth the $25 price difference. Have fun.

 

[Informant X]

I just think it's funny and contradictive of WD. I have two of the My book live duo's a 6 TB and a 8 TB one and they both use greens. 2 3TB's and 2 4TB's, heh so it had me wondering. I was also thinking of the slight power savings with the drive spin-down which doesn't both me.

 

[razel]

The mybooks are consumer drives. I wouldn't expect WD to waste their Red drives in them. I'd be more surprised if they did!

 

[dtgoodwin]

I had been using Green's in my Windows Home Server since they were introduced. I still have 5 of them in service, but all but one have been replaced at some point. I purchased the 3 TB Reds the next time I needed drives after they became available. I only have two, but they've both been in service for almost exactly two years. No, I am not running them in RAID, but they've been fantastic. Zero SMART errors, reasonably fast, quiet, cool, and still low power. If you have ANY intention of running RAID down the road, or even multiple disks, I would highly recommend getting the Reds over the Greens for warranty, TLER, and the multiple disk vibration tolerance.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Red.

Don't use FreeNAS. Too limited. Just use a general purpose Linux distro and configure it to be a file server. Much better driver support, probably better support and documentation, etc.

Or use unRAID. It's weird, but effective, and it doesn't force you to use RAID to get parity protection (so you actually COULD use WD Greens.)

Edit: You could also do a RAID array and file sharing pretty easily with Windows.

 

[denis280]

+3 red again

 

[Informant X]

Red.

Don't use FreeNAS. Too limited. Just use a general purpose Linux distro and configure it to be a file server. Much better driver support, probably better support and documentation, etc.

Or use unRAID. It's weird, but effective, and it doesn't force you to use RAID to get parity protection (so you actually COULD use WD Greens.)

Edit: You could also do a RAID array and file sharing pretty easily with Windows.

If i was to use the Windows tool (I do plan to use windows file sharing) would the reds matter?

I supposed I could use some kinda SMART program to monitor the HD's on the side as well.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

If i was to use the Windows tool (I do plan to use windows file sharing) would the reds matter?

I supposed I could use some kinda SMART program to monitor the HD's on the side as well.

If they were in a Mirror or a Stripe, then Reds vs. Greens would matter. unRAID actually stores individual files on individual drives, and read operations (most IO is reads) only spin up the drive where that specific file lives. It's actually pretty neat, and could save a lot of electricity.

As far as Windows goes, there are all sorts of SMART and disk monitoring applications out there. I wouldn't worry too much about it - you'll be able to find something to do the job regardless of what system you use. The (imho) key feature is email alerts.

 

[Ratman6161]

If your concern is protecting your data from loss, you might be better served by not bothering with any kind of complex set up and instead go with one of the various off site/cloud backup companies. In any kind of setup you might build at home, you are still going to be at risk for hardware failures or...your house burning down...or the cat peeing on the computer etc.

I use Crash Plan which has been working well for me but there are many others. Its not free of course. I pay $149 per year but for that I can back up up to 10 computers and unlimited storage. Of course for $60 a year you can back up just one computer but unlimited data. That could be a possibility for you. Individual PC's backup to your file server by some other means and then Crash plan backs up the file server, getting you around the 1 computer limit.

My file server actually has a LSI hardware Raid card with 4 disks in RAID 5 but I still send it all to the cloud anyway.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Individual PC's backup to your file server by some other means and then Crash plan backs up the file server, getting you around the 1 computer limit.

This is what I do. Please don't tell Code42.

 

[Ketchup]

How often are you backing up?

If you aren't backing up in real time, you probably don't want a backup source that is always running. If you do, a RAID setup from the BIOS would be the way to go. However, just remember that once a RAID setup is created, that's it. You have to get a fairly high-end controller if the want the ability to add to a RAID 5 or RAID 10 array.

How many drives are you using?

And, as others have said, I think the Reds are the way to go.

 

[Informant X]

So I have a motherboard with 8 SATA connectors coming in. I'm probably going to max all them out minus 1 for the boot drive and 1 for the CDROM. So eventually 6 HD's in 3 Raid 1 Arrays. so 2, 2, 2. I would consider Raid 5 but I'm under the impression if the PC/software fails it's really hard to retrieve the data. Also i'm trying to KISS.

As far as cloud backup, I need this stuff on the lan to server my MediaBrowser/HTPC so that's not really an option.

The Windows utility seems the best because I'm thinking it's the easiest to maintain. For instance if the SSD with the OS on it fails I could literally just take one of the HD's and plug it into another PC and it would read like a normal drive right? So when it comes time to rebuild the array it's easy to do as well with Windows.

 

[Informant X]

So that being said I wasn't really concerned with the longevity of the Red vs Green, I have a ton of green drives and they're fine. I just was only concerned about like TLER (whatever the hell that is) and if i was to use a simple raid program like windows software raid if it would even make a difference. Seems like everyone is saying red though.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

So I have a motherboard with 8 SATA connectors coming in. I'm probably going to max all them out minus 1 for the boot drive and 1 for the CDROM. So eventually 6 HD's in 3 Raid 1 Arrays. so 2, 2, 2. I would consider Raid 5 but I'm under the impression if the PC/software fails it's really hard to retrieve the data. Also i'm trying to KISS.

If a RAID 5 array fails, there's more math involved with the healing, and a small chance that a disk failure could cause a rebuild failure. If you have your data living in two spots (RAID is not a backup!) then you're fine. If the rebuild fails, just replace the failed disks, wipe everything, and restore your data from backups.

Software-defined RAID arrays (Windows RAID, for example) can be migrated between computers fairly easily.

As far as cloud backup, I need this stuff on the lan to server my MediaBrowser/HTPC so that's not really an option.

The Windows utility seems the best because I'm thinking it's the easiest to maintain. For instance if the SSD with the OS on it fails I could literally just take one of the HD's and plug it into another PC and it would read like a normal drive right? So when it comes time to rebuild the array it's easy to do as well with Windows.

For a Windows RAID mirror, yes. If you take one of the disks from a mirror and plug it into another computer, it will be able to mount the degraded array.

 

[Informant X]

Yup, I've seen that mantra tons of times "Raid is not a backup." But all i'm concerned about is drive failure, so it's good enough for me. I would murder someone if I lost all my TV shows/Movies because a HD decided to die.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Yup, I've seen that mantra tons of times "Raid is not a backup." But all i'm concerned about is drive failure, so it's good enough for me. I would murder someone if I lost all my TV shows/Movies because a HD decided to die.

If you have a lot of static data like that, consider using unRAID.

It's not as fast or cool as RAID-5, but any given file is only stored on a single HDD, so you can recover data from individual drives as well as having parity protection.

 

[imagoon]

Yup, I've seen that mantra tons of times "Raid is not a backup." But all i'm concerned about is drive failure, so it's good enough for me. I would murder someone if I lost all my TV shows/Movies because a HD decided to die.

You may want to reread what Dave said again. A single disk failure has a chance that increases with capacity to cause an unrecoverable array. I have been lucky to never have had this issue on Enterprise equipment but I have had issues periodically on the cheaper NAS arrays and software based solutions.

If you are going rage because it was lost, then you need to look at getting multiple copies saved.

 

[Informant X]

Wait so if one disk breaks in an windows raid 1 array there is a chance the other could be broken too? I'm only speaking stricly of hardware failure.

Thanks Dave I will look into it. I'm confused though as you said it stores files on one HD, if that HD fails I would think it's gone forever and not "on the other" hd?

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Wait so if one disk breaks in an windows raid 1 array there is a chance the other could be broken too? I'm only speaking stricly of hardware failure.

You're confusing us talking about RAID5 with us talking about RAID1.

Random read errors happen.

When rebuilding a RAID5 array, there is a small chance (approaching certainty if the drive is big enough) that the parity calculation will hit a read error on the not-failed disk. This doesn't mean the other disks are broken, but it means the rebuild will fail and you're hosed.

With RAID1, that's not a problem.

Thanks Dave I will look into it. I'm confused though as you said it stores files on one HD, if that HD fails I would think it's gone forever and not "on the other" hd?

It stores the files on a single HD, and then stores parity information for all the drives, so just like a RAID5, you can have a drive fail and your data is still, theoretically, retrievable. (Read errors like I mentioned above also only break one file instead of everything on the failed disk.)

It's really pretty ideal for a home media storage server. (small number of clients, low bandwidth, can spin down drives you're not using, etc.) Read about it on the unRAID website.

 

[razel]

I would murder someone if I lost all my TV shows/Movies because a HD decided to die.

Depending on how much you're willing to spend on storage or if you plan on a career in IT data recovery. Have you considered buying the TV shows/movies on physical media instead? At least that physical media is already your backup, then you rip it onto your HDDs.

I know that physical media is unpopular, but the local Tower Records (I know, they still exist?) nearby me has ridiculous used sales on TV shows/movies. Additionally, arguably the quality of the Blu-Ray version will top nearly all download versions, but in your case, it seems like a backup copy is most important.

 

[imagoon]

Wait so if one disk breaks in an windows raid 1 array there is a chance the other could be broken too? I'm only speaking stricly of hardware failure.

Thanks Dave I will look into it. I'm confused though as you said it stores files on one HD, if that HD fails I would think it's gone forever and not "on the other" hd?

So I would clarify that the chance of a complete failure of a RAID 1 array due to single disk failure is low, there is the chance that the data on the working copy is invalid.

RAID controllers work in various ways. One of the cheaper ways to work is to do all read and writes to one disk and then copy the data to the second. If the second drive (the one that is in "spare" mode) has a bunch of bad sectors in files that have not been read in while and the controller is fairly stupid and doesn't do verifications (scrubs) when the first disk fails and the secondary starts up, anything in the bad sectors is lost and cannot be copied back to the replacement disk.

This is fairly rare now since most controller will intentionally use both disks for reads because it can improve performance as well as "scrubbing" which is basically chkdsk or FSCK for the array itself.

You can further mitigate this by using something like ZFS or ReFS that will also go through and check the data stored on the volume.

 

[Carson Dyle]

Yup, I've seen that mantra tons of times "Raid is not a backup." But all i'm concerned about is drive failure, so it's good enough for me. I would murder someone if I lost all my TV shows/Movies because a HD decided to die.

But things like video and music files seldom, if ever, change. You may add a few every week, but the existing ones do not change.

If you really wanted KISS, instead of three RAID 1 arrays, you'd install the six drives, three with active content, then use the other three to mirror (or backup) the active drives once a day, once a week, or even just once a month.

Ideally, I'd want those backups offline or in another system, but even if they're installed in the same system, it's both simpler and less prone to error than using RAID to protect your files.

 

[Informant X]

Awsome guys thanks for the replies. I figured I'd be chided and told to use the search function or google (and probably rightfully so).

I've come down down either using Windows Raid with two Reds, or use a program like rsync/robocopy (not sure how easy those are, seem command based hope I can find a easy GUI version of them) and get 1 red and 1 green drive. The red for the active drive and the green to copy new stuff over to every week or so. Personally I like the second option better, just depends on those copying tools I guess.