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Thread: Unraid alternative?

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    Unraid alternative?

    Anyone know of any Unraid alternatives?
    I like the idea of being able to add any size HD to increase the overall size of the partition with only needing 1 drive at least as big as the biggest drive for parity, and im not too bothered about striping, but with unraid you cant use the server for anything else. I want to run a home fileserver / LAMP server, thinking about using FreeBSD or Ubuntu, i use FreeBSD on my dedicated server in california, and ive installed Ubuntu on the demo web server at work (the rest of the ppl like using a gui, i usually just ssh into it and pretend its debian ) ive got a motherboard with dual 3ghz xeons on it and 2GB ram that im gonna use, its got a couple of pci-x slots so gonna look at putting a raid card in, was gonna go with hardware raid, but not sure theres any point really, just go with an 8 or 12 port software raid card, any thoughts on any of it?

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    Re: Unraid alternative?

    First thoughts,

    ive installed Ubuntu on the demo web server at work (the rest of the ppl like using a gui, i usually just ssh into it and pretend its debian )
    What has that got to do with anything, I apologies in advance for picking you up on it, but I've had my fill of hearing this "everyone else loves the gui - I'm l33t and love the command line". Not aimed at you, just fed up of hearing it.

    The only reason to use hardware raid is if you have a fat wad of $$$$$ to get a top notch quality card, other than that, you'll probably find that software raid will perform at least as good if not in some situations better. Thats going to be true of Linux.

    I believe and have little to no-experience with BSD so I can only go by information I've been given, not exeprience that software raid is very basic and not great

    One of the main issues you may have is your PCI slots sharing the same bus as things like your network card, which can slow it down. I know of more than one person that this has caused major performance issues on, so check your board layout.
    It is Inevitable.....


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    Re: Unraid alternative?

    haha, i dont think im l33t, im just more used to command line, debian was the first linux distro i used when i was helping out a shell provider, no gui, thats how i learnt, although using a gui is sometimes easier, most tasks just seem quicker on the commandline.

    I dont have a fat wad of money and ive scoured ebay long and hard, lol, the cheapest one at the time i could find was an Areca 1130, which is a 12 port card but that was £280 and in america (the cheapest 8 port - 1120 was even more) which is out of my price range, so ive been looking for a software raid card, i can get a decent-ish one from scan for £176. Been trying to get a second hand one off ebay for £100, not going well yet.

    Yeah im not sure how well FBSD will handle raid, so i may end up using linux.

    The motherboard im using is arima_server its got 2 pci-x ports which the network card will me in, and ive got an intel gig network card in on of the 32 bit pci ports

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    Re: Unraid alternative?

    by the rest of the people i meant at work btw, lol

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    Re: Unraid alternative?

    I think you may have missunderstood a little of what I was trying to point out.

    I was trying to explain that some motherboard put the PCI slots on the same bus as the onboard network card (as an example) so even wacking a fantastic card can still cause performance issues on.

    I'm not familier with the board your using, but looking at its price tag, it doesn't stike me as joe the home users board, so I suspect you'll be fine.

    I have 2 good raid cards in my machines at home and "could" use them in hardware mode, however I find I actually get excellent performance out of them, but I again think that is a combination of both the software raid setup and the actual card/disk quality.

    Its harsh to say but you get what you pay for, having a reasonable motherboard as you appear to have, wacking 8 to 12 disks of a cheapo card seems, well like potentially a waste. But I do appriciate that cash doesn't grow on trees.
    It is Inevitable.....


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    Re: Unraid alternative?

    don't buy a "software raid card", it won't work properly outside windows

    if you want to go down that route, buy a non-raid SATA controller, and use the tools built into your OS (e.g. md and LVM on linux) to manage your software raid. it'll be more resistant to failure and less buggy

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    Re: Unraid alternative?

    well im not using the onboard network card anyway, using an intel pci card.

    Find LSI MegaRAID SATA II 300-8XLP 8 Port SATAII RAID 5 on eBay within RAID Cards, Interface Cards, Desktop PC Components, Computing (end time 29-Oct-07 17:42:54 GMT) thats the card ive been looking at, scan has it for £176 its actually the 8XR not the 8XLP i offered him £100, which with shipping is £110, which i though was pretty fair for a second hand card when a new one is £176 and comes with a 5 year guarantee, but he declined, nevermind.

    perhaps it might be better starting with a 4 port card? i know some (like the areca) can link with up to 3 more cards, what cards do you use?

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    Re: Unraid alternative?

    Quote Originally Posted by directhex View Post
    don't buy a "software raid card", it won't work properly outside windows
    Really? o_O

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    Re: Unraid alternative?

    when i first read this thread i thorhgt about this

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    Re: Unraid alternative?

    Quote Originally Posted by directhex View Post
    don't buy a "software raid card", it won't work properly outside windows

    if you want to go down that route, buy a non-raid SATA controller, and use the tools built into your OS (e.g. md and LVM on linux) to manage your software raid. it'll be more resistant to failure and less buggy
    have you got any links to some examples?

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    Re: Unraid alternative?

    Quote Originally Posted by DragonStar View Post
    have you got any links to some examples?
    https://help.ubuntu.com/community/FakeRaidHowto
    Serial ATA (SATA) on Linux

    and megaraid cards are PCI-X only (i.e. will not work in 32-bit PCI slots). whether that's an issue for you i don't know

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    Re: Unraid alternative?

    Quote Originally Posted by directhex View Post
    and megaraid cards are PCI-X only (i.e. will not work in 32-bit PCI slots). whether that's an issue for you i don't know
    no, i have 2 x pci-x slots on my motherboard, as well as 1 x 64 bit pci slot, and 2 x 32 bit pci slots
    Last edited by DragonStar; 24-10-2007 at 11:15 PM.

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    Re: Unraid alternative?

    Sorry, i think you misunderstood, i meant some links to example cards my motherboard has no onboard sata ports so i need a card to provide the ports, the only reason i was even looking at "fakeraid" cards was because they were cheaper than hardware raid cards
    Last edited by DragonStar; 24-10-2007 at 11:31 PM.

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    Re: Unraid alternative?

    Quote Originally Posted by Elspuddy View Post
    when i first read this thread i thorhgt about this
    yeah the functionality of that looks similar/same as unraid

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    Re: Unraid alternative?

    Quote Originally Posted by DragonStar View Post
    Sorry, i think you misunderstood, i meant some links to example cards
    anything with sata ports on it ought to work. something sii3112 based or somesuch

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