So confused. first NAS setup. Help?

Discussion on setting up QNAP NAS products.
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SerfNoob
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So confused. first NAS setup. Help?

Post by SerfNoob »

Hello to all you friendly wizards.
I'm so out of my depth here and almost at panic.
I had a last minute job request and the media (16TB of 4k video in numerous codecs) arrives Monday. It exceeds my current storage (9TB SAS raid 5), and I have admittedly jumped into NAS a little hastily. I purchased what I could find in stock TVS-672xt 2x EVO 980 500gb + 6 x 8TB ironwolf pro along with a sonnet Solo 10G ethernet card for my classic Mac Pro... I know. Povo.

From here in I'm lost, I have read so many pages of tutorials and walkthroughs but they all seem to assume I have a basic understanding of life, I don't.

1) added the M.2's and booted the NAS, it asked me if I wanted to install QuTs Hero, I said yes but it still just gave me QTS, no major problem just one of the many things I don't understand.

2) now I need to make a storage pool (storage pool 1) I selected both M.2 and it made a raid 1... am I doing ok so far?

3)then that needs a volume? I went with thick... what do I do about thresholds on both the pool and the volume for what I assume is the system disk?

4) I added 1 by 1 the 8TB sata drives > created new (storage pool 2) and turned them in to a raid 5 array... am I still on track?

5) volumes again. I can't get me head around thin and thick... static I think I can understand. I've selected thick again and once again I'm unsure about provisioning and thresholds.

Image

Do I max-out the storage pool then make the volume %80 or vis versa? I currently seem to be short disk space.

All help appreciated... I'm fragile from exhaustion and I have even started the job yet. Maybe I should have just stuck 14tbs in the old SAS enclosure but I wanted something with a little future.

Not going to push my luck and ask how best to set up my Mac for both a DAS style connection from the 10gbe card... I think I've sorted that by assigning manual IP addresses 1 off each other in a different range to the home network?

Thanks I advance,
The SerfNoob.
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Moogle Stiltzkin
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Re: So confused. first NAS setup. Help?

Post by Moogle Stiltzkin »

QUTS hero is only available for specific models. check your product page online to see if it is available. usually if it has quts hero branding, that is a clear indicator it has quts hero support. Quts hero simply means Linux openzfs. Whereas QTS is using linux EXT4. Personally i prefer quts hero if given the option between the 2.


How to configure a QNAP NAS using QuTS Hero for the first time
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z8Z60TPIz9k

First Time QNAP NAS Setup! Configuring your QNAP for the first time.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mBZswHLdwI8


With your hard i'd configure it like this

pool1: first create raid1 using the 2 x 500gb 980 evo ssds. This is volume 1.

pool2: Then create a raid6 with the 6 x 8TB ironwolf pro. This is volume 2.


your choices are between thick or thin. Personally i'ved used thick. Here is an explation comparing the 2
https://www.qnap.com/en/how-to/knowledg ... ick-volume


for ssd provisioning i believe they offer default values? stick with those. Linus explains what over provisioning is for if you don't understand why it asks you to do this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q15wN8JC2L4


I'm more familiar with thick so i'll explain about that. With thick, by default it allots 50% of the total usable space. So don't be surprised why only 50% is available. You have to then allot from 50 to 100% of the space if you want to allot more usable space. Usually it's recommended only to increase availability incrementally as required.


By the way if you plan to utilize snapshots, the minimum reserved required for snapshots is 5% of the total usable space. So if you allocate 100%, you won't be able to unallocate to make room for that minimum 5% if later you decided you want snapshots after all. In that situation, you'd have to redo your raid to get the allocation setup for that. So make sure you know what you clearly intend to do before going 100% allocation off the bat for your usable space :wink:


Anyway once you setup your raid volumes, you can then create your shares. E.g. i created a share i call "storage", "storage2" etc. You can come up with your own system for this. So once it's created, you can edit the share configs as needed. For my own simple purposes i have smb enabled on the QNAP. So i can then access these shares from my windows 10 client devices like pc, laptop using File Explorer > network. Then i can access the folders/subfolders containing the files stored on those shares :}



Sadly i don't use 10gbe so i cannot advise on that. But other knowledable users can probly chime in. To my understanding, it requires some tunning in order to ensure that you get 10gbe performance. But in regards to 1gbe, you have a much easier time getting that performance as long as your switches are 1gbe and the ethernet cables are cat5e or better.


in regards to raid maintenance, schedule raid scrubs for once a month. Also raids are not a backup, Just keep that in mind (a lot of newbies mistakenly think that raid can be a substitute for backup. it isn't :S )
https://www.reddit.com/r/qnap/comments/ ... _a_backup/
Last edited by Moogle Stiltzkin on Fri Jun 18, 2021 6:34 pm, edited 1 time in total.
NAS
[Main Server] QNAP TS-877 (QTS) w. 4tb [ 3x HGST Deskstar NAS & 1x WD RED NAS ] EXT4 Raid5 & 2 x m.2 SATA Samsung 850 Evo raid1 +16gb ddr4 Crucial+ QWA-AC2600 wireless+QXP PCIE
[Backup] QNAP TS-653A (Truenas Core) w. 4x 2TB Samsung F3 (HD203WI) RaidZ1 ZFS + 8gb ddr3 Crucial
[^] QNAP TL-D400S 2x 4TB WD Red Nas (WD40EFRX) 2x 4TB Seagate Ironwolf, Raid5
[^] QNAP TS-509 Pro w. 4x 1TB WD RE3 (WD1002FBYS) EXT4 Raid5
[^] QNAP TS-253D (Truenas Scale)
[Mobile NAS] TBS-453DX w. 2x Crucial MX500 500gb EXT4 raid1

Network
Qotom Pfsense|100mbps FTTH | Win11, Ryzen 5600X Desktop (1x2tb Crucial P50 Plus M.2 SSD, 1x 8tb seagate Ironwolf,1x 4tb HGST Ultrastar 7K4000)


Resources
[Review] Moogle's QNAP experience
[Review] Moogle's TS-877 review
https://www.patreon.com/mooglestiltzkin
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Moogle Stiltzkin
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Re: So confused. first NAS setup. Help?

Post by Moogle Stiltzkin »

hm when you first create the raid6 using the hdds, just put all the hdds in and create that raid6 volume in one shot. You don't need to put 1 by 1 by 1. You only do that if you already have data on there, and want to expand to include more hdds. But if you are starting from scratch, just put them all in and create in one go.

If you do it 1 by 1, it takes ages. Because you got to wait for the new hdd to sync which takes hour, and you repeat the process each time each new hdd added.


for quts hero they have something similar to raid. RaidZ1 = raid5, raidz2 = raid6.


You can use this raid calculator to figure out how much usable space you get
http://www.raid-calculator.com/


it may be tempting to use raid5 over raid6, because you get more usable space. But once you use X amount of hdds, it may be better to use raid6 instead, because the odds of raid failure gets higher (the calculator link above doesn't show the failure raid, so you can google to find one that does), the more hdds you use. For myself using 4 hdds, raid5 is a no brainer. But 6 -8 you may want to consider raid6 perhaps? :'
NAS
[Main Server] QNAP TS-877 (QTS) w. 4tb [ 3x HGST Deskstar NAS & 1x WD RED NAS ] EXT4 Raid5 & 2 x m.2 SATA Samsung 850 Evo raid1 +16gb ddr4 Crucial+ QWA-AC2600 wireless+QXP PCIE
[Backup] QNAP TS-653A (Truenas Core) w. 4x 2TB Samsung F3 (HD203WI) RaidZ1 ZFS + 8gb ddr3 Crucial
[^] QNAP TL-D400S 2x 4TB WD Red Nas (WD40EFRX) 2x 4TB Seagate Ironwolf, Raid5
[^] QNAP TS-509 Pro w. 4x 1TB WD RE3 (WD1002FBYS) EXT4 Raid5
[^] QNAP TS-253D (Truenas Scale)
[Mobile NAS] TBS-453DX w. 2x Crucial MX500 500gb EXT4 raid1

Network
Qotom Pfsense|100mbps FTTH | Win11, Ryzen 5600X Desktop (1x2tb Crucial P50 Plus M.2 SSD, 1x 8tb seagate Ironwolf,1x 4tb HGST Ultrastar 7K4000)


Resources
[Review] Moogle's QNAP experience
[Review] Moogle's TS-877 review
https://www.patreon.com/mooglestiltzkin
Bob Zelin
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Location: Orlando, FL.
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Re: So confused. first NAS setup. Help?

Post by Bob Zelin »

Hi SerfNoob -
I am the video guy here.
I am disappointed you chose the TVS-672XT. A better choice in 2021 would have been the TS-h886 with a 10G card, because this runs the QuTS operating system.
You are doing 4K video editing. All you needed was the six 8TB drives. You create a single RAID 5 or RAID 6 volume, as a STATIC VOLUME - not thin, not thick volume.
You did not need the M.2 drives - but if you started with the M.2 drives, and put your QTS operating system on those - that is perfectly ok. Your six 8TB drives will be just for your video storage.
You are trying to get maximum speed here, and the static volume (not thick, not thin) will do this for you.

In your Mac (I can't believe you are using a 2010 Mac Pro - I bet you are running Media Composer with macOS 10.13.6) - you have the excellent Solo 10G PCIe card. Assign the QNAP 10G port (ethernet port 1 - the top ethernet port) to be 192.168.2.3, subnet mask 255.255.255.0, enable Jumbo Frames MTU 9000). Make the Mac 10G card - configure Manually> IPv4 192.168.2.11. subnet 255.255.255.0. Advanced> Hardware> Manually> MTU 9000> OK, APPLY.

Now on the Mac - GO> Connect To Server> smb://192.168.2.3
it will ask for your QNAP name and password - and the QNAP will mount. If you don't see the QNAP - on the Mac, click on Finder> Preferences> Connected Servers, and the QNAP
will appear on your Desktop

I do this every day for video guys. And don't forget - transcode your h.264 media - because nothing is going to play this back, and you will be blaming the QNAP - when it's you and your DJI drone footage !

bobzelin@icloud.com
Bob Zelin / Rescue 1, Inc.
http://www.bobzelin.com
SerfNoob
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Joined: Fri Jun 18, 2021 4:18 pm

Re: So confused. first NAS setup. Help?

Post by SerfNoob »

Thanks Moogle and Bob for the replies.
Great to know there is an active and supportive community here.
I'm re-creating the SATA storage pool as a raid 5 static volume and I'll cross my fingers.
I cant seem to change any of my static IP settings for the 10bit port {invalid network set-up}, even if I enter the setting that were just working.
Must need a restart but I'll try that after the raid has finished building.

Bob... I wish it was a 2010 cMP... I'm still on a 2009 :) firmware updated to 5,1 and a bunch of unsanctioned stuff to run Catalina and an rx5700. I've been holding out to see what the apple silicon will do in pro space or maybe i'll just build an AMD rig and move to windows.
Just running premiere, AE and resolve but I've been in my mac cocoon for 30 years. It will be hard to teach this old dog new tricks.

TS-h886 looks like it would have been a better choice as the thunderbolt connection seems flakey on the TVS. I just thought it might come in handy.
Is the TS-h886 quieter in real life than the TVS-672xt? I dont know if its my unit or the model but the TVS is very loud. I'm getting 37/43 dBa 1m away even before populating with HDD.
The room with the NAS off is 23/26 dBa. I've raised a ticket.

Sorry it probably won't be my last request for help/guidance.

Thanks again for the support & info,
SerfNoob.
Bob Zelin
Experience counts
Posts: 1370
Joined: Mon Nov 21, 2016 12:55 am
Location: Orlando, FL.
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Re: So confused. first NAS setup. Help?

Post by Bob Zelin »

Hi SerfNoob -
I don't know what to tell you. You have been editing for 30 years. You need professional modern equipment. A M1 Mac Mini is $700 and will outperform your antique 2009 5,1 Mac Pro.
You have been around editing gear for 30 years, and you think that the TVS-672XT is loud ? Wasn't a Sony VTR much louder ? Wasn't your stack of SCSI drives much louder ?

You don't need a RAID restart to change the static IP's - you go into Control Panel> Network> and select the ethernet port 1 Configuration (the 3 dots), change it to STATIC and you can set a static IP address.

And you want to build your own Win 10 PC ?
'
Bob Zelin
Bob Zelin / Rescue 1, Inc.
http://www.bobzelin.com
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Moogle Stiltzkin
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Re: So confused. first NAS setup. Help?

Post by Moogle Stiltzkin »

for building a pc i'd use pcpartpicker to get an idea for what parts to get and at what budget. as for putting it together, i do water cooling, so i send my pc to the pc repair shop and they do it for me :} it's that easy. It's still a DIY pc with separate parts bought online, but others put it together for you. graphics cards are so expensive these days......

https://pcpartpicker.com/

or get a M1 Mac Mini is $700 like bob suggested :'
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4MkrEMjPk24
NAS
[Main Server] QNAP TS-877 (QTS) w. 4tb [ 3x HGST Deskstar NAS & 1x WD RED NAS ] EXT4 Raid5 & 2 x m.2 SATA Samsung 850 Evo raid1 +16gb ddr4 Crucial+ QWA-AC2600 wireless+QXP PCIE
[Backup] QNAP TS-653A (Truenas Core) w. 4x 2TB Samsung F3 (HD203WI) RaidZ1 ZFS + 8gb ddr3 Crucial
[^] QNAP TL-D400S 2x 4TB WD Red Nas (WD40EFRX) 2x 4TB Seagate Ironwolf, Raid5
[^] QNAP TS-509 Pro w. 4x 1TB WD RE3 (WD1002FBYS) EXT4 Raid5
[^] QNAP TS-253D (Truenas Scale)
[Mobile NAS] TBS-453DX w. 2x Crucial MX500 500gb EXT4 raid1

Network
Qotom Pfsense|100mbps FTTH | Win11, Ryzen 5600X Desktop (1x2tb Crucial P50 Plus M.2 SSD, 1x 8tb seagate Ironwolf,1x 4tb HGST Ultrastar 7K4000)


Resources
[Review] Moogle's QNAP experience
[Review] Moogle's TS-877 review
https://www.patreon.com/mooglestiltzkin
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