unRaid 6
- Thread starter Hank C
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Here is a forum that I'm a part of that many user's have went back to UnRAID 6. UnRAID 6 | LinuxServer.io Forums. Still only one parity disk and no built-in bitrot protection. But, it does have a nice web GUI, lots of Docker apps, and KVM virtualization.
Not my cup of tea, but it is a perfect solution for others.
Not my cup of tea, but it is a perfect solution for others.
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Stupid spell check
I meant to write, one parity disk (not enough for my data as I'd like at least two disks or even more as the spindle count increased). The lack of bitrot protection means that it does not provide checksumming for data to ensure it's accuracy like ZFS, btrfs, refs, or other snapshot RAID solutions like SnapRAID or FlexRAID. If you'd like to read more, take a look at this article.In regards to virtualization, UnRAID6 uses KVM or Xen as it's virtualization platform (KVM also allows GPU and PCIe passthrough on vt-d hardware).
LimeTech – Exciting New Developments with unRAID 6!
This chart also does a good job of comparing many of the popular bulk media storage platforms.
SnapRAID
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other than checksum for data integrity, i think it has other great features for a all-in-one box lab.
i am looking at this as well but doesn't seems to have KVM...
Rockstor | Linux & BTRFS powered Opensource NAS solution
i am looking at this as well but doesn't seems to have KVM...
Rockstor | Linux & BTRFS powered Opensource NAS solution
It does, and it's certainly better than ReiserFS or XFS. Also, a COW filesystem can prevent corruption of unsynced data. But, btrfs is still limited in it's recovery ability in UnRAID because it's a filesystem applied to each individual disk vs. a typical btrfs array. Unless you enable multiple copies per disk, btrfs can detect the error, but not always repair it. That's why having bitrot protection at the array level is a bit more helpful to actually repair the corruption.
So...then UnRAID does support bitrot protection, as you can use btrfs as the file system. Of course, xfs is the other option, reiserfs is now depreciated in v6.
UnRAID applies the filesystem to individual disks, and as result, and will not provide the ability to recover from bitrot, only report that it found it. So, it doesn't take full advantage of the bitrot protection that btrfs provides (since it can detect, but not repair the error). As a sidenote, I also wonder how many UnRAID users with btrfs backed disks actually schedule scrubs for their data disks. Finally, since UnRAID uses realtime parity calculations, corruption could could be transferred to the parity disk before being detected by an individual disk scrub thus preventing the user to restore a previous, uncorrupted version of the file.
As result, I would say that it does not provide the same level of bitrot protection as a multi-disk brtrfs/ZFS array, or a SnapRAID array. If a btrfs scrub detects and error in UnRAID, you are going to need to restore from either a snapshot or a backup, rather than relying on btrfs to just repair it for you like it would in a traditional multi-disk array.
Basically, a scrub can correct errors on devices that are redundant (for example a snapshot or in a btrfs raid configuration). Unfortunately, in a single disk filesystem like you would be using with UnRAID data disks, a btrfs scrub can only detect the issue, not actually repair it.
Here's a discussion from the Limetech forums about the benefits/limitations of btrfs in single disk configurations and the impact of a scrub in this scenario and on the parity calculation.
BTRFS Scrub Discussion
Another shortcoming with UnRAID for my use case is that I want to have more than one parity disk on a large pool. If you are happy with UnRAID, that is great. I was expressing my opinions about why is not my cup of tea. For others, it is the perfect solution
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Using btrfs in single-disk mode will not give you bitrot protection - you basically get bitrot detection. Theoretically UnRAID could use the detection provided by btrfs to then do a rebuild/repair using its own parity data, but I suspect they are not doing that. You would probably have to manually (or with a scheduled job) run btrfs scrubs on each drive to monitor for bitrot, and if any files are found corrupt then delete them and allow UnRAID to rebuild them from its parity.
I think, you can have bitrot protectio for single drive on btrfs without manually run scrubbing
run this when creating btrfs partition or a whole disk: mkfs.btrfs -d dup -m dup -M <device>
You are absolutely correct. As I wrote above, if you you enable multiple copies per disk, you can recover data from bitrot. But, this makes duplicate copies on the individual disk and halves the disk space available per disk. Also, I would bet that almost no one using UnRAID + btrfs is doing this.
I've been using unRAID v6 since the beta and I think it's a fantastic solution for certain uses. I for one use it mainly as my bulk media storage solution and for streaming media. You can also do some really cool things with regard to virtualization as you can see from the below videos:
Also, dual parity is coming soon (version 6.2 I've heard). I for one won't be using the dual parity as I use 8TB drives and don't feel like losing another 8TB of usable space. I have a second server backing up my main server and I'm quite comfortable with the fact that if I lose 2 drives I'll only have to restore the data on those two drives.
Also, dual parity is coming soon (version 6.2 I've heard). I for one won't be using the dual parity as I use 8TB drives and don't feel like losing another 8TB of usable space. I have a second server backing up my main server and I'm quite comfortable with the fact that if I lose 2 drives I'll only have to restore the data on those two drives.
Ok, that's pretty cool... the videos. Now I'll have to build a dual-head web-browsing machine.
Probably can get away without the dual Xeon E5's thenOk, that's pretty cool... the videos. Now I'll have to build a dual-head web-browsing machine.
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I use this as my home media/test system in a (2) x5690/96GB system in a Norco 4224 4U case. Its almost silent thanks to the $300+ I spent in Noctua heatsinks and fans.
I was able to consolidate a good number of my home systems utilizing unRaid6.
Home docker test server
Chucked my home proxmox server in favor or unRaid6's built in KVM manager.
Media server for OpenElec
My wifes OSX86 desktop that runs via a passthrough GPU.
I was able to consolidate a good number of my home systems utilizing unRaid6.
Home docker test server
Chucked my home proxmox server in favor or unRaid6's built in KVM manager.
Media server for OpenElec
My wifes OSX86 desktop that runs via a passthrough GPU.
I am still hunting for the binary for v6 ... seems like they don't really care about GPL violations much.
... it is inside the installed directory, which requires agreeing to the EULA... and its not the entire source, even though the entire sources uses GPL libraries ... interesting.
... it is inside the installed directory, which requires agreeing to the EULA... and its not the entire source, even though the entire sources uses GPL libraries ... interesting.
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I won't touch unRAID.
FreeNAS - YES!
Proxmox - Sure
Ubuntu/ CentOS - Of course
Napp-IT - ok (but I wish it was ZoL based!)