NAS Drive

LunarMist

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Amazon. I'd hold off until I hear back from their tech. He wanted to talk to me yesterday, but I was busy spending 10.5 hours installing 15 DirecTV receivers in a large house.

I can live with those speeds in RAID 6 for a backup. I'm going to continue with individual drives for the primary data, but use larger and better ones.
 

ddrueding

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I bought the 16GB version. Partly because I knew I'd be testing the limits of performance and wanted it to have the best chance, and partly for availability.
 

LunarMist

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I'm not planning to copy any files over 4GB so I doubt it matters.
 

LunarMist

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Did you find out anything else? If I buy 8gb does all RAM need to be replaced together for 16GB?
 

LunarMist

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Wouldn't that video card draw excessive power from the NAS?
 

LunarMist

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Does anyone return to the egg if the product sucks but is not defective? I don't know where to buy it with a return policy.
 

Stereodude

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Does anyone return to the egg if the product sucks but is not defective? I don't know where to buy it with a return policy.
I'm pretty sure they have a restocking fee on most items. Amazon is pretty good if you want to do that, but if you abuse their return policy by doing it too often they will ban you.
 

LunarMist

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Thanks. The 8GB RAM version is currently available directly from the Amazon. The 16GB was from the QNAP and the only one in stock for the past few weeks.
 

ddrueding

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They did remotely access the NAS, and did try to reach me to tell me what was up, but I still haven't been available. I suspect they closed the ticket.
 

LunarMist

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So I finally picked out the 831X and after several problems, I think it is working well enough. I'm getting high 400s for reads and high 300s for writes according to the benchmarks. Actual transfer rates from other drives are slower, but I'm not seeing any CPUs at 100%. Despite transfer rates being decent, there must be some latency or other issue that makes extracting from 2000 RAW files still slower than from a single 10TB drive. The 831X is certainly a faster NAS for backups and has the 6th drive so that RAID 6 can be used.

Negatives are that the construction is rather tinny and the fan is either too weak or too strong, not to mention the crappy software. It's very frustrating to find key terminology that are not defined anywhere and multiple screens with limited or no options. The Synology is a lot better.

For some reason the WOL does not seem to work over the 10GbE. Perhaps that is normal because the port is dead when off? The data always goes over the slow path when both the GbE and 10GbE are connected, so that is not an option. I want to have the NAS over in the corner and don't want to reach down there to turn it on every time. :(
 

LunarMist

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The fan operates at about 500 RPM on low and 1200 RPM on medium. On low fans the system temp is 38°C, but the drives are ~46. I suppose that is fine, but I'd like them to be a little cooler for long-term use.
AT 1200 RPM the system temp is 28 and drive temps are 31-32, so you can see that I'd like them in between.
Can I replace the fans with slower ones or add some controller to make them slower (~800 RPM) without the system going bonkers or voiding the warranty? Thanks.
 

CougTek

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Can I replace the fans with slower ones or add some controller to make them slower (~800 RPM) without the system going bonkers or voiding the warranty? Thanks.
Replacing the fan will of course void the warranty. Any tempering of the internal components will.
 

LunarMist

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Yeah, I suppose so. If I could use the WOL the NAS would be another 1.5m+ away and the noise would be acceptable.
 

LunarMist

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No, it was the network setting that ranges from 1500 to 9000.
Do you use it?
 

Handruin

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No, it was the network setting that ranges from 1500 to 9000.
Do you use it?

In specific situations it helps but if you make this change, you'll likely need to change every device on the same network to an MTU value of 9000 (aka jumbo frames). If the CPU is weak on the NAS this might help you with 10Gb performance but for 1Gb I doubt you'll notice a difference.
 

LunarMist

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So Windows will have a MTU setting for the 520DA2? There is nothing on the network but the NAS and two computers on separate 10GbE cables.
The GbE ports are set to 1500 and I would not change settings since that is on a switch with 6-7 devices plugged in.
 

Handruin

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So Windows will have a MTU setting for the 520DA2? There is nothing on the network but the NAS and two computers on separate 10GbE cables.
The GbE ports are set to 1500 and I would not change settings since that is on a switch with 6-7 devices plugged in.

Yes, there should be an option under that network adapter's properties for MTU. Open the normal network properties dialog and select the Configure button. Switch to the advanced tab and look for either MTU or Jumbo packet in the list of advanced options. Select the item so that you can make the change. If those are the only devices on the network (or if it's a point to point) then feel free to set them both to MTU of 9000.
 

LunarMist

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Yes, there should be an option under that network adapter's properties for MTU. Open the normal network properties dialog and select the Configure button. Switch to the advanced tab and look for either MTU or Jumbo packet in the list of advanced options. Select the item so that you can make the change. If those are the only devices on the network (or if it's a point to point) then feel free to set them both to MTU of 9000.

Thanks. I'm not seeing a difference within the variation of the benchmarks. The X520-DA2 had the setting on 9014, which is not exactly the same as the NAS, but I doubt that matters.
I'm hoping the red light will eventually stop flashing.
 

LunarMist

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For some reason the WOL does not seem to work over the 10GbE. Perhaps that is normal because the port is dead when off? The data always goes over the slow path when both the GbE and 10GbE are connected, so that is not an option. I want to have the NAS over in the corner and don't want to reach down there to turn it on every time. :(

No matter what I do the default goes back to the GbE after the power is off. Is it possible to connect two switches in series, using one to turn on or off the access to the main switch? I would apply AC power to the secondary switch just for the WOL and they turn it off during the boot process.
 

LunarMist

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The red light would not turn off until after the reboot. It's not too bad for a cheap RAID 6 NAS with 62% full 8TB 5400RPM drives. Of course it is only for use as the backup target.

831X-0.62-Crystal.png
 

Handruin

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No matter what I do the default goes back to the GbE after the power is off. Is it possible to connect two switches in series, using one to turn on or off the access to the main switch? I would apply AC power to the secondary switch just for the WOL and they turn it off during the boot process.

Rather than use auto-negotiate, can you set both adapters to 10000Mb fixed speed? I don't fully understand your setup to know why you're looking to connect up two separate switches. Is this to keep one adapter online while the other is powered off just to keep them set to 10Gb?
 

Handruin

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The red light would not turn off until after the reboot. It's not too bad for a cheap RAID 6 NAS with 62% full 8TB 5400RPM drives. Of course it is only for use as the backup target.

View attachment 1111

The 4K IOps is pretty low especially if it's not random 4k. I think that's like 375/IOps. What is the stripe size for your RAID 6 volume?
 

LunarMist

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Rather than use auto-negotiate, can you set both adapters to 10000Mb fixed speed? I don't fully understand your setup to know why you're looking to connect up two separate switches. Is this to keep one adapter online while the other is powered off just to keep them set to 10Gb?

No, the 10Gb adapters are working fine at 10Gb. However, there is no power to the 10Gb port on the NAS when it is off, so WOL is not possible.
The Gb port on the NAS does stay on and accepts the WOL. However, when both the 10Gb and 1Gb (through a switch) are connected, the transfers default to 1Gb after the NAS is rebooted.
By disconnecting the GbE port during boot, the NAS will use the 10Gb port. Yeah, I know it is stupid, but it does work. I tried several metrics settings and that did not help either.
 

LunarMist

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The 4K IOps is pretty low especially if it's not random 4k. I think that's like 375/IOps. What is the stripe size for your RAID 6 volume?

There is no stripe option described in the 428 page user manual and the internal help is useless as well. :(
QNAP documentation and support are rather poor from everything I read. Every search seems to land in a forum where IT people are showing some Linus command lines or something like that.
 

LunarMist

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Is a hot spare rotating or is it just in the NAs waiting for another drive to croak? Do you guys use the hot spares?
 

Handruin

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Is a hot spare rotating or is it just in the NAs waiting for another drive to croak? Do you guys use the hot spares?

Usually it's both. I don't for personal use but at work I allocate hot spares on the arrays I manage.
 

ddrueding

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For the most part I don't use hot spares. I will occasionally keep a spare new drive sitting nearby so that a rebuild can start ASAP.
 

Howell

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As a reminder, RAID5 can afford to lose one drive. During the time the array is degraded you are at risk of array collapse and losing all data. The time to rebuild is a function of the amount of data you have PLUS how long it takes you to replace the drive. A hot spare takes the urgency out of the emergency. I want to do this every chance I can.
 

LunarMist

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As a reminder, RAID5 can afford to lose one drive. During the time the array is degraded you are at risk of array collapse and losing all data. The time to rebuild is a function of the amount of data you have PLUS how long it takes you to replace the drive. A hot spare takes the urgency out of the emergency. I want to do this every chance I can.

In addition to increasing the copy speed via the 10Gb ports, I obtained the QNAP for the 8 bays. I could only use RAID 5 with the first NAS (5 drives). Now I am using the RAD 6 (6 drives).
I will not add a hot spare if it is indeed running. I thought perhaps it could be in there and the NAS would any apply power as needed, but apparently that's not feasible. I don't have any empty helium drives to test it with.
 

LunarMist

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With RAID 6 of 6 drives the failure rates should be fairly low. I think that could go up to 8 drives and still be fine. Maybe I'll get another drive when the capacity exceeds 80% or if the 8TB drives become cheap next year.
 

LunarMist

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I goofed due to dim lights and now the array is rebuilding. :doh:
Does it really matter which drive slot is used if the change is done with the power off?
 
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