[OpenIndiana-discuss] Fwd: ZFS 0+1 across disparate drives

Wed Dec 1 23:33:26 UTC 2021

Yes, you can use whatever drives you have but don't expect it to have 
consistence performance.

Each mirrored vdev will be as slow as the slowest drive. I would not put 
a green drive in the pool. Green drives have this nasty habit of 
spinning down to save power and be green like kermit the frog.

I put 96 WD green drives in a pool spread across four chassis. The 
infant mortality rate on those drives was insane. For the first three 
months one to three drives would fail every week. Was that due to 
vibration? All the spin/down because of the array was fairly active? 
Just a crappy production run? I dont know, but I will never do that again.

j.

On 12/1/21 9:51 AM, Michelle wrote:
> Good advice. Thanks for taking the time.
>
> This remains one question ... can drives and partitions be mixed in a
> ZFS pool?
>
> This project is a backup project which is actually a backup of a
> backup, if that makes sense.
>
> The original data is spread across two servers, one running OI (the
> main data store) and a Cisco NAS (my video/rip store). These are backed
> up to external drives, with two backup sets for each. So I already have
> a situation with one RAID resilient copy of the data, along with two
> full external backups of the data.
>
> But I have a series of odd drives hanging around, as many people
> probably do. And I want to do something useful with them.
>
> The only other alternative is to dismantle and trash the drives.
>
> So I am going to undertaken this project, and document it, so that
> others in the same situation can find some use for their drives as
> opposed to simply throwing away perfectly serviceable drives.
>
> Yes, the drives are going to be disparate. Most of them are WD Red
> units, one is WD green. For this project I will also be re-using an old
> motherboard which has been sitting in the attic for years.
>
> The operating system will be on its own SSD drive, and the whole thing
> will be documented so in the case of an OS failure, the drive can
> easily be rebuilt and reconfigured... because all the notes are there.
>
> So... yes... partially I'm doing this for the hell of it. And hopefully
> my success or failure will be documented and of use to other people. I
> have a small youtube channel - not monetized - where all this will
> ultimately be recorded.
>
>
> On Wed, 2021-12-01 at 20:08 +0300, Mehmet Erol Sanliturk wrote:
>> On Wed, Dec 1, 2021 at 2:55 PM Michelle <michelle at msknight.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> I'm trying to achieve a resilient way of bringing together all my
>>> older
>>> drives for a backup solution using scraps of whatever I can get my
>>> hands on.
>>>
>>> I have closing on 12TB of data so even the 10 won't be enough to
>>> back
>>> everything up, but this is as much for the exercise of doing it, as
>>> achieving anything solid. It won't be under pressure, but I'd
>>> rather
>>> push the envelope and see what I can do.
>>>
>>> So how would the command go?
>>>
>>> zpool create tank raidz mirror drive1 drive2 mirror drive3 drive4
>>> drive5
>>>
>>> ...which is where I come unstuck with the 2TB drive in the mix.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>> A few days ago I lost many weeks of work because my drive #1 / 3 died
>> , not
>> synchronized into #2 / 3 and #3 / 3 .
>> This made the computer unbootable .
>> I replaced the failed disk and synchronized it with #2 .
>> The disk #3 failed and made the computer unbootable .
>> I replaced that disk and synchronized it with #2 .
>>
>> The #1 disk was new but bought approximately 5 year ago .
>>
>> You are saying your disks are older .
>>
>> One "safe" but slow choice would be the following .
>>
>> Use external USB docks for each of your disks and make their file
>> systems
>> compatible
>> with your computer ( if your disks have other file systems ) .
>>
>> With your synchronization shell scripts (1) mount (2) rsync (3)
>> un_mount
>> your drives
>> by using cron or ( manually which this option is not a good choice )
>> .
>>
>> If any one of your disks fails , it will not affect your computer .
>> This will be slow but without any other harm .
>>
>>
>> The most suitable additional action may be to backup your data to
>> external
>> disks
>> regularly . These disks will not be continuously connected to the
>> computer
>> and will not be affected by electricity harmful effects .
>>
>>
>>
>> OR
>>
>> You may use another computer ( such as a single board computer ) as
>> an NFS
>> server
>> ( or a NAS if one is available to you ) , and use your drives in that
>> server .
>> Then synchronize your drives from your computer . If any disk fails ,
>> it
>> only affects the server
>> but your computer continues to work without affection .
>>
>>
>>
>> Mehmet Erol Sanliturk
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>> On Wed, 2021-12-01 at 11:17 +0000, James wrote:
>>>> On 01/12/2021 08:31, Michelle wrote:
>>>>> Say I was to put a 2tb, three 4tb and a 6tb together (a 2 and
>>>>> two 4
>>>>> would make 10 and the other 4 and the 6 would also make 10)
>>>>>
>>>>> Would that be possible with ZFS now?
>>>> I think it has always been possible, ask is is sensible? Try it,
>>>> if
>>>> you
>>>> have nothing to loose. The problem is if one drive fails is
>>>> takes
>>>> out
>>>> all of one side of the mirror.
>>>>
>>>> Why not use 2 separate 4TB mirrors? 4&4 = 4, 4&6 = 4, total
>>>> 8. You
>>>> loose the 2TB drive completely but (guessing) it is the slowest
>>>> and
>>>> oldest. You ignore 2TB of the 6.
>>>>
>>>> You don't say what you are trying to achieve but it's unlikely
>>>> you
>>>> have
>>>> the full 8TB of data, it is unlikely it can't be split.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
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