We run dual 18TB file servers using 8 3TB drives in a RAID6 configuration. Each servers mirrors itself to the other server for redundant backup. These servers are attached to our network and serve up the file stores via SMB/CIFS (they are Windows-based). Until recently, we were accessing them over a 10/100 Mbps network with no issues from our Rivendell workstations. The only exception was the server-to-server mirroring, which runs over a dedicated direct connection to avoid choking off the workstation access when the mirroring occurs each night.
Being Windows based, we use Areca ARC-1220 hardware RAID cards in these machines: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816131004. One of these per machine connects all 8 drives and powers the RAID6. if we were using Linux servers (which we would be if we were building from scratch again today), we'd probably use Linux software RAID (Linux MD RAID) to drive the system. Modern processors are more than fast enough to handle this and the Linux MD Raid implementation is fairly ubiquitous, fast, and very stable. Were we to use software RAID, we'd go with a cheaper HBA adapter card since we wouldn't need hardware RAID support: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816118112. I'd recommend going with RAID 5 or RAID 6 (only a possibility if you have more than 4 drives) instead of RAID 10. I've never been a big fan of combined RAID levels, as they tend to be harder to expand, harder to maintain, and very few people actually have a good understanding the complex failure probabilities they present. With a 4 drive system, I'd recommend using RAID 5 over RAID 10. ZFS is a cool system, but Linux ZFS support has always been spotty. It's designed primarily for Solaris, not Linux, and licensing issue have prevented its incorporation in the Linux kernel. There is some support via FUSE (non-kernel implementation) and a few other 3rd party kernel modules, but generally Linux does not fully or optimally support ZFS. BTRFS is the Linux answer to ZFS, and it also provides built-in RAID-like capabilities. That said, BTRFS is still under heavy development and I probably wouldn't yet recommend it for production use. As Wayne mentioned, there are companies that sell pre-built systems, but in this day and age, it's probably just as simple, and generally cheaper, to build your own. I think your safest, most-stable, and simplest approach would be to build a small Linux server with 4 to 6 drives running under Linux MD software raid using RAID5 or 6. Good luck! -Andy Sayler www.wmfo.org www.andysayler.com On Mon, Jun 4, 2012 at 4:48 AM, Rob Landry <[email protected]> wrote: > > A station I converted to Rivendell back in 2010 has asked me to update > the system. In addition to moving from 1.7.2 to 2.x, they want to add more > disk storage. > > They're currently running a RAID 1 array consisting of two 2 TB disks, > providing about 1.7 TB of available storage. It is set up using Linux > software RAID. I'm thinking of going with two systems (for redundancy), > each with four 2TB drives configured as a RAID 10 array, effectively > doubling the station's current capacity, also using software RAID. > > My question is: are there ready-made systems available in such a > configuration, or will I have to build my own? > > Also, I've long been averse to playing audio files from a workstation over > the air through a network from a server, and so I'm thinking of setting > these new machines up as wholly self-contained Rivendell workstations, > keeping them synchronized using the Perl scripts I developed for another > station, where they have been working very well. > > Any thoughts? > > > Rob > _______________________________________________ > Rivendell-dev mailing list > [email protected] > http://lists.rivendellaudio.org/mailman/listinfo/rivendell-dev >
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