Re: OpenBSD as a NAS
Hello, For your use case make sure from reading softraid it will fit your needs in the first place, perform some tests to make sure softraid meets what you need. Otherwise have a look at hardware raids which OpenBSD supports. As far as NAS for local, yes OpenBSD's perfect for the job, I've used it since many years and still do. Had a few hardware crashes and filesystem rebuild but all in all never had any issue. I prefer the simple volumes, I don't understand RAID so good, as you feel confident with it use it either ways. Initially I had NFS and Samba and FTP, nowadays only Samba and FTP over SSH (I think that's called SFTP). OpenBSD file systems aren't journaled (file system check after a crash). Also check how to perperly tune the filesystems, I think soft updates can be advised. If you need further advises let ask. Jean-François Le 03/12/2020 à 00:19, Ashton Fagg a écrit : Hi all, I'm currently in the process of provisioning a new NAS for home. It's replacing an older Synology unit that ticks me off in so many ways. I am looking to hear other's experiences with using OpenBSD as a NAS - specifically in terms of reliability, and for suggestions on how to provision my storage. I have an LSI card (supported by the drivers in OpenBSD) that is currently flashed to IT mode, but it can of course flashed back to the IR firmware which lets it act as a hardware RAID controller. My needs for the NAS are as follows: NFS and Samba share support, reasonable performance, some amount of tolerance to disk failure, reliable and trustworthy software and file system, ability to closely monitor disk/array health. By extension, it should also be as simple as possible. It might be nice to have it be able to host an iSCSI volume, but that's not essential. I don't care about bleeding edge performance, fancy web UIs or any other "shiny" stuff. By my estimates, OpenBSD with softraid volumes should tick all of those boxes. The box will do nothing else besides be a file server. OpenBSD is my preferred OS nowadays, but I am open to something else if it's the best tool for the job. I guess I'm trying to find out if there's any compelling reason why I *shouldn't* use OpenBSD with softraid. (ZFS also scares me, btw. Maybe unjustifiably so, but it seems very complex and I suspect much of the hype comes down to zealotry and fanboyism.) The questions I have are: a) Is softraid reliable enough to support my use-case? Does anyone have anecdotes to encourage/discourage use of softraid for this application? b) Would I be better off using the LSI RAID controller for the arrays? c) Bearing in mind that the provisioning scheme I have in mind is to provision the disks in pairs (forming RAID1 arrays), thus resulting in 3-4 separate volumes (6-8 disks), is there any reason I should *not* use OpenBSD, and look more toward something like TrueNAS or FreeBSD? (Before anyone mentions it - Yes, I have a proper backup system. I do not rely on the redundancy provided by RAID arrays in lieu of a real backup. I have both a local backup and offsite backup.) Thanks in advance.
Re: OpenBSD as a NAS
On Sat, Dec 05, 2020 at 12:36:04PM +, Roderick wrote: > > On Sat, 5 Dec 2020, Georg Bege wrote: > > > keep in mind that the ZFS supported versions may be quite different. > > > > The "one ZFS for many OS" isn't really working in reality, > > > > you may not be able to import your pool into different OS than the one > > you've created it with. > > Indeed there is this risk. I only superficially testet long ago > compatibility between Ilumos and FreeBSD. > > But ist there a waranty that UFS partitions created in one system can > be always mounted without big problems in other systems? > > Rod. > In general there is no warranty at all, see the license. But there are good chances it will work, as long as the endianess of the old and new system are the same. -Otto
Re: OpenBSD as a NAS
On Sat, 5 Dec 2020, Georg Bege wrote: keep in mind that the ZFS supported versions may be quite different. The "one ZFS for many OS" isn't really working in reality, you may not be able to import your pool into different OS than the one you've created it with. Indeed there is this risk. I only superficially testet long ago compatibility between Ilumos and FreeBSD. But ist there a waranty that UFS partitions created in one system can be always mounted without big problems in other systems? Rod.
Re: OpenBSD as a NAS
On Fri, 4 Dec 2020, Predrag Punosevac wrote: OpenBSD is super simple and most reliable OS I have personally dealt with but the storage OS, it is not. Nevertheless some people are using in that capacity and to paraphrase Nick's point if OpenBSD is your goto OS, there is nothing wrong in storing and sharing a few files of OpenBSD box instead of picking up and introducing another OS into your home environment. I choose ZFS mainly for two reasons: (1) selfhailing, (2) it runs under many OS and hence I am not dependent on a specific OS or hardware vendor. Unfortunately, OpenBSD does not support ZFS and I see no alternative till now. Rod.
Re: OpenBSD as a NAS
On Fri, 4 Dec 2020, Predrag Punosevac wrote: FreeBSD, ZFS wins hands down. That being said I neither have a need nor a hardware good enough to use ZFS at home. I am testing a 500GB ZFS mirror on an intel D945GCLF atom board with 2 GB Ram. I boot FreeBSD as diskless. It seems to work fine. Rod.
Re: OpenBSD as a NAS
Ashton Fagg wrote: > Hi all, > > I'm currently in the process of provisioning a new NAS for home. It's > replacing an older Synology unit that ticks me off in so many ways. > > I am looking to hear other's experiences with using OpenBSD as a NAS - > specifically in terms of reliability, and for suggestions on how to > provision my storage. > In my experience practical, answerable OpenBSD specific questions based on actual problems that people face are more likely to get you an answer on this mailing list than inviting subscribers to share their experience and opinions. Here is my experience/opinion. OpenBSD is super simple and most reliable OS I have personally dealt with but the storage OS, it is not. Nevertheless some people are using in that capacity and to paraphrase Nick's point if OpenBSD is your goto OS, there is nothing wrong in storing and sharing a few files of OpenBSD box instead of picking up and introducing another OS into your home environment. Building a home NAS involves solving the following five sub-problems. 1. The choice of volume manager (HWRaid vs SoftRaid vs ZFS). 2. The choice of file system (legacy vs modern (ZFS, HAMMER, HAMMER2). 3. How are you going to share the files (NFS, SMB, GlusterFS) 4. How are you going to back up your NAS server (tape, disk, remote machine) 5. Inquiry, monitoring, and alerting of your NAS server for data integrity and performance. > I have an LSI card (supported by the drivers in OpenBSD) that is > currently flashed to IT mode, but it can of course flashed back to the > IR firmware which lets it act as a hardware RAID controller. > So we are now talking about the volume manager. I have not used HWRaid on OpenBSD but I have used SoftRAID. oko# bioctl softraid0 Volume Status Size Device softraid0 0 Online 2000396018176 sd3 RAID1 0 Online 2000396018176 0:0.0 noencl 1 Online 2000396018176 0:1.0 noencl At my place of employment I have used high end LSI HWRaid cards, I have used Linux SoftRAID, and I am currently using ZFS (FreeBSD). I would not recommend HWRaid cards to a home user. Between Linux SoftRAID and ZFS on FreeBSD, ZFS wins hands down. That being said I neither have a need nor a hardware good enough to use ZFS at home. Comparing to Linux SoftRAID, OpenBSD is super crude. Once upon a time I accidently off lined one of the HDDs in RAID1 mirror. It took probably 2 days to rebuild 2TB mirror. The things might have improved. Look for the posts of Karel Gardas who IIRC was one of the guys fiddling with SoftRAID after the original creator Marco Peereboom left the project probably 10 years ago. If you have more than a 1-2 TB of data I would be very worried about using OpenBSD softraid. The best thing is to test before your commit. > > My needs for the NAS are as follows: NFS and Samba share support, That is item 3 on my list. I have not run Samba server of OpenBSD box. I have run NFSv3 server for educational purposes and I currently use OpenBSD NFSv3 client. My needs are very limited so I am not sure if much has changed since Matt Dillon of DragonFly BSD fame gave me a bit of education http://lists.dragonflybsd.org/pipermail/users/2016-April/228719.html > reasonable performance, some amount of tolerance to disk failure, > reliable and trustworthy software and file system, ability to closely This is item 2 on my list. OpenBSD doesn't have a "modern" file system but that is also true for most other actively developed OSs with exception of FreeBSD and DragonFly BSD. Note that I don't consider Illumos kernel and OmniOS in particular activelly developed systems. ZFS on Linux is PITA and on the NetBSD doesn't look much better. If you need copy-on-write, check-sums, consistency and such your choice is pretty much among ZFS, Hammer, and Hammer2. If you stick with OpenBSD's FFS2 start by looking for Solene Rapenne's posts and his blog https://dataswamp.org/~solene/2017-03-17-integrity.html > monitor disk/array health. By extension, it should also be as simple as > possible. That is item 5 on my list. In my experience bioctl is good enough for home users. YMMV. Start by reading https://www.openbsd.org/papers/opencon06-bio.pdf I wish somebody could point me to anything more recent. > > It might be nice to have it be able to host an iSCSI volume, but that's > not essential. I am confused now. You said you are building NAS. Now you are talking about SAN. I would suggest you familiarize yourself with this paper before going further https://www.open-e.com/site_media/download/documents/Open-E-white-paper-EN-web.pdf > > I don't care about bleeding edge performance, fancy web UIs or any other > "shiny" stuff. > > By my estimates, OpenBSD with softraid volumes should tick all of those > boxes. The
Re: OpenBSD as a NAS
On 2020-12-02 18:19, Ashton Fagg wrote: > Hi all, > > I'm currently in the process of provisioning a new NAS for home. It's > replacing an older Synology unit that ticks me off in so many ways. > > I am looking to hear other's experiences with using OpenBSD as a NAS - > specifically in terms of reliability, and for suggestions on how to > provision my storage. > > I have an LSI card (supported by the drivers in OpenBSD) that is > currently flashed to IT mode, but it can of course flashed back to the > IR firmware which lets it act as a hardware RAID controller. > > My needs for the NAS are as follows: NFS and Samba share support, > reasonable performance, some amount of tolerance to disk failure, > reliable and trustworthy software and file system, ability to closely > monitor disk/array health. By extension, it should also be as simple as > possible. > > It might be nice to have it be able to host an iSCSI volume, but that's > not essential. > > I don't care about bleeding edge performance, fancy web UIs or any other > "shiny" stuff. > > By my estimates, OpenBSD with softraid volumes should tick all of those > boxes. The box will do nothing else besides be a file server. OpenBSD is > my preferred OS nowadays, but I am open to something else if it's the > best tool for the job. I guess I'm trying to find out if there's any > compelling reason why I *shouldn't* use OpenBSD with softraid. > > (ZFS also scares me, btw. Maybe unjustifiably so, but it seems very > complex and I suspect much of the hype comes down to zealotry and > fanboyism.) that was my ZFS experience. That, and the regular, "$PRODUCT is the answer, what was your question?". ZFS is one of those $PRODUCTs... > The questions I have are: > > a) Is softraid reliable enough to support my use-case? Does anyone have > anecdotes to encourage/discourage use of softraid for this application? I've been using it in various ways for many years. I'm happy with it. HOWEVER, before you go live, build an array. Replace a disk. Rebuild the array. Basically do everything you might someday have to do in an emergency...do it now before you load your data. > b) Would I be better off using the LSI RAID controller for the arrays? One, no. Two, maybe. Nice thing about software RAID in general is it's hw agnostic. If your system dies, it's easy to move your drives to another machine, maybe with very different hw (for example, I've moved Softraid between pcide(4) systems and ahci(4) systems. Just works). With HW raid, you really HAVE to have a spare RAID card on the shelf ready to do use in case your existing one fails. You won't plug your old drives into another card and have them recognized. HW RAID can be fast. It /can/ be easily managed in OpenBSD if bioctl recognizes your controller. But it is very dependent on the underlying hw. It can also bite you in the butt if it turns out to be quirkier than you expected. I can make a very good case for both HW and SW RAID -- and at this point in my life, if anyone tells you one is absolutely the answer, I'm going to say this person lacks some experience. > c) Bearing in mind that the provisioning scheme I have in mind is to > provision the disks in pairs (forming RAID1 arrays), thus resulting in > 3-4 separate volumes (6-8 disks), is there any reason I should *not* use > OpenBSD, and look more toward something like TrueNAS or FreeBSD? If your weapon of choice is OpenBSD, you will be happy using OpenBSD softraid, much more than trying to pick up another OS for a theoretical advantage. I like your plan. With Softraid, your entire disk should be one RAID array. You can then slice up that RAID array into sub partitions. (i.e., other software RAID systems are different -- for example, Solaris would mirror individual partitions, rather than entire disks). Keeping your arrays simple means your data is more likely to be there when things go wrong (and they always do). > (Before anyone mentions it - Yes, I have a proper backup system. I do > not rely on the redundancy provided by RAID arrays in lieu of a real > backup. I have both a local backup and offsite backup.) Good. :) Nick.
Re: OpenBSD as a NAS
Hi Ken, Thanks for your mail. Kenneth Gober writes: > I believe softraid is reliable enough, but I don't use it so I can't > say so from personal experience. I do use Samba and NFS though and > can report that those work acceptably well. Reading a large file via > Samba over a gigabit link runs at between 30MB/s and 110MB/s in > OpenBSD 6.8. This is a big improvement over older OpenBSD releases. That sort of performance is perfectly adequate for my needs. >> b) Would I be better off using the LSI RAID controller for the arrays? >> > > I do, but mostly because I want to use RAID10 which is not officially > supported in OpenBSD softraid. It's also nice to be able to take > advantage of the battery backed delayed write cache on my controller > (a Dell PERC H700 in my case). > > One thing you might find important is that using hardware RAID makes > it harder to closely monitor controller and disk status, since the > controller vendor provided software typically won't work on OpenBSD. > If your drive enclosure supports alert LEDs then keeping an eye on > those indicators may be the easiest way to monitor array health. That's a good point actually. I hadn't considered the software support. And my hardware is nothing fancy - so no LEDs. I definitely have more SATA devices to attach than ports on the motherboard, so I'll just install the cards in HBA mode. That should allow sensorsd to monitor the status, since its just a passthrough in that case, right? > c) Bearing in mind that the provisioning scheme I have in mind is to >> provision the disks in pairs (forming RAID1 arrays), thus resulting in >> 3-4 separate volumes (6-8 disks), is there any reason I should *not* use >> OpenBSD, and look more toward something like TrueNAS or FreeBSD? >> > > I suspect that the OpenBSD port of Samba will give you more challenges > than OpenBSD itself. I suggest setting up a small test server and verifying > client compatibility (including user authentication) before building the > full server. Yup, good idea. The last of the hardware arrived today so I'll build it out for some testing. I have had performance issues with OpenBSD's Samba server in the past...I didn't investigate since I only needed it temporarily...but I do fully expect that Samba will be the biggest PITA. Oh how I wish we didn't need it...
Re: OpenBSD as a NAS
On Wed, Dec 2, 2020 at 6:19 PM Ashton Fagg wrote: > a) Is softraid reliable enough to support my use-case? Does anyone have > anecdotes to encourage/discourage use of softraid for this application? > I believe softraid is reliable enough, but I don't use it so I can't say so from personal experience. I do use Samba and NFS though and can report that those work acceptably well. Reading a large file via Samba over a gigabit link runs at between 30MB/s and 110MB/s in OpenBSD 6.8. This is a big improvement over older OpenBSD releases. > b) Would I be better off using the LSI RAID controller for the arrays? > I do, but mostly because I want to use RAID10 which is not officially supported in OpenBSD softraid. It's also nice to be able to take advantage of the battery backed delayed write cache on my controller (a Dell PERC H700 in my case). One thing you might find important is that using hardware RAID makes it harder to closely monitor controller and disk status, since the controller vendor provided software typically won't work on OpenBSD. If your drive enclosure supports alert LEDs then keeping an eye on those indicators may be the easiest way to monitor array health. c) Bearing in mind that the provisioning scheme I have in mind is to > provision the disks in pairs (forming RAID1 arrays), thus resulting in > 3-4 separate volumes (6-8 disks), is there any reason I should *not* use > OpenBSD, and look more toward something like TrueNAS or FreeBSD? > I suspect that the OpenBSD port of Samba will give you more challenges than OpenBSD itself. I suggest setting up a small test server and verifying client compatibility (including user authentication) before building the full server. -ken
OpenBSD as a NAS
Hi all, I'm currently in the process of provisioning a new NAS for home. It's replacing an older Synology unit that ticks me off in so many ways. I am looking to hear other's experiences with using OpenBSD as a NAS - specifically in terms of reliability, and for suggestions on how to provision my storage. I have an LSI card (supported by the drivers in OpenBSD) that is currently flashed to IT mode, but it can of course flashed back to the IR firmware which lets it act as a hardware RAID controller. My needs for the NAS are as follows: NFS and Samba share support, reasonable performance, some amount of tolerance to disk failure, reliable and trustworthy software and file system, ability to closely monitor disk/array health. By extension, it should also be as simple as possible. It might be nice to have it be able to host an iSCSI volume, but that's not essential. I don't care about bleeding edge performance, fancy web UIs or any other "shiny" stuff. By my estimates, OpenBSD with softraid volumes should tick all of those boxes. The box will do nothing else besides be a file server. OpenBSD is my preferred OS nowadays, but I am open to something else if it's the best tool for the job. I guess I'm trying to find out if there's any compelling reason why I *shouldn't* use OpenBSD with softraid. (ZFS also scares me, btw. Maybe unjustifiably so, but it seems very complex and I suspect much of the hype comes down to zealotry and fanboyism.) The questions I have are: a) Is softraid reliable enough to support my use-case? Does anyone have anecdotes to encourage/discourage use of softraid for this application? b) Would I be better off using the LSI RAID controller for the arrays? c) Bearing in mind that the provisioning scheme I have in mind is to provision the disks in pairs (forming RAID1 arrays), thus resulting in 3-4 separate volumes (6-8 disks), is there any reason I should *not* use OpenBSD, and look more toward something like TrueNAS or FreeBSD? (Before anyone mentions it - Yes, I have a proper backup system. I do not rely on the redundancy provided by RAID arrays in lieu of a real backup. I have both a local backup and offsite backup.) Thanks in advance.
OpenBSD ppp and NAS-Port attribute
Hi there all I'm expecting this to be in a manpage somewhere but I cant find it (Google-foo not being good it seems today) so please bear with be if I'm being a bit daft here. What I've setup is a PPPoE concentrator (OpenBSD/i386 4.5-GENERIC as a host OS) with a FreeRADIUS+MySQL backend and for some reason ppp isnt passing the NAS-Port parameter to FreeRADIUS in the Access-Request packet. I am however happily receiving the NAS-IP-Address, NAS-Identifier, NAS-Port-Type parameters. As a result of this radwho and radlast aren't working :( Anyone know where I've gone wrong? What config files would be useful to anyone wishing to help me in this case? Many thanks,... Ross Cameron
