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lightrush

@lightrush@lemmy.ca

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lightrush , (edited )
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  • Lenovo ThinkCentre / Dell OptiPlex USFF machine like the M710q.
  • Secondary NVMe or SATA SSD for a RAID1 mirror
    • Use LVMRAID for this. It uses mdraid underneath but it's easier to manage
  • External USB disks for storage
    • WD Elements generally work well when well ventilated
    • OWC Mercury Elite Pro Quad has a very well implemented USB path and has been problem-free in my testing
  • Debian / Ubuntu LTS
  • ZFS for the disk storage
  • Backups may require a second copy or similar of this setup so keep that in mind when thinking about the storage space and cost

Here's a visual inspiration:

https://lemmy.ca/pictrs/image/20de16c0-cd76-4184-a88e-2d36ec707ff9.jpeg

lightrush OP ,
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OK, I think it may have to do with the odd number of data drives. If I create a raidz2 with 4 of the 5 disks, even with ashift=12, recordsize=128K, the performance in sequential single thread read is stellar. What's not clear is why this doesn't affect, or not as much, the 4x 8TB-drive raidz1.

lightrush OP ,
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Yes, yes I would use ZFS if I had only one file on my disk.

lightrush ,
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Over the last 40 years in the US productivity has increased steadily and so have prices. Real wages have stayed flat.

lightrush OP , (edited )
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  • 8x 8TB in a set of 2, some shucked WDs, some IronWolfs
  • 5x 16TB in a set of 2, "recertified" WDs from serverpartdeals.com
lightrush OP ,
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Two machines. A main server/workstation and a small off-site backup machine that runs the same services but hass less compute and RAM.

lightrush OP ,
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That was the cheapest option. 🤭

lightrush OP ,
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Thanks for the warning ⚠️🙏

This isn't my first rodeo with ZFS on USB. I've been running USB for a few years now. Recently I ran this particular box through a battery of tests and I'm reasonably confident that with my particular set of hardware it'll be fine. It passed everything I threw at it, once connected to a good port on my machine. But you're generally right and as you can see I discussed that in the testing thread, and I encountered some issues that I managed to solve. If you think I've missed something specific - let me know! 😊

lightrush OP , (edited )
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You want ASMedia ASM1351 (heatsinked) or ASM235CM on the device side 🥹

This box has 4x ASM235CM and from the testing I've conducted over the last week it seems rock solid, so long as it's not connected to the Ryzen's built-in USB controller. It's been flawless on the B350 chipset's USB controller.

lightrush OP ,
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I thought about it, but it typically requires extra PCIe cards that I can't rely on as there's no space in one of the machines and no PCIe slots in the other. That's why I did a careful search till I stumbled upon this particular enclosure and then I tested one with ZFS for over a week before buying the rest.

lightrush OP , (edited )
@lightrush@lemmy.ca avatar

I've been on the USB train since 2019.

You're exactly right, you gotta get devices with good USB-to-SATA chipsets, and you gotta keep them cool.

I've been using a mix of WD Elements, WD MyBook and StarTech/Vantec enclosures (ASM1351). I've had to cool all the chipsets on WD because they like bolt the PCBs straight to the drive so it heats up from it.

From all my testing I've discovered that:

  • ASM1351 and ASM235CM are generally problem-free, but the former needs passive cooling if close to a disk. A small heatsink adhered with standard double-sided heat conductive tape is good enough.
  • Host controllers matter too. Intel is generally problem-free. So is VIA. AMD has some issues on the CPU side on some models which are still not fully solved.

I like this box in particular because it uses a very straightforward design. It's got 4x ASM235CM with cooling connected to a VIA hub. It's got a built-in power supply, fan, it even comes with good cables. It fixes a lot of the system variables to known good values. You're left with connecting it to a good USB host controller.

WD PCB on disk

https://lemmy.ca/pictrs/image/031e4ab6-4bbe-465b-8460-3fb3d03049ad.png

lightrush OP , (edited )
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This article provides some context. Now I do have the latest firmware which should have these fixes but they don't seem to be foolproof. I've seen reports around the web that the firmware improves things but doesn't completely eliminate them.

If you've seen devices disconnecting and reconnecting on occasion, it could be it.

lightrush OP ,
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I think I've seen this hypothesis too and it makes sense to me.

If I'm building a new AMD system today, I'd look for a board that exposes more of the chipset-provided USB ports. Otherwise I'd budget for a high quality 4-port PCIe USB controller, if I'm planning to rely a lot on USB on that system.

lightrush OP ,
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Here's the box test thread if you're curious. 😊

lightrush OP ,
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Found the bit counter

lightrush ,
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It can't because birds are not real.

lightrush OP ,
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5950X, 64GB

It's a multipurpose machine, desktop workstation, games, running various servers.

lightrush OP ,
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I was wondering what would be better for discoverability, to write this in a blog post, on GitHub, then link it here, or to just write it here. Turns out Google's crawling Lemmy quite actively. This shows up within the first 10-15 results for "USB DAS ZFS":

https://lemmy.ca/pictrs/image/f1c20c84-f55f-4c99-af16-2c0eb9e24fc3.png

It appears that Lemmy is already a good place for writing stuff like this. ☺️

lightrush OP , (edited )
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I wasn't able to reach it for a top-down visual through the back and so I don't have pics of it other than the side view already attached. I'll try disassembling it further sometime today, once the ZFS scrub completes.

Luckily, the PSU is connected to the main board via standard molex. If the built-in one blows up, you could replace it with any ATX PSU, large, small (FlexATX, etc), or one of those power bricks that spit out a 5V/12V molex. Whether you can stuff it in or not.

lightrush OP ,
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Finally happy with the testing. I'll disassemble it sometime today.

lightrush OP ,
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Done. Says 150W on it. Not sure if it's real. If it is, then it's plenty overrated for the hardware which should bode well for its longevity. Especially given that the caps are Chengx across the board so definitely not the best. :D Can you tell anything interesting about it from the pics?

lightrush OP ,
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Yeah, I googled that IC, no hits. 😂

lightrush OP ,
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I see a number of dual-output PSUs on Mouser that will probably fit well if this goes. For example.

lightrush OP ,
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Quite possibly. That said the one I linked is CUI, not a noname. It's even got an MTBF of 300K hours in its datasheet. There are cheaper ones. 😅 And more expensive ones.

lightrush OP ,
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And now it no longer shows up.

lightrush ,
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- Hey ChatGPT, is it normal for my A4 to be burning this much oil?
...

- Yes.

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