FreeNAS

[dragon2600]

Hi all

Im looking for some help in deciding if this option would be right for my network.

Ok the first big question I have is would freenas work with my pci ide card?

I have AMD1000 with 3/4 Gb's of ram, 6 HDD's, DVD burner, the box is running server 2003 Enterprise, but I’m getting fed up of windows deciding that I don’t have permission to access my data :evil: . After seeing this month’s show I think that maybe this could stop this

Thanks in advance

[VaKo]

Should be fine, just boot it from your mobo's IDE slot. One thing about freeNAS though, its NTFS support is limited at best, so given that your running 2k3 on it, that might be an issue (its what stopped me using it given that all the data i wanted to share was on NTFS). Also, its just for storage, so if your doing funky things with 2k3 it might not be able to replicate all the functionallity. This is something i need confirmed myself, but i have a feeling you can't just stick a disk full of data in it, you need to format it first via the webgui.

[dragon2600]

thanks for the info, i was willing to get rid of server 2003 and just run freeNAS but all my HDD are in NTFS :shock: but i could change them, (just borrow some more from work) do u know if windows reads FS of freeNAS??

[Sparda]

Since FreeNAS is based on FreeBSD I would guess that it uses UFS2 as it's primary file system. So no, windows only suppots FAT16, FAT32 and NTFS. You can probably find a program to read UFS2 partions, but don't hold your breath.

[Darren Kitchen]

It uses UFS, but it has a CIFS service that allows you to access the files over the network, the box does the translation for you, so it looks and feels just like your windows server solution (without the crazy permisison errors). You can even have it integrate with an active directory or radius server if you've got the need to.

[dragon2600]

just rewatched the episode and i think this could really work for me

Thanks for the help :o

[stingwray]

Take the time to install and set up a linux distro of your choice for the job with Samba shares, you'll recieve much better transfers rates this way as FreeNAS is painfully slow in comparison.

You'll also find that you'll have better hardware support as FreeNAS is fairly limited due to its size.

Also that machine your talking about would be wasted on FreeNAS, running a full distro will give you the oppotunity to run other services from it such as DNS, DHCP, HTTP etc.

[VaKo]

<dons teflon suit and stands under a sprinkler in a tub of water>

Meh, just learn how to make 2K3 work right. Its a good OS. Honestly. And if you have a large amount of data on NTFS disks, need write access to them and don't have the space to move&convert, stick to windows. After playing around with freeBSD and suse for a similar system (400gb of TV shows on NTFS disks), I went back to 2k3. Not because its a totally 100% better OS, i love BSD, but when you have a lot of data stuck on NTFS, windows saves you a butt load of pissing about.

If you have a enough room to move&convert, give freeBSD a try. Its a personal choice but I find freeBSD to be designed while linux seems to have evolved. FreeBSD just seems more logical, less kludgish. FreeNAS was based on monowall, which was based on freeBSD 4 or 5(?).

[Sparda]

when you have a lot of data stuck on NTFS, windows saves you a butt load of pissing about.

Can you say: "Anti-competative" ;)

[VaKo]

Hell yeah, it even manages to piss me off and you know my position on MS products.

[Darren Kitchen]

I agree with both Stingray and VaKo on this one. If it were a crappy ol Pentium I'd say stick with freeNAS, but if you've got the hardware for it either spend a weekend getting down and dirty with the NT file permissions, or swap it out with gentoo, fedora core, suse, <insert distro here>. In the end they're all going to do basically the same thing, serve up files on the network, but it's the hunt, not the catch, that brings true geek happyness :)

Let us know what you end up doing.

[stingwray]

Linux support for NTFS is getting better but I know the feeling of not being able to move my stuff about.

If your willing to risk it (i say this as NTFS support is final yet) then buy a cheap ~20GB hard drive to add and put linux on there, then you can also trial it by leaving 2k3 on the NTFS partitions.

I'm not saying 2k3 is a bad server OS, microsoft can do somethings very well, however it is slightly unaffordable to most people for home use. This is simply were linux/bsd wins hands down.

[dragon2600]

wow thanks for all the help, but im still undecided on wot to do. I ve also got another spanner to throw in the works my home network is wireless (WEP and MAC filtered) and as i found out last night freeNAS don't support wireless. i tried to install freeNAS with Virtual PC just to get a feel for it b4 i committed to real HDD space. so now im thinking maybe it would be better to stick with wot i know works and try and solve the permission probs.

so again thanks for all the advice

[stingwray]

That machine is powerful enough to run VMware server so load that up and start playing with some linux/bsd. Best of both worlds until hopefully you are ready to make the full transition.

[VaKo]

This was on Digg a while back. No idea if its any good, or if its been supersceded, or even if its now built into any *nix distros.

The ntfs-3g driver is an open source, GPL licensed, third generation Linux

NTFS driver for 32-bit, little-endian architectures which was implemented

by the Linux-NTFS project. It provides full read-write access to NTFS,

excluding access to encrypted files, writing compressed files, changing

file ownership, access right.

[jalada]

With specifications like that, you're really going to be underusing it just to run FreeNAS. I would agree with Stingwray on this that if you take the time to install a Linux distro (or FreeBSD, I'm just using Linux as an example here) in my opinion it will be more rewarding, and also you have the flexibility to run other things on it. Also it probably (drivers permitting) solves your wireless problem.

But then I'd also agree with Vako, if you've got a bunch of stuff on NTFS you're in for a lot of time converting that for Linux, or working with developing NTFS drivers (which is risky if you don't want to lose the data).

I haven't got any experience with Windows Server 200-whatever so I don't know how frustrating access right issues are (though I can imagine). Maybe I should get myself a copy and experiment. :P

[Cynagen]

It's funny that this thread crops up the DAY AFTER I booted my NAS up on the network with a drive prepared. I'm also using 2k3, on a P3 933Mhz, it needs a lot more memory (768mb to be exact), before I'll really consider it anything special, and found that I had to sign in for my drive access. This is great because then I can lock down folders, bad because now I have to add/manage users all the time if I have friends over that want access. GRRR. I'm thinking of setting up a Guest account with access to all the drives (read-only of course) and a Guest dropbox, where people can dump stuff onto a specific folder only on my NAS, leaving it open for my DLink media center, and my computer to have unlimited access. I do highly suggest if you're going to build a NAS from scratch, go with your fave distro (Slack for me), and build it up there, stay away from the windows route if you can. Stupid permissions stuff.

[VaKo]

Cost aside (lets be honest here, if your running 2k3 on P3's and old AMD kits, you probally didn't pay for it), i really don't understand why so many people are having problems with permissions on 2k3. True its not a n00b proof as XP's simple file sharing but its pretty much a case of creating a couple of users and setting up the folder you want to share with the right users. So on mine I have it setup so some folders are shared to everyone, and other folders are limited to myself only.

[stingwray]

2003 is designed to be used in an Active Directory Network, either running it or joined to it. If its not then it can be a bitch, lots of features become almost hidden without using the Active Directory software.

[Cynagen]

Cost aside (lets be honest here, if your running 2k3 on P3's and old AMD kits, you probally didn't pay for it), i really don't understand why so many people are having problems with permissions on 2k3.

Let's be even more honest, let's not point out who has and who hasn't a legal copy, less you are a fed, and need to be fed to the Hak.5 Server of Evil. Now that aside, (you snooping cop you,) the fact is, i'm lazy with permissions, and yes, they have gotten the better of me on a windows XP machine, (and here I was thinking of playing around with 2k3 in domain controller mode,) and I figured they'd be a bitch in 2k3 as well, so far not the case, just a lot of bull checkboxing and stuff.

[VaKo]

Sorry man, that wasn't directed at you. It was just directed at the general attitude of windows being hard. The cost comment? Well, it just amuses me. I would buy legal copys of all my programs if i could afford it. 2k3 is one of them as I genuinely think its good from my expirences with it. BSD is better, but a whole lot harder to setup correctly.

[devnull0]

great piece on freeNAS!! thanks.

i wanted to share a drive that is currently formated with ext3. although the docs say that ext3 formated drives can be used, i could not find anyway to select this. in the end i selected ext2.

the only problem im currently facing is howto write to the drive under freeNAS. by now, cant do it via ftp/samba or nfs. ive tried it from a xp-box, and a ubuntu system, and no luck.

ive been having a look with google, but havent been lucky either.

mount: (ext2fs, NFS exported, local)

cant find any reference to r/w, as i can find in ubuntu.

anyone knows what to do? thanks in advance.