Best HDDs for home server?

[dustin1706]

I have been contemplating getting either a NAS or a home server for a while, and after watching a few of Linus's videos I have decided to go the home server route.

I have ordered a lot of the parts already and am going with a RAID6 setup with just 4 or 5 drives to start running from an adaptec 8 port raid card. Of course I will still make regular backups to an independent drive. Linus mentioned in his personal home server update video that he was planning to run seagate 3tb drives because the WD drives aren't ideal for RAID, but did he mean the barracudas or the enterprise drives?

The enterprise drives are ridiculously expensive so I am looking for a lower cost but still reliable alternative.

[LarkStarr]

he meant the green drives I think, and I think they're just fine for RAID, you just have to modify the head parking time from it's default of 7 or 8 seconds or whatever. I use four greens just fine.

Also with 4 - 5 drives, why not just RAID5? You're going to lose a lot of space with RAID6

[BlueByte]

+1 for RAID 5, if you start running 8 drives even then I personally would suggest breaking it into 2 RAID 5 arrays. No technical reason really, just personal preference on manageability.

[dustin1706]

I lost a bunch of data twice, years ago so I am currently running 2 individual RAID1 arrays for storage. 2x2TB WD greens each(headparking and spindown disabled), so Raid 6 with 5+ drives will actually be more efficient than what I have. I haven't had any drive failures in the 3 years I've been running this array, but still, I don't mind 1 extra drive for a bit more piece of mind. Just not sure which drives to go with. 5+ drives is a reasonably heavy investment so I want to get it right the first time around.

Actually, my docs and pics are on my primary SSD, which backs up to one of my raids, which backs up to an external drive.. paranoid much? haha

[moocow]

dustin did you also turn on TLER on the WD Green drives?

[dustin1706]

Originally Posted by moocow

dustin did you also turn on TLER on the WD Green drives?

Yeah I did. I have one set of the older WD20EARS which was simple, but my other set is the newer WD20EADS which had to be flashed to a different firmware to enable TLER.

No problems so far and they are very quiet, but I only get sustained transfer speeds of ~65MB/s in RAID1. I've been reading the WHS2011 forums and I've read a lot about people losing their whole raid5/raid 6 arrays after updates, reboots, power surges etc... and it has me scared. I'm now thinking about going with seagate barracuda 3TB drives in RAID1. A colossal waste, but safe.

[moocow]

I had 7200.11 and .12 drives in my 3Ware 9xxx 12 port and they all died. I'm too scared to use non ES stuff from Seagate now. Have anyone checked out Hitachi Deskstart 7K1000 series? They are listed as tested with my 3ware card (up to the old SATA2).

[dustin1706]

Originally Posted by moocow

I had 7200.11 and .12 drives in my 3Ware 9xxx 12 port and they all died. I'm too scared to use non ES stuff from Seagate now. Have anyone checked out Hitachi Deskstart 7K1000 series? They are listed as tested with my 3ware card (up to the old SATA2).

7200.11 is one of the drives that made me the paranoid maniac I am today. I was a bit curious when Linus said he was planning to use SG 3TB drives in his personal server...

[Nodscene]

Im staying far away from Seagate drives. I've run into another firmware issue with some Dell machines that have Seagate drives. If you are that paranoid just bite the bullet and get the WD enterprise drives and be done with it.

[crazyea]

Originally Posted by dustin1706

Yeah I did. I have one set of the older WD20EARS which was simple, but my other set is the newer WD20EADS which had to be flashed to a different firmware to enable TLER.

No problems so far and they are very quiet, but I only get sustained transfer speeds of ~65MB/s in RAID1. I've been reading the WHS2011 forums and I've read a lot about people losing their whole raid5/raid 6 arrays after updates, reboots, power surges etc... and it has me scared. I'm now thinking about going with seagate barracuda 3TB drives in RAID1. A colossal waste, but safe.

I think its the other way around.

I have an older EADS and 3 Newer EARS drives.