August 31, 2009 at 4:52 pm
rboggess (8/31/2009)
I see a lot of folks here bashing a guy for standing up for Linux against a crack-pot zealot. Any reason y'all are ganging up?
Which of us exactly would be the 'crack-pot zealot'?
August 31, 2009 at 5:02 pm
rboggess (8/31/2009)
But y'all sure aren't making this discussion look like a balanced perspective, either.
I think I'd disagree. A few people have pointed out mis-information, or incorrect information regarding WHS so that people could make an informed decision if it fits their environment. The tone that I got from IceDread is that he/she is bashing the product without understanding it.
No one has said that using Linux or ZFS is a bad idea, but rather not for them for various reasons. I don't use a MythTV for the same reasons. It's not that it isn't better or doesn't offer more options, but because my TiVo just works well enough.
August 31, 2009 at 5:29 pm
The Comparison to MythTV VS TIVO, is IMHO the discussion we COULD be having of there was a Linux solution that was able to compare featurewise with WHS in much the same way that MythTV can actually be compared with TIVO and other DVR's.
That would be interesting. Instead what we've gotten has been alligations that WHS is buggy and unreliable, along with reasons that ZFS is the cats meow.
If we get back to the original question of 'do you use raid at home' and the subject of some kind of redundant storage for the average home user (and RAID being too complicated due to requirements of same sized drives etc) Then I think I would respond thusly.
Given that most of us agree that formal RAID is too complicated for home users, especially if a drive fails and you have to find a replacment, I would submit that at this time ZFS falls well into the same category, given the limited OS support and degree of expertise and specific knowledge required to setup and maintain a ZFS.
I do think it shows a LOT of promise, but in order to make it into the mainstream I think it would need to support a lot wider variety of OS's, and not JUST *Nix open-source OS's but Mac and Windows as well. Or exist in a form that is accessable to the regular Joe, similar to the current WHS devices like HP markets, or NAS appliences, WITH client software for Mac, Windows, and *nix systems.
ZFS would also need a simple, dirt stupid UI that would let non-technorati types do something like add a new drive or remove an existing (or failed) drive. Configure logical drives, redundate arrays, etc. That is to say something on the level of what WHS currently supports but perhaps with a bit more functionality to take advantage of ZFS capabilities.
September 1, 2009 at 6:29 am
SQAPro (8/31/2009)
If we get back to the original question of 'do you use raid at home' and the subject of some kind of redundant storage for the average home user (and RAID being too complicated due to requirements of same sized drives etc) Then I think I would respond thusly.
Thank you for the level-headed, reasonable and reasoned reply. Well said.
I do think that Ubuntu Server could be made to serve most of the functionality of a home server, with lots of room to expand. Of course, I'm guessing here, because I've only barely looked at Windows Home Server. And I'm overlooking a great deal in setting up and maintaining a linux server. (I'm running US for network printing and storage services already.)
I'm curious, do you schedule the backups from the WHS machine, or do you have to setup each machine to backup to the server? Aside from backups, do you use WHS for any other network services?
September 1, 2009 at 7:22 am
rboggess (8/31/2009)
I see a lot of folks here bashing a guy for standing up for Linux against a crack-pot zealot. Any reason y'all are ganging up?I'm not saying either side here is correct. They're not. But y'all sure aren't making this discussion look like a balanced perspective, either.
WHS isn't evil just 'cause it's Microsoft. And Linux ain't evil just cause it ain't. A little less hyperbole and a little more on-topic would be nice here, folks.
Can we get back to storage, and stop feeding the rabid animals?
I learned long ago to try to stay out of jihads between Linux Fanatics and Windows Zealots (yes, I consider those proper nouns). Neither side stays rational for long, and the collateral carnage can be a bit extreme.
- Gus "GSquared", RSVP, OODA, MAP, NMVP, FAQ, SAT, SQL, DNA, RNA, UOI, IOU, AM, PM, AD, BC, BCE, USA, UN, CF, ROFL, LOL, ETC
Property of The Thread
"Nobody knows the age of the human race, but everyone agrees it's old enough to know better." - Anon
September 1, 2009 at 7:22 am
SQAPro (8/31/2009)
...If we get back to the original question of 'do you use raid at home' and the subject of some kind of redundant storage for the average home user (and RAID being too complicated due to requirements of same sized drives etc) Then I think I would respond thusly.
Given that most of us agree that formal RAID is too complicated for home users, especially if a drive fails and you have to find a replacment, I would submit that at this time ZFS falls well into the same category, given the limited OS support and degree of expertise and specific knowledge required to setup and maintain a ZFS.
...
I don't know that I would agree raid is that hard to set up - Mirroring is raid 1, and that's usually pretty simple to set up. You do need drives of the same size though.
I'd agree raid 5 can be hard to set up as well.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_RAID_levels
WHS drive extender
I'm not convinced that WHS is THE solution, it's just one of many possible solutions. and it does offer a form of raid.
WHS uses some kind of internal 'raid' that happens automagically, and can use drives of different sizes
September 1, 2009 at 7:34 am
Mark Horninger (9/1/2009)
I don't know that I would agree raid is that hard to set up - Mirroring is raid 1, and that's usually pretty simple to set up. You do need drives of the same size though.
I guess the first thing we should decide on is the skill set of our home user. Are we talking about general respondents on this list (whom I would expect know the automatic coffee-cup holder is for CD/DVD)? Or are we talking general population?
September 1, 2009 at 7:41 am
Windows Home Server is Great.
What people forget is what the target audience was. It really is a great addition to a multi computer\device home where a centralized experience is desired. Not just storage but experience.
Likewise, Linux is great as is Windows Vista (don't hate me yet), Windows XP, Windows 7. When they are used as designed and expectations are leveled.
September 1, 2009 at 7:50 am
It's not a skill set issue, necessarily, it's a need/want issue. I'm looking for a central backup solution that I don't have to manage. WHS does that. I have seen plenty of people script their own solutions, with Windows and *nix, but I don't want to mess with that.
If you want a non-managed, easy to plug in and run solution, what do you use? WHS seems to fit that on the Windows side, along with some extras. Is there something else?
Drobo works, somewhat, but not as automatic as I'd like.
September 1, 2009 at 7:56 am
WHS appears to have two target audiences:
1) Novice users.
2) Experienced people (whether IT professionals or not) with no time.
(I have ignored business use that I read somewhere, somewhen)
It is more than an appliance but less than a generic server.
For me, the only missing feature is the offline backup. These days I would expect to utilise the internet for such a service and at a reasonable price. Particularly bearing in mind that after the initial backup the amount of data throughput would be minimal. I would still want this as simple as the rest of WHS.
Gaz
-- Stop your grinnin' and drop your linen...they're everywhere!!!
September 1, 2009 at 8:02 am
Steve Jones - Editor (9/1/2009)
It's not a skill set issue, necessarily, it's a need/want issue. I'm looking for a central backup solution that I don't have to manage. WHS does that. I have seen plenty of people script their own solutions, with Windows and *nix, but I don't want to mess with that.If you want a non-managed, easy to plug in and run solution, what do you use? WHS seems to fit that on the Windows side, along with some extras. Is there something else?
Drobo works, somewhat, but not as automatic as I'd like.
Probably could use some simple batch files tooo? Robocopy and a simple NAS drive (which could be mirrored/raid or not)
September 1, 2009 at 8:46 am
rboggess (9/1/2009)
I'm curious, do you schedule the backups from the WHS machine, or do you have to setup each machine to backup to the server? Aside from backups, do you use WHS for any other network services?
You have to install client software on each machine you want to backup to the WHS. That's as simple as connecting to a share on the WHS and running a simple installer.
It's been over a year since I've had to mess with anything so I'm going by memory (seriously it's that much 'set it and forget it) .. there's ability to configure the time window for when backups happen, and a bunch of other preferences like how many backups to keep, should it wake up systems that are hibernating or sleeping.. Don't recall if you set that as you setup each system, but I do know you can control it all from the WHS 'console' which can be accessed via any 'client' system (password required)
In terms of what I use?
standard fileserver functions like centralized fault-tolerant storage, print-server, the automatic backup, media streaming.
I've not configured the webserver part myself, am seriously at a point where I'm considering that. People that have done it say it's great, and also provides a remote access 'gateway' of sorts to your home network (I believe it uses some kind of vpn, I'd have to go look up details on the MS site to be sure)
I've also used the recovery, and it was very very slick. (one aspect where scripts and robocopy don't really compare I think) Boot from CD, connect to WHS, about 20 min later, system was fully restored from a new blank hard disk with NO OS on it to the original state. For a lot of other backup methods I'd have had to at least re-install the OS before I could restore the rest of the system, and even then dealing with protected OS files might be a bit tricky.
----
I'd agree raid 1 is pretty easy to setup initially, I think the sticking point for the average user would be recovering from a drive failure, figuring out which drive to replace, getting a proper replacement, re-establishing the mirror, etc. Lets face it for a lot of folks out there, anything involving opening the box is way past their comfort zone.
September 1, 2009 at 2:07 pm
IceDread (8/30/2009)
And I still can't understand why pick WHS, a system that has proven to have quite a few bugs, some file types not compatible etc. Not to mention hardware raid is slow and binds you to that hardware. All thou I'd probably do WHS if it supported ZFS but seeing how it does not have the latest, the best, no WHS for me.
After that peeps gets flaming mad with me as you see if you read the thread.[/b]
SQAPro (8/31/2009)
IceDread (8/30/2009)
And I still can't understand why pick WHS, a system that has proven to have quite a few bugs, some file types not compatible etc.Care to provide a source or two for that alligation? otherwise it's just slander and hearsay. .
If you do not know about the file corruption bug then you should search for it because it’s common knowledge these days and if I provided a link it would just be claimed fabricated would it not? Anyway here is a link. http://www.anandtech.com/weblog/showpost.aspx?i=413
SQAPro (8/31/2009)[seriously, dude you keep saying 'hardware raid' and that has NOTHING, zero, zip, nada, null, to do with WHS. So it makes me (and I suspect others) question if you have clue one as to how WHS handles drives and storage, or you are just on a mission to bash it since it's MS technology instead of descended from the loins of the allmighty Sun. WHS does not use hardware raid. It uses a dynamic system that allows you to easily add or remove drives, and mirrors data that is designated to be stored redundantly across multiple drives. It does NOT use hardware raid, it does not even use traditional software raid. Drives do not have to be matched (as with raid 1, 5, or 1+0), and can even be connected in different ways (some IDE, some SATA, some USB etc)
Which brings me to the same link above talking about the software raid in WHS, unless you download the Drive Extender info from ms homepage which I did. It looks like raid1, and that is not something I want to do. What I want is Raidz2 which I think requires min 4 or 5 disks thou I recommend doing 6 disks so you only lose 33% of the data to the raid and have 66% of the drives space to make use of. Out of these 6 disks, 2 can fail and the zfs still works.
If two disks of a raid1 fails, you might be lucky and your WHS still has all the data but you might be unlucky too, which is not the case with raidz2. I’ve seen so many lose their data, I’ve had harddrive crashes myself but this far been able to retrieve the data, but it aint fun. So I value stability a lot. If I invest some time in stability now less time needs to be invested if something goes wrong.
Steve Jones - Editor (8/31/2009)
rboggess (8/31/2009)
But y'all sure aren't making this discussion look like a balanced perspective, either.I think I'd disagree. A few people have pointed out mis-information, or incorrect information regarding WHS so that people could make an informed decision if it fits their environment. The tone that I got from IceDread is that he/she is bashing the product without understanding it.
No one has said that using Linux or ZFS is a bad idea, but rather not for them for various reasons. I don't use a MythTV for the same reasons. It's not that it isn't better or doesn't offer more options, but because my TiVo just works well enough.
I were not after trying to bash WHS all thou it's not stable enough and not fast enough for me to even consider. I wanted to bring another option out there knowing there should be some people interested but seems I did so in a rather bad way since so many got down right angry. Thou I did except a few fanbois, just not these many 😛 If you do not find learning about other OS interesting and other systems then of course nothing I have said would change your view. However, if you do find that a few hours of learning is interesting in this area and that a few hours spent is time worth it for a safe fast server then ZFS is something I strongly recommend.
My summery of why I don’t want WHS is:
1.What I know about it’s storage it’s not safe enough for me, raid1 is not something I like to trust.
2.Reads and writes speed you could check up on yourself but know that 200mbyte/s both ways is far from uncommon these days for ZFS servers. This is way faster than WHS btw from what I’ve seen in tests, all thou WHS might be fast enough for some people, depends on which features you make use of. For ZFS you will wanna make use of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Link_aggregation untill you can get your hands on 10gbit/s cards because 200+mbyte/s reads is more than your 1gbit Ethernet card can handle.
3.Backup, at home, really? Well I actually do that too but to a very small extent. I like backups on another location. I do not want to have the same file on both my laptop, my tower and my server. I want it only in my server, this I didn’t catch WHS doing. This means I will have more space available in total. There is no point having a file in several places except for a backup outside of your home. A raidz2 can handle enough disk crashes for me to sleep well, WHS this far does not comfort me.
Trust trust trust, I can’t trust raid1 to keep my data safe, not to mention it’s not space efficient, and WHS from the tests I’ve seen is slow, making use of only 1 drive to read from probably thus the slow speed.
rboggess (8/31/2009)
I see a lot of folks here bashing a guy for standing up for Linux against a crack-pot zealot. Any reason y'all are ganging up?
It sure looks like I insulted someone's religion because things like this is common to see in those cases.
September 1, 2009 at 2:33 pm
I were not after trying to bash WHS all thou it's not stable enough and not fast enough for me to even consider.
You seem to have an odd definition of "bash".
- Gus "GSquared", RSVP, OODA, MAP, NMVP, FAQ, SAT, SQL, DNA, RNA, UOI, IOU, AM, PM, AD, BC, BCE, USA, UN, CF, ROFL, LOL, ETC
Property of The Thread
"Nobody knows the age of the human race, but everyone agrees it's old enough to know better." - Anon
September 1, 2009 at 2:44 pm
GSquared (9/1/2009)
I were not after trying to bash WHS all thou it's not stable enough and not fast enough for me to even consider.
You seem to have an odd definition of "bash".
I would consider bashing if I talked about everything that WHS can do how it does it and then show why that is all very very bad. I didnt do that, I only talked about a few parts that is not good enough for me but I didnt try to claim that they were not good enough in general.
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