[ale] NAS enclosure recommendations?

Sat May 11 15:36:58 EDT 2013

Thanks for the advice, Ron. At home, I've been using CrashPlan, which
allows you to seed a backup and take it to a friend's house (or the office,
if allowed), for free offsite backups. A friend of mine, who lives about
twenty miles away, swapped drives with me. (I wouldn't choose a nearby
neighbor, in case a tornado happens to cross both houses.) This has the
huge advantage of being much faster to restore, if you need it. Because,
you can simply retrieve your drive from your friend/office, and take it
home for restores. <http://www.crashplan.com/consumer/crashplan.html> Also,
the backups are encrypted from the source - which means your friend can't
snoop, even if they wanted to. The one disadvantage of the free version is
that it's a once-a-day thing. If you want it to happen more often, you have
to get CrashPlan+.

I've been looking at some of your links. The Addonics stuff, like this one:
<http://www.addonics.com/products/na3ms4hu2.php>
appears to simply be an external array - meaning I still need a separate
computer to run FreeNas. Not what I want. I guess I'll need to just buy or
build a tower computer and do it myself. :-( I was hoping to find a fairly
small (mini-tower) enclosure which was specifically designed for NAS
devices, with energy-saving power systems and on-board processing and
memory cards. Some of the proprietary NAS devices have easy-access to the
drive bays, and external lights which indicate whether or not there's a
problem with the individual drives.

The AcmeMicro stuff does, for the most part, appear to be overkill. Since
this will be in a home, I really don't want a rack-based system. A tower
would be better, but I can't seem to find the right combination of features
and size.

Thanks, and keep me posted if I missed something.

Doug

On Sat, May 11, 2013 at 1:15 PM, Ron Frazier (ALE) <
atllinuxenthinfo at techstarship.com> wrote:

> Hi Doug,
>
> I had one more thought.  Backup the nas online with something like
> carbonite or Amazon S3 via a Jungledisk client or similar.  I use
> Jungledisk on both Windows and Linux machines.  The client software is a
> little dated, but it works fine for me.  It uses the Amazon S3 servers.  I
> have my data backups run every 6 hours.  If anyone needs help configuring
> that, I could assist.  Amazon charges $0.18 / GB / mo for storage.  That
> could get cost prohibitive depending on the amount of data.  Carbonite's
> normal marketing says all your DATA on your personal hard drive, so system
> files, etc. don't get backed up.  I think they require a different contract
> for each PC at $ 60 / year or so.  Whereas, I backup all my pc's to my
> Amazon S3 volume and just pay for the total data storage.  I think I have
> about 70 GB of storage in use, so my bill is about $ 14 / mo.  If you're
> talking TB of data, cost would go up a good bit.
>
> Another alternative is to do peer to peer syncing with the nas to another
> nas.  A very early but promising (alpha stage) solution is BitTorrent Sync.
>  If you can provide peers you want to sync with and you don't need cloud
> storage, this could work.  Steve Gibson did a podcast on this recently.  I
> haven't tried it but it sounds cool.
>
> http://twit.tv/sn/402
>
> Low bandwidth versions are available here.  Look for episode 402.
>
> https://www.grc.com/securitynow.htm
>
> Experts that Steve likes to quote on the show recommend a 3-2-1 backup
> strategy.  If I'm remembering correctly, you data should exist in 3 places
> - original, backup 1, backup 2.  It should be on 2 different mediums
> preferably.  And 1 copy should be off site.
>
> By the way, DROBO appears to be a nice, but not cheap plug and play NAS
> solution.
>
> Hope this helps.
>
> Sincerely,
>
> Ron
>
>
>
> Doug Hall <doughalldev at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> >This is a pro-sumer application. She has written a book, and has a blog
> >for
> >promoting that and other pursuits. She's got thousands of high res
> >photos,
> >and is getting into video too, for her blog. Add to this, backup space
> >for
> >her computers - some of which can be alleviated, if she's not moving
> >files
> >between computers all the time. So, she does need a fair amount of
> >storage. Their Apple Time Capsule is full, and quite frankly -
> >inadequate.
> >
> >This NAS won't be directly connected to a computer, but I was thinking
> >that
> >it would be a good idea to have that option. They've got an iMac and a
> >MacBook Pro, so Firewire or Thunderbolt would actually be better than
> >eSata. The NAS will probably be situated in a closet, provided there's
> >enough ventilation. I was hoping to use FreeNAS and ZFS, for worry-free
> >storage.
> >
> >While I'm thinking about it, how are upgrades handled? Is it a matter
> >of
> >pulling in updates, like with Ubuntu, or do you download a package and
> >replace the whole OS? I'm not that familiar with FreeBSD. Is there a
> >learning curve I should be concerned about?
> >
> >Thanks guys!
> >
> >
> >On Sat, May 11, 2013 at 9:55 AM, Ron Frazier (ALE) <
> >atllinuxenthinfo at techstarship.com> wrote:
> >
> >> Hi all,
> >>
> >> This sounds like a consumer application so the following security
> >issues
> >> may not be too pressing.  However, depending on the situation,
> >physical
> >> security may be an issue; from kids (ie teenagers that want to play
> >> everything or toddlers that want to touch everything), pets,
> >visitors,
> >> contractors, etc.
> >>
> >> You may want a case where access to the physical ports and drives is
> >> lockable.  A closet or cabinet would also work with proper
> >ventilation.
> >>
> >> Also, while I haven't had experience with the high speed port options
> >> myself, I heard an interesting tidbit on the Security Now podcast.
> >>  Apparently both firewire and thunderbolt are dma access systems.
> >That
> >> means that anything plugged into one of those ports may be able to
> >directly
> >> access and alter system memory, with the potential of inserting
> >malware or
> >> reading critical data.  USB of any type does not have that problem.
> >I
> >> don't know about sata / esata.
> >>
> >> Also, I've heard that esata connectors are notorious for being
> >finicky and
> >> getting unplugged.
> >>
> >> Just thought I'd throw in my 2 cents.
> >>
> >> Sincerely,
> >>
> >> Ron
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> JD <jdp at algoloma.com> wrote:
> >>
> >> >I use an external array from these guys: http://www.addonics.com/
> >> >attached to a normal Core i5 PC, but mine is only 4 bay. 6+ yrs,
> >ever
> >> >any issues
> >> >besides a loose SATA cable that was my fault.
> >> >
> >> >I'd avoid USB3 as the primary connector. IME, it has queuing issues.
> >Of
> >> >course,
> >> >those could be due to the USB3 card or driver used. I've never had
> >that
> >> >issue
> >> >with eSATA-MP.
> >> >
> >> >For a business, things get harder due to all the choices.
> >> >
> >> >
> >> >On 05/11/2013 01:50 AM, Doug Hall wrote:
> >> >> I want to build a NAS for a friend. I need a five-bay enclosure.
> >It
> >> >must have a
> >> >> 64-bit CPU and allow me to add up to 16GB of memory. It'll be
> >using
> >> >ZFS, which
> >> >> performs better with lots of memory. I'll probably need USB3,
> >eSata
> >> >and dual
> >> >> ethernet ports. A low power unit would be nice.
> >> >>
> >> >> Anyone know of and can recommend any such enclosures? The ones I'm
> >> >seeing appear
> >> >> to already be set up to run some proprietary system, but don't
> >even
> >> >mention
> >> >> memory capacities or CPU specs. I want to use FreeNAS, of course.
> >> >Thanks for any
> >> >> suggestions.
>
>
>
>
> --
>
> Sent from my Android Acer A500 tablet with bluetooth keyboard and K-9 Mail.
> Please excuse my potential brevity if I'm typing on the touch screen.
>
> (PS - If you email me and don't get a quick response, you might want to
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> quickly.)
>
> Ron Frazier
> 770-205-9422 (O)   Leave a message.
> linuxdude AT techstarship.com
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