My new NAS: Odroid HC2 and Seagate Ironwolf 12TB.

    • Offizieller Beitrag

    I'm about to give up on my old Synology 411j NAS. It works, but it is sloooow. It has 4 WD Red 4TB disks. All still fresh.


    I mainly use the Synology NAS for a NFS share with autofs and fscache. Works, but it is way too slow. And only 1,5TB free.


    I have considered for quite a while what to replace it with. Finally I have decided: Odroid HC2 and a single Seagate Ironwolf 12TB disk.


    The HC2 is on its way and I have the Seagate Ironwolf on my desk.


    Short term I will put the WD RED 4TB disks in an old PC enclosure and use them, and some other disks, as a backup storage server for my new NAS.


    Long term I may use the surplus 4TB disks in a beefy combined home lab server / NAS that I can use to experiment with VMs and Docker and so on. And use the Odroid HC2 OMV NAS for backup storage instead. It is even portable... ;)

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    My new NAS is operational. ATM I'm shuffling files from my old Synology 411j 4x4TB WD RED to the new Seagate Ironwolf 12TB in the HC2. Takes a while, even with NFS, the 411j is slooow.


    SSH:ed in and installed Midnight Commander first thing, just to feel at home... 8)


    Very pleased with the performance so far.


    I have four more HC2 on the way. Will use them for backups and experimenting. I may stay with the HC2 "server format".


    Also I got a 12V 20A PSU, enough for at least 8 x HC2, one 16 port gigabit switch and a WiFi mesh unit. Not a single fan anywhere! Everything 12V so one plug for everything. Thinking about putting everything in an white Billy IKEA bookcase, with glass doors, and drill some holes in the back of the shelves to allow air to rise and cool using the chimney effect.

  • I have four more HC2 on the way. Will use them for backups and experimenting. I may stay with the HC2 "server format".


    Also I got a 12V 20A PSU, enough for at least 8 x HC2, one 16 port gigabit switch and a WiFi mesh unit. Not a single fan anywhere! Everything 12V so one plug for everything. Thinking about putting everything in an white Billy IKEA bookcase, with glass doors, and drill some holes in the back of the shelves to allow air to rise and cool using the chimney effect.

    This is a really interesting idea.


    When you were doing your research, did you consider going with a Helios4?

    • Offizieller Beitrag

    Nope. Didn't know it existed.


    Seems really nice, but I think I prefer my way.


    The price for a 4 HDD setup is higher using the Odroid HC2. But I like that each HC2 is separate. A backup HC2 can be in another room, updating via fast WiFi, or moved to another place. Also I really, really dislike fans...


    The specs for the new Odroid N2 are expected real soon, this or next week. Looking at the scrapped N1 it could be very interesting.

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    I bought my HC2 from Odroid UK. Expensive but quick delivery... Inside EU (so far) so no customs hold ups.


    https://www.odroid.co.uk/


    But the HDD is still by far the bulk of the cost. HC2 makes more sense with bigger/more expensive disks. Or perhaps the hurt is elsewhere...


    I ordered four more HC2, but directly from HK Korea. Didn't want any power supply with them. Around half the price. They should arrive next week, will have to see what EU customs handling fees and VAT does to increase the price... I live in Sweden so I expect around $15 fee + 25% VAT.


    https://www.hardkernel.com/main/shop/good_list.php?lang=en


    I have another Seagate IronWolf 12TB and a 500 GB Samsung 860 EVO SSD waiting for them.

  • I am in a very similar position.


    I currently use a big noisy server, containing lots of smaller-sized hard drives.


    tkaiser recommended going down the exact same route as you (i.e. an HC2 with a single huge hard drive), although he does also recommend the Helios4.


    The Helios4 has the advantage of your not having to buy a single hard drive that is disproportionately expensive - it can take four hard drives, so you could spend less on 2 6TB hard drives as opposed to a single 12TB hard drive.


    The other big pull of the Helios is that it uses ECC memory, which is pretty useful on a server.


    However, it does indeed have a couple of fans and given that they are small, I would imagine that thy are probably audible.


    The N2 looks really interesting - I think I will wait to see what that offers before deciding what to do.

  • The N2 looks really interesting

    Where did you see an N2 or at least some information? I only know of this bunch of speculations: https://forum.odroid.com/viewtopic.php?f=149&t=31277


    Two months ago Justin (that's the 'odroid' guy in their forum) told me they are 'trying to share a couple of engineering samples in September with you' but of course yet shared no information about the SoC used and feature sets. And there was an obvious disclaimer if the new chosen SoC shows serious issues to probably look again into RK3399.

  • Sorry - that particular phrase was rather misleading.


    I should have said that the N2 should be interesting.


    I have been keeping a close eye on the Odroid forums and everything I have read is pure speculation at the moment - they seem to be very good and preventing any information at all, from getting out.

  • I should have said that the N2 should be interesting


    Interesting given that the ONLY information that is available now is that the SoC seems to be rather new and they had to sign an NDA with the chip manufacturer. So all we know is that software support situation will most probably be a mess in the beginning and they chose a shitty SoC vendor instead of a good one (sharing information freely).

  • they chose a shitty SoC vendor instead of a good one (sharing information freely).

    Hmm - not good.


    I will have to await the official release (and the dust to settle) before considering all the options.


    I guess it is the age-old issue of there always being a new bit of tech on the horizon and whether you should wait - the HC2 (based upon all the reviews/advice you have offered on here) already more than fits the bill for my needs.

  • I guess it is the age-old issue of there always being a new bit of tech on the horizon and whether you should wait


    Hmm... I don't agree given that good software support in the ARM world unfortunately gets the better the older the SoC.


    The Samsung Exynos in ODROID HC2 (and HC1, XU4, MC1) appeared in Galaxy S5 early 2014 (so it's a 2013 design), the RK3399 known from N1 and countless other (IMO more interesting) dev boards is a 2015 design. The SATA capable A20 is from 2012 and the also SATA capable i.MX6 SoC that can be found on some dev boards is even from 2011. The RPi SoC (VideoCore IV) is even from 2010. Software support for any of these old chips is great in the meantime. But this was different in the beginning with all of them.


    Most probably N2 is based on Amlogic S922 (or A311D -- maybe both are simply the same) and according to Da Xue (who's behind Libre Computer) software support situation shouldn't look that bad: https://www.cnx-software.com/2…i-g52-gpu/#comment-555235


    But who knows? Amlogic is still not amongst the 'open' SoC vendors and proper upstream Linux support required and might still require the work of 3rd parties (like BayLibre guys partially paid by Amlogic and Libre Computer to mainline Amlogic SoCs). They also require their SoCs running with a proprietary firmware running on an internal micro controller always cheating with clockspeeds.


    So no more Amlogic for me even if S922 doesn't suck that much.


    IMO those many RK3399 designs are pretty interesting. Today's update for the upcoming tiny NanoPi NEO4 is really impressive. Even on this board PCIe x2 exposed so waiting for someone coming up with a '4 port SATA' add-on board making use of Marvell's 88SE9235 (as already suggested for NanoPi M4). You could use an old disk enclosure and simply screw the NEO4 inside the enclosure with a thin thermal pad connecting SoC and enclosure and heat dissipation is already solved.


    BTW: the flood of other RK3399 devices IMO is the real reason Hardkernel canceled the N1. It would have just been another RK3399 thingy that could not compete since too expensive. They need a new SoC/platform they own (for some time).

    • Offizieller Beitrag

    My four new Odroid HC2 have arrived!!!



    So now I can start building my small big home computer center, without any fans, on a bookshelf.


    Will start by drilling several 100 mm holes in the bookcase, for ventilation/cooling using the chimney effect.


    (Don't tell anyone: It seems my new HC2s slipped between the cracks. No VAT, no customs handling fee. :saint: )

  • Hmm... I don't agree given that good software support in the ARM world unfortunately gets the better the older the SoC.

    Excellent point - really had not considered this.


    Given that the amount of time I have spent trying to get things to work, I really want something that just works out of the box. As you say, the HC2 is the perfect choice in this respect. How mature is software support for the Helios4?


    I totally agree, Adoby - do let us all know how you get on with your project.

  • really had not considered this

    BTW: Software support is also an issue with really energy efficient x86 designs (to be used as SBC). Recently checked situation with my old UP Board using an Intel Atom: https://forum.armbian.com/topi…formance-compared-to-arm/

    As you say, the HC2 is the perfect choice in this respect. How mature is software support for the Helios4?

    HC2 is far from being perfect (both network and storage are connected via USB3 which puts a bit of an unnecessary load on the system. Also I would prefer a 64-bit ARM design these days). But HC2 simply works as performant and pretty compact NAS and very important: it avoids common hardware hassles people would otherwise have (see my signature).


    Helios4 software support is excellent due to Armada 38x SoC used there being... an older design ;)

    • Offizieller Beitrag

    I have had my old Synology 411j NAS for several years now. I started the change from 4 x 2TB HDDs to 4 x 4TB HDDs when one of the 2TB drives quit. And recently it started to complain about being close to full, so I did some tidying up. And considered if I should upgrade it to 4 x 6TB or 4 x 8TB drives. But I felt it was far too old and slow. I wanted something new and fast and shiny!


    For a long while I considered a mini-ITX build with an APU Ryzen-processor and an extra SATA-card, a lot of RAM and a bunch of HDDs. Could be a fun platform for VMs and experimenting with Docker and so on. But I felt it was too expensive and would draw a lot of power. And it would be extreme overkill...


    So I thought I could re-use an old PC and fill it with HDDs. To tide me over while I decided. But it would be clunky and noisy and draw a lot of power and I would have to get a Gigabit NIC.


    I read about wonderful stuff like GlusterFS and various forms of multinode storage. And discovered the HC2. But GlusterFS seemed too complicated and slight overkill. But the HC2 looked nice. But I should perhaps use it just as a normal NAS. That way I would be up and running much faster.


    I finally decided on a HC2 because I wanted something simple and quiet. I intended to use it for backup for my old NAS. And I liked the huge metal body for cooling and mounting the HDD. And if it worked out I could get another. And another. And...


    So I ordered one to try out. And also a really big HDD. Seagate IronWolf 12TB. I did some calculations of cost per TB storage. If I only calculated with the HDD then the 12TB drive would be significantly more expensive per TB than the IronWolf 10 or 8 TB. But if I also factored in the cost for the HC2 then the price per TB evened out... And a very small very big NAS is pretty nice in itself. And I figured fewer bigger drives would mean less power total. So 12TB it was! And the top of the line(?) IronWolf Pro felt like overkill...


    And then I had to consider software.


    And so I came here to OMV. And I got some confirmation that the HC2 with a single huge HDD perhaps wasn't a terribly sucky idea... 8)


    In fact I figured out that it would most likely out-perform my old Synology NAS. And indeed it does, easily!


    I access my network almost exclusively over WiFi. Laptop, tablet, phone and now perhaps also my old SqueezeBox players again. I also have an old small 5 port Gigabit switch between the old NAS and my desktop PC, but even though the 411j has a Gigabit NIC it can't saturate the Gigabit network. It can come close perhaps for a second or so if the cache is filled right. But the 411j has only 128MB RAM, so there is not a lot of cache... ||


    The HC2 saturates my Gigabit network in sustained transfers.


    I've also upgraded my WiFi to a fast 5GHz mesh and I got a new shiny 16 port switch and new CAT6 cables to accommodate several new nodes in the network.


    Now I get around 35 MiB/s read speed from the HC2 over 5GHz WiFi using NFS to my laptop with a wall between, without trying to optimize anything. That is way faster than I had with the 411j over cable, not to mention the old 2.4GHz WiFi. :P


    The 411j performance also seems to have benefited some from the new infrastructure, and perhaps from not being close to full anymore. So I'll keep it as a backup device, and let it spin down most of the time. Perhaps even turn it off periodically.


    Since the 411j was so slow over WiFi I have a 26 GB FS-Cache for NFS on my Laptop SSD. That helped some, but I suspect I can reclaim that space now...


    And I got four more HC2 to use for backup and experimenting. I figure I'll use one with an SSD to run IoT-stuff and my SqueezeBox players. One as NAS1 (running). One as NAS2, backup of NAS1. And the old 411j for even more backup.


    And the other two HC2 I might use to test stuff. Perhaps try upgrades. GlusterFS/compute nodes/LDAP/Kerberos/NIS/PXE/tftp/DHCP/DNS-servers. But really mostly to expand the storage to NAS3 and NAS4 in the future and provide more backup when needed or if something happens. I might use one of them as a loaner or to carry with me, but then an HC1 would be better...

  • My plans for a small and compact NAS are exactly the same. HC2 and a big single HDD. Everything important is synced to another remote cloud solution in the meantime. So it does not really matter if the HDD crashes in the future.


    However - I don´t like to spend so much money on a single HDD... 8TB would be enough in my case.

    • Offizieller Beitrag

    Only some GBs of my files and data are truly important. Stuff I have written, scanned legal documents, old scanned family photos and so on. And all that I also have on offsite USB-drives and on the sd-card of my phone as well as on the ssd of my laptop. I have it all in a special folder on NAS1 now. And whenever I update it I sync it out to the other devices, some of it automatically.


    Then there are things like e-books, mp3-files, photos, maps, tv-shows and movies. None of that is truly irreplaceable. But I have invested a lot of time and effort to find, rip, download, buy, fix metadata, (remove DRM) and perhaps edit, convert, normalize, trans code and organize. I wouldn't want to loose all that work. So I back it all up, once or twice, but not offsite.


    And then there are a lot of snapshots. Of my laptop. Of my desktop. Of my phone, my ereader and of my tablet. Most of that is just for convenience. Nice to be able to go back in time and find that old file. If it is really important I should store it among the important stuff. When storage space start to dwindle I purge a lot of snapshots. The snapshots are themselves backups, and usually they are not critical. So I don't back them up extra. I use rsync and hard links to create snapshots. Either using BackInTime or my own scripts.


    I live far out in the woods. And my phone is my internet connection. I share the internet on it to the rest of the network using a GL-Inet AR300M. Works great! I just turn on internet sharing on the phone, and the AR300M starts routing it to the rest of the LAN. The AR300M is also my DHCP-server. No cables or other changes needed. I used to have a separate 4G router, but I figured out that it would be cheaper with just the phone and a 100GB/month plan.


    So I have the internet "on" only when I actually use it. And when I'm at home. But perhaps I still should consider doing more about that part...

    • Offizieller Beitrag

    My plans for a small and compact NAS are exactly the same. HC2 and a big single HDD. Everything important is synced to another remote cloud solution in the meantime. So it does not really matter if the HDD crashes in the future.


    However - I don´t like to spend so much money on a single HDD... 8TB would be enough in my case.

    Do the math! :D


    Cost divided by number of TB. And you get cost per TB.


    If you only do this för the HDD itself then it is obvious that a 12TB HDD is more expensive per TB than a 8 or 10 TB HDD.


    But you can factor in other costs needed to use one HDD. A HC2, a network cable, a port on a switch, a power supply. Then a big HDD starts to make more sense. When I did the math I figured out that a 12TB HDD cost the same as a 8 or 10 TB HDD per TB.


    (Confession: I calculated with the more expensive HC2 I bought from UK. Not the cheaper ones I got directly from Korea... :saint: )

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