[Beginner] OMV on Odroid HC4 - HW e SW Suggestions

  • Hi everyone!

    I am a newbie in the NAS world, soon I am building a home little NAS with Odroid HC4, which I ordered yesterday.

    My plan is to use it to store and access my documents with now reside in my tower PC from the PC itself, my mobile and laptop (when they're attached to WLAN). Further plan is to install something like a Nextcloud instance to access parts of these files from the internet.


    Because until now I stored my documents only on my local machine I am here to kindly ask you some suggestions on both hardware and software sides.


    Firstly I need to buy the physical drive(s) where put my data. Until now my files reside on a single 3TiB hard drive and there is more than half space free, but I need to think in advance because I would keep my new hardware as long as I can.

    Which kind of HDs do you suggest and in which RAID configuration (the Odroid case has two slots for 3,5'' or 2,5'' drives)?

    I saw a Seagate IronWolf Pro 12 TB (7200 RPM SATA, 240MiB/S, 256 MB of cache, 1-5-7.8W) and a WESTERN DIGITAL RED 4TB (5400rpm SATA3 180 MiB/s 256MB of cache, 0.4-3.1-4.8W) for 3/5 of the Seegate price. Is it better to buy two of the small HDs or one of the larger? Should these drive fit well with ODROID and OMW or do you have better suggestions?


    On the software side, I saw from another post that this installation guide exists and if nobody has a better suggestion I am going to use it for setup. Later, which protocol do you suggest for access the files, SMB, NFT or another one? I use only Linux machines and the phone use E-os which is a degoogled customed version of android.

    Is it possible and advisable to use some kind of encryption where the keys never circulates in the net but always reside on the clients? if yes, how to configure OMV in that way?

    Are there another suggestions to keep the files secure at a reasonable level?


    For minimize the energy waste, is it possible to autosuspend the NAS after a period of inactivity and wake it automatically by LAN?


    If you'll have the patience to read this and answer some of my naive questions, I thank you in advance.

  • KM0201

    Approved the thread.
    • Official Post

    Which kind of HDs do you suggest and in which RAID configuration

    I would not use RAID. Most likely you don't need RAID, but backup which can be achieved by installing two drives and using one as backup for the data on the first one.

    installation guide

    omv6:armbian_bullseye_install [omv-extras.org]

    But I think that armbian is using the same script to install OMV and omv-extras, so it might be the same


    As introduction to OMV:

    New User Guide — openmediavault 6.x.y documentation

    Later, which protocol do you suggest for access the files, SMB, NFT or another one? I use only Linux machines and the phone use E-os which is a degoogled customed version of android.

    NFS, if you don't have any systems like Windows that prefer smb

    Are there another suggestions to keep the files secure at a reasonable level?

    Have backup. Read about the backup strategy in my signature. And don't open any ports to your server from the outside except if you are using a reverse proxy like swag in docker.


    Guide for installation of nextcloud:

    For minimize the energy waste, is it possible to autosuspend the NAS after a period of inactivity and wake it automatically by LAN?

    Yes, can be configured in the GUI of OMV. Not sure if the HC4 is doing this by default. On my HC2 the firmware in the usb-sata-controller spins down the drive.

    If you spin down your drives, you probably don't need NAS drives, but normal desktop drives will do. But there is a lot of different opinions about that around. Most important: backup. Did I mention this already?

  • I really appreciated your detailed answers, thank you!

    They inspired me a couple of further questions:

    I would not use RAID. Most likely you don't need RAID, but backup which can be achieved by installing two drives and using one as backup for the data on the first one.

    In this case, if one drive is reserved for backup purposes, isn't ok to just use an external drive instead? I think you said this in regards of the 3-2-1 backup strategy you linked me but to have 3 different drives is expensive and I perceive little improving in having a backup to maintain on the same machine (RAID 1 should do the same job but at least is automatic and in nearly real-time). What are the benefits which I am missing?

    If you spin down your drives, you probably don't need NAS drives, but normal desktop drives will do.

    So, to simplify, do you think that every drive big enough and whose transfer rate surpasses the LAN speed would fit the job well?

    • Official Post

    What are the benefits which I am missing?

    5 Simple Reasons Why RAID Is Not a Backup
    “Can I use RAID in place of backups?” I see this question posted throughout the web in one form or another. After learning how RAID facilitates redundancy,…
    www.arcserve.com


    You can run a scheduled rsync or - even better - a scheduled rsnapshot job every hour, every day or whatever you prefer. Automatic as well.

    So, to simplify, do you think that every drive big enough and whose transfer rate surpasses the LAN speed would fit the job well?

    I would go with one of the major brands.

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