The UI is sketchy and the plugins / jails can be janky, but the underlying tech / idea is solid (FreeBSD + ZFS + the concept of your data on the disks and the O

The UI is sketchy and the plugins / jails can be janky, but the underlying tech / idea is solid (FreeBSD + ZFS + the concept of your data on the disks and the OS as just some ephemeral thing on a thumb drive). I had a USB key go bad on a freenas and had it running again in an hour. The total config backup / restore makes it pretty darn painless. With that said, I'd recommend cloning your USB key to a backup one once you get your system configured how you like, in addition to keeping a few copies of the golden config around. It's possible to data recover the actual config file from a dead-ish flash drive, but at <$10 a pop it just makes sense to me to keep a spare or two ready to go.