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TrueNAS ensures that different versions of different software fit together. So you update your OS, and your setup doesn’t break. The common tasks are made easy

by aborsy 4y ago

TrueNAS ensures that different versions of different software fit together. So you update your OS, and your setup doesn’t break. The common tasks are made easy: snapshot scheduling, snapshot replication, Samba share with a few clicks, backup to cloud, users management, one click install of applications, SMART tests, etc. Config management can be a headache.

neilpanchal 4y ago
I use zfs-auto-snapshot for snapshots, it works great. I think the only thing I would want is early warning for a disk failure. I'll probably automate that. TrueNAS feels extremely heavy with too many features I don't need. There is a web server, database, etc which feels overkill for a simple home NAS IMO and having to manage the management system.
- mustache_kimono 4y ago
  > I think the only thing I would want is early warning for a disk failure. https://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/jammy/man8/zed.8.html https://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/jammy/man8/zed.8.html
- mustache_kimono 4y ago
  > I think the only thing I would want is early warning for a disk failure. The only other thing, you may be forgetting, is an app you never knew you needed.[0] ;) [0, an interactive, file-level Time Machine-like tool for ZFS]: https://github.com/kimono-koans/httm https://github.com/kimono-koans/httm
  - neilpanchal 4y ago
    Hnggg.... this thing looks cool. A handful of .rs files in the /src folder. Sold.
    - mustache_kimono 4y ago
      A man/person of taste!
vladvasiliu 4y ago
As GP said, all these features are nice, but if you don't need them, they're just overhead. I'm in the same boat, all I have on my NAS is Samba, zrepl (ZFS snapshots and backups) and node exporter (monitoring agent for Prometheus - handles SMART, etc). It's running Arch, and I've never had my setup "break" in more than 10 years of using this distro (though this particular NAS is not that old). I don't care for a DB, web server and god forbid random applications doing who knows what on my NAS. But if you want your NAS to do everything, it should be great. To each their own, I guess. Also, TrueNAS is FreeBSD which may or may not work on dinkier hardware. I'm specifically thinking of random watchdog problems on some older Realtek Gigabit NICs, where you had to use a specific patched driver which, at one point, didn't support the latest version.
- neilpanchal 4y ago
  Yea, TrueNAS comes with a jails manager which has nothing to do with NAS. It's incredibly feature rich: https://static.ixsystems.co/uploads/2020/04/image-4.png https://static.ixsystems.co/uploads/2020/04/image-4.png Plus the setup now gets intricately coupled with the host OS. That's a big no for me. I want to treat the host OS as disposable, ephemeral and decoupled for peace of mind. The host's only job is to serve files over samba protocol and run scrub cronjobs. That's it. It gets 2 vCPUs and 24GB of ram. Stays put.
  - vladvasiliu 4y ago
    I guess there could be an argument for the NAS part to be one of the jails. But then, the whole thing should be marketed more like "Proxmox with batteries included".
    - cassianoleal 4y ago
      > the whole thing should be marketed more like "Proxmox with batteries included". It's not though. Even if you make all the "NAS software" part of the jails (or the half-baked Kubernetes in TrueNAS SCALE), it's not even close to Proxmox when it comes to managing VMs, containers/jails, firewall, networking, etc.

by aborsy 4y ago

neilpanchal 4y ago

I use zfs-auto-snapshot for snapshots, it works great. I think the only thing I would want is early warning for a disk failure. I'll probably automate that. TrueNAS feels extremely heavy with too many features I don't need. There is a web server, database, etc which feels overkill for a simple home NAS IMO and having to manage the management system.

mustache_kimono 4y ago
> I think the only thing I would want is early warning for a disk failure. https://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/jammy/man8/zed.8.html https://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/jammy/man8/zed.8.html
mustache_kimono 4y ago
> I think the only thing I would want is early warning for a disk failure. The only other thing, you may be forgetting, is an app you never knew you needed.[0] ;) [0, an interactive, file-level Time Machine-like tool for ZFS]: https://github.com/kimono-koans/httm https://github.com/kimono-koans/httm
- neilpanchal 4y ago
  Hnggg.... this thing looks cool. A handful of .rs files in the /src folder. Sold.
  - mustache_kimono 4y ago
    A man/person of taste!

vladvasiliu 4y ago

As GP said, all these features are nice, but if you don't need them, they're just overhead. I'm in the same boat, all I have on my NAS is Samba, zrepl (ZFS snapshots and backups) and node exporter (monitoring agent for Prometheus - handles SMART, etc). It's running Arch, and I've never had my setup "break" in more than 10 years of using this distro (though this particular NAS is not that old). I don't care for a DB, web server and god forbid random applications doing who knows what on my NAS. But if you want your NAS to do everything, it should be great. To each their own, I guess. Also, TrueNAS is FreeBSD which may or may not work on dinkier hardware. I'm specifically thinking of random watchdog problems on some older Realtek Gigabit NICs, where you had to use a specific patched driver which, at one point, didn't support the latest version.

neilpanchal 4y ago
Yea, TrueNAS comes with a jails manager which has nothing to do with NAS. It's incredibly feature rich: https://static.ixsystems.co/uploads/2020/04/image-4.png https://static.ixsystems.co/uploads/2020/04/image-4.png Plus the setup now gets intricately coupled with the host OS. That's a big no for me. I want to treat the host OS as disposable, ephemeral and decoupled for peace of mind. The host's only job is to serve files over samba protocol and run scrub cronjobs. That's it. It gets 2 vCPUs and 24GB of ram. Stays put.
- vladvasiliu 4y ago
  I guess there could be an argument for the NAS part to be one of the jails. But then, the whole thing should be marketed more like "Proxmox with batteries included".
  - cassianoleal 4y ago
    > the whole thing should be marketed more like "Proxmox with batteries included". It's not though. Even if you make all the "NAS software" part of the jails (or the half-baked Kubernetes in TrueNAS SCALE), it's not even close to Proxmox when it comes to managing VMs, containers/jails, firewall, networking, etc.