Synology NAS ISCSI Query “topic moved”

[kev2021]

Hi all,

Does anyone have a Synology NAS and setup iSCSI?  Totally new to ISCSI, never used it before.

My HP microserver HD is getting a bit old now and I’m considering setting up a iSCSI LUN on my HP microserver and then pointing VMware esxi to ISCSI LUN for the VM’s.

Has anyone done this? Does it work ok or slow?

Also I have existing data on my NAS, when I setup the ISCSI does it need to be a new volume that’s blank or can I point it to the same volume my data is on and it will keep all the data and effectively create a folder i presume?

My thinking is the NAS is in a RAID 5 so the VM’s would be safer on the NAS and I can then back the folder up (after turning off my VMs) every so often.  There is really only 3 or 4 VMS to backup, the others I can store the data elsewhere so worst case I rebuild the server and then restore the data, not too bad as they are not massively critical but I have 3 or 4 VMs where I need to backup the whole VMs, not just the data.  For example, my main server I need to backup but my DB server I can just backup the DBs and then re-setup from scratch as if urgent, I have them on a hosting site so can access them.  I just tend to make changes locally, then upload.

Thanks

Kev

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[UK Sentinel]

So you never brought your HP Gen 10 Plus then

Never used a Synology NAS but I have (did) spend half my life around Servers / Core switches and the like, NAS is in a RAID 5 is a safe bet.

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[kev2021]

Hi, no not yet, it seems on closer look, the gen 10 only seems to support 6.7 not version 7.0 so wondering if a new microserver is due?  Also looking to see if any other makes do small microserver type machines which maybe include a raid card etc for hopefully cheaper money :)

Yes, my synology nas is in raid 5 BUT I’m effectively up to what is considered the safe limit and if I was to expand it, i need to move to raid 6 which effectively means buying 2 drives to increase capacity as 1 would be used for the parity etc so that the raid could suffer upto 2 drive failures at the same time. Hence my idea to maybe se ISCSI but upon looking I’m seeing some reports of slowness and poor performance so I think i might just get 2 drives for the server and mirror them and move the data to those for now – probably the cheapest and safest option as the micro server has 4 drive bays and I’m only using 2 (1 esxi OS, 1 vm’s)

Also no clear info yet on the gen 10 and solution seems to be to use a USB stick with bootable esxi on it inside the server and then use the drives in sata mode as regular drives but i tend to leave server on and not sure I’m keen on leaving a USB stick plugged into the server internally 24/7 with it being on etc.

Also I’ve recently found out there are to be some changes at my work and effectively we are being asked to do our existing role plus a role that is considered a entry level position so will see what happens here as not sure if they can enforce this or if they are simply trying there luck so at the moment I’ve decided to hold fire, see how this goes and i think win2012 is EOL in 2025 so prices may come down or newer boxes appear.  In currently climate, finding a new job not overly easy as lots of people working from home etc.

My existing PC I’ve also is covered doesn’t meet the criteria for windows 11 so I’m going to have to update that also (yep – everything is come round at once lol) but I lasted updated this PC prob 2012 or maybe earlier, its a i5 CPU but prob a 2nd gen or similar and apparently I saw today they up to 12th gen lol.

Also going to downsize my PC, have a zalman full tower case, which was great when i got it as it has a handy door on the front I push and it opens and i can slide in/out the drives… However, the issue is the card they put in the case for this is only sata 3.. so when i use sata 6 drives, i get very very poor performance/hanging and tons of errors in the event log, soon as i bypass it and go direct with the sata cable, all is well so so going to get a micro atx case now so can make it bit smaller as I seldom use CD/DVDs and I no longer need multiple drives in my machine, I’m just going to have 2 going forward.  m.2 drive for OS and either a SSD or HD for data as I got one 4b HD now so will just re-instate it.

Kev

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[UK Sentinel]

Busy life you have, RAID 5 can support – is there any spare slots in your Synology nas ? ‘I forget you setup’

Not directly related, but a handy tutorial on how to setup Unifi Network Controller as a container in Docker on a Synology Nas

Hope you have a nice little UPS holding this all together

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[kev2021]

Hi,

:) My raid 5 is made up of 5 drives and looking online, this seems to be what they suggest is the max in terms of not running into problems.  They suggest if going beyond 5 drives, to move to raid 6 for additional protection of 2 drives being able to fail and not just 1.

My nas has 3 empty drive bays so I can add more drives but I’m considering not and I’m currently thinking I’ll keep these 3 drives so that IF I run out of space, it may work out cheaper to buy 3 larger drives and move content over to that and then add drive(s) in future, as opposed to buying 5 larger drives and replacing 1 drive at a time and waiting hours/days for the raid rebuild to complete for each drive.  I did this when up upgraded from my smaller drives and it took best part of 24hrs to rebuild each drive so i did it over 2 weeks replacing 1 drive, letting the array rebuild, leave it for a day or two to ensure was all ok and also power the nas of and on to ensure all ok before replacing the next drive.

Don’t have any unifi stuff, have looked at it but bit expensive so decided to just get the ASUS router in the end plus at the time there was lots of reports of issues with the USG and BT You View not working and having to go in and manually alter some code etc which sounded a bit unnecessary and should of worked out the box as it does with very other router.   So decided to avoid that as we had BT You View at the time but now no longer have it.  Plus I have *limited* access to unifi in work (we have 1 switch and AP for meeting rooms on 1 floor) and we had some issues with ipads connecting to it after a update/reboot of the ipad if SSID is hidden, it just wont reconnect even though all info is saved etc.  Only way is to make SSID visible, connect all ipads for about 1 hour then hide the SSID.  If you do it any sooner, the ipads just disconnect. Very odd.

No UPS here.  Fortunately power doesn’t go off hardly at all and on odd occasions, everything has been fine.

Router – no issue just boots back up

switch – no issue just boots backup

Nas – boots up ok and just warns of incorrect shutdown

microserver – n issue just boots back up, OS’s will complain of improper shut down but they all come back up.

I started to look at home automation, installed it in docker and started to set bits up BUT then I got the Asus router, setup all my IoT on a separate wireless network which my nas is not part of so of course it no longer seems them lol so I’ve either got to make the IoT wireless have access to internal network or not bother and leave as is.  At the moment, they operated though apps so its not a major issue, it’s just not all the same brand so would of been nice to have them all in one place to control as needed.

Kev

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[UK Sentinel]

kev2021 wrote:

:) My raid 5 is made up of 5 drives and looking online, this seems to be what they suggest is the max in terms of not running into problems.  They suggest if going beyond 5 drives, to move to raid 6 for additional protection of 2 drives being able to fail and not just 1.

Yep, 5 drives is really the max as you say before moving to a RAID 5 alternative.

 

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[kev2021]

Been looking at this a bit more and it seems quiet a few people have mentioned poor performance when using over iscisi so i’ve decided to simply buy 2 new drives to replace my agng drives in the microserver.

1 currently have:

2 x 1TB WD Green drives in a raid 1 containing the esxi OS and ISO files – Year 2008…

2 x 1TB WD Green drives in a raid 1 containing the VMs – Year 2011 – Not too worried about these, if it fails, i’ll put a new drive in, re-install the OS and then i’l; simply add the VMs back in and setup the ones i need to auto startup and shut down etc. Not a major issue as ESXi is fairly easy to install and doesn’t take too long.

So new question…

Whatsthe best way to replace the drives for the 2 drives containing the VMs?

Option 1:

1. Move VMs off to Esxi OS drives
2. Remove raid on raid controller,
3. Power off the server
4. Remove the 2 drives
5. Insert the 2 new drives
6. Power on the server
7. go into raid setup and setup the raid 1 on the new drives
8. Move Vms to new drives and mount in vmware

Option 2

1. Power off the server
2. Remove 1 of the drives in the mirror
3. Replace with a new drive
4. Power back on server
5. do raid repair of mirror
6. Power off server
7. remove other drive in mirror
8. insert new drive
9. power on
10. let it repair mirror and then all is good

I’m currently going with option 1 but its taking quiet a while to copy the VMs as it not overly quick, not sure why.  Main issue I cannot afford to loose any of the VMs as its my main server, not my test one.  I have files backed up but don’t have the VM’s themselves backed up as not found a easy free way to do this so I’m currently manually copying from the vmware vsphere client by browsing the 2 datastores and then simply right clicking the folder -> copy and then click on other windows and paste it and then wait for around a hour or two for each one so far.

Thanks

Kev

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[kev2021]

oh incase it matters, I’m replacing the 2 x 1TB Greens for vmstore with 2 x 2TB drives as I’ve used about 90% of the drive but I suspect I can loose some of the VMs.  AS mentioned before biggest issue is I can’t run them all at the same time due to RAM limitations.  Not to mention CPU will likely suffer also on some of them.

Thanks

Kev

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[Grisu]

Why not option2, seems much easier to me and will use and do what Raid is made for.

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[UK Sentinel]

You do seem to be at a crossroads between Cost and Performance and if money was no object, I would ditch the Synology nas and replace with a NAS/SAN with SSD drives unit that takes  Fibre Channel connectivity.

On a cost effective/ safe choice, option 2 as @Grisu says seems to be the safer option, it will take more time but seems to easier in practice.  breaking mirrors and setting up again always worries me (need a good backup you will)

And treat yourself to a UPS whilst the wallet is out, if you get a power failure whilst the new disc is in RAID rebuild mode, you could have issues

Black Friday /Cyber Monday soon for those deals maybe ;)

 

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[Grisu]

I see no need for UPS, even if it fails he still got the removed disk to do the mirroring again.

Or diskcopy removed disk to the first again and again till it runs well.

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[UK Sentinel]

Unless the original disk in the mirror set become damaged / corrupt or the controller fails etc. duo to power outage / spike etc.

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[Grisu]

I think you mean daily usage (7/24), I refered to HDD change only where I dont see any need for it.

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Grisu wrote:

I think you mean daily usage (7/24), I refered to HDD change only where I dont see any need for it.

I mean’t both, like seat belts, ”better to wear an not need, rather than need and not be wearing’, unless your car is already on fire

Either way, I am sure @kev2021 will make all the choices based upon his pocket depth and risk appetite

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[kev2021]

Hi all,

The Synology is a NAS, its a DS1819+ so could take SSDs if got a caddy probably.  I didn’t look at that as a option to get equivalent sized SSDs to give the storage capacity would be very expensive but it is possible to do.

I thought about option 2 but I’ve seen quiet a few reports online saying they are getting “queued for rebuilding error 776” and some people having issues mirroring to larger capacity drive as your meant to mirror to identical sized drives so I’m currently doing option 1 – taking forever.. but at least at the end I can remove the raid for the 2 VM storage drives, remove them, add in 2 new drives, setup mirror from scratch and then move the data back again.  Looong process but these current WD Green drives have lasted 13 years so far and are not advising of any errors etc, I’m just replacing them due to age (2008).  I’m replacing them with WD Gold 2 TB drives which are enterprise class and meant for 24/7 operation, which the Greens were not to my knowledge so I’m hopeful they will last a good number of years too fingers crossed.

The O/S drives would be the next ones to do but they are 2011 (same model) so whilst would be a pain if they died, its easy to re-install as they only have OS and ISOs (which I have copies of on my nas) so would only mean re-installing OS and then re-mounting/adding VMs back in again s not too bad.  Could have it back up in a day for sure.

Kev

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