Learn FreeNAS

Linux.com have published an excerpt from my book Learning FreeNAS… The excerpt is entitled “Configuring storage in FreeNAS”.

You can read more here.

Varun has posted an entry on his blog about his FreeNAS server. After 193 days he has had to reboot it due to a problem with his router (and not the FreeNAS).

He is a bit saddened as he was conducting an experiment to see
how long various operating systems can keep running before they need to be shut down or restarted for any reason. FreeNAS was at the top of his list!

Harryd has a excellent blog entry about solving/measuring ZFS write performance using the dd command.

You can read it here.

The Bored SysAdmin has put together a mini howto about building a 2TB NAS box for only $360. For the software he suggests FreeNAS or OpenFiler. The 2TB is achieved by using 3 x 640MB disks which means
that you get 2TB unformatted space. In Raid 5 formatted the storage will be closer to 1.1TB.

You can read more at How-To: Mini DIY Project: 2TB NAS Box For $360

The Linuxbsdos.com website has a good review of FreeNAS compared to OpenFiler.

In the conclusion they write: “The main difference between FreeNAS and Openfiler is that one is a network-attached storage (NAS) server, while the other serves as both a NAS and a SAN (Storage Area Network) server. The SAN feature of Openfiler is what makes it appealing to enterprise and business users.”

The reason for this is that the reviewer didn't know that FreeNAS also has iSCSI target capabilities and they only list iSCSI initiator in the feature list of FreeNAS.

Just to set the record straight: FreeNAS has iSCSI target as well as iSCI initiator features and can act very well as a SAN server.