How to configure Proxmox to work with 6 drives

D

DonAndress

New Member
Feb 20, 2025
2
0
1
Hi.
I'd like to get your opinion if the below use case / configuration is even possible to work, and if so, to work smoothly.

So, I'd like to have a setup of 4 NVMe drives in raid 10 (for silence and power consumption).
On top of that I'd like to have 2 HDD drives (for safety), each would have a total size of the NVMe setup.

Now, on daily basis I'd like the NVMe's to serve as network storage with automatic synchronization of data.
The 2 HDD's would be dormant most of the time and never accessible to users.
The HDD's would spin up once a week at certain hour to make a synchronization of the NVMe's, same copy on both drivers. Once done, they would go to sleep again.

On top of that the whole NAS would be running between certain hours during the day, shut down during night time and shut down when no client is online for certain period of time, with possibility to boot up using wake on lan feature.

Is it possible with Proxmox?
if all is not possible, what out of that setup is?
 
DonAndress said:
Is it possible with Proxmox?
Click to expand...
yes. a few items of note:

1. you mentioned you want nvme for "power consumption." it may surprise you to learn nvme consume a LOT more power then HDDs.
2. The setup you're describing is for a production dataset and a backup. if you're already doing that, consider putting the backup OUTSIDE your server. that way, the backups are accessible even if the server dies/burns/decides to jump out of a plane. I'd suggest a small low power device like a 2 bay Synology for the purpose. While you're at it, you can use it for serve your NAS functions too.
3. a low power NAS wouldnt need to be put to sleep, as its idle draw is very small.
 
Kingneutron said:
Why this weird sync configuration to non-mirrored spinning HD on the same node? Why don't you just do backups to PBS, and/or HA cluster?
Click to expand...
alexskysilk said:
yes. a few items of note:

1. you mentioned you want nvme for "power consumption." it may surprise you to learn nvme consume a LOT more power then HDDs.
2. The setup you're describing is for a production dataset and a backup. if you're already doing that, consider putting the backup OUTSIDE your server. that way, the backups are accessible even if the server dies/burns/decides to jump out of a plane. I'd suggest a small low power device like a 2 bay Synology for the purpose. While you're at it, you can use it for serve your NAS functions too.
3. a low power NAS wouldnt need to be put to sleep, as its idle draw is very small.
Click to expand...

There are couple of reasons I plan to do the above:
  1. This will be a home NAS, so 1 new device is acceptable by the household.
  2. More than 1 device means additional hardware cost, especially when I already have micro ATX motherboard available.
  3. In this area it's extremely rare to have power outage, yearly it's probably 4-5 minutes. Thus, the only thing I'm afraid of is drive failure. And there is small UPS available too.
  4. Why weird drive configuration? NVMe for silence and power consumption and that's in RAID for safety.
    The additional separate HDD's are there just in case, mostly because we all know that in case NVME's are not powered for a long time they tend to lose data. Plus I don't believe I'm gonna be able to plug more than 4 NVMe's to same motherboard.
  5. Why I want HDD's to be sleeping most of the time? Power consumption and silence.
  6. So in essence, I will have 3 copies of data in NAS, plus original files stored on devices. I think pretty neat.

@alexskysilk
  1. I believe you have top performing NVMe's in mind. I'm not after that. I'm looking towards slower (and cooler) PCIe 3.0 drives. It's gonna be in RAID anyway so speed is less important. Especially that the LAN bandwidth is not that great.
    So, such devices take ~4 mW when sleeping and ~4-5 W when in full speed. Spinning HDD starts with ~3 W.
  2. Again, 2 quite big devices in a small household, not acceptable for the Mrs. Plus, the more devices, the more hardware cost and more power consumption.
  3. Plug n Play NAS solutions are great, but since I take great joy in assembling hardware and playing with soft, I'd prefer to build it myself and also get new experience. Plus, it's cheaper than Synology.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top Bottom