Affordable High Performance DIY 8TB NAS

Post by **odroid** » Tue Jun 27, 2017 5:12 pm

A forum user @linuxest reported the most affordable 8TB external storage could work with XU4 UAS driver in Kernel 4.9.
viewtopic.php?f=146&t=26016&start=200#p192817

I also wanted to make my own NAS because my Google Cloud storage was almost full.
I ordered the same storage(STEB8000100) from Amazon. It is US$180 only. 1TB costs $22 approximately.

https://www.amazon.com/Seagate-Expansio ... B01HAPGEIE

It has arrived here this morning and I've run a few Samba performance tests with Kernel 4.9 on my XU4Q.
I formatted the storage with EXT4 file system before testing because its stock file system is NTFS.

Downloading an 8GB file to my laptop(Windows 10) from the XU4 NAS. It shows 110MB/sec of transfer speed stably.

Uploading an 8GB file to the XU4 NAS from my Windows laptop. It shows 90~100MB/sec of transfer speed.

Helios LanTest (3GB transfer option) also shows good performance too.

I am going to attach the XU4Q + Case on the storage with Velcro tape.
I hope I can share some pictures by end of this week.

PS: I used the latest OMV image on an 8GB SD card to build this great NAS.

Post by **odroid** » Tue Jun 27, 2017 5:27 pm

Some pictures

XU4Q and the official case

Velcro tape (3M Scotch 40mm x 25mm 4-pairs)

Attach Velcro tape (loop side) to the XU4Q case bottom

Attach Velcro tape (hook side) to the Seagate HDD case

Place the XU4Q case on the HDD case

Connect cables.
DC plug for HDD, DC plug for XU4Q, Ethernet and USB 3.0 cables.

mad_ady · Post by **mad_ady** » Tue Jun 27, 2017 6:24 pm

You should also test the following:
* samba/NFS move speed (from one directory to another on the same disk
* local (shell) move speed (should depend only on uas)

Post by **odroid** » Tue Jun 27, 2017 6:31 pm

mad_ady wrote:You should also test the following:
* samba/NFS move speed (from one directory to another on the same disk
* local (shell) move speed (should depend only on uas)

Any recommended commands or scripts or utility like the iozone?

Code: Select all

root@odroidxu4:/srv/dev-disk-by-id-ata-ST8000AS0002-1NA17Z_Z8410XJ5-part2# iozone -e -I -a -s 100M -r 4k -r 16k -r 512k -r 1024k -r 16384k -i 0 -i 1 -i 2
	Iozone: Performance Test of File I/O
	        Version $Revision: 3.429 $
		Compiled for 32 bit mode.
		Build: linux 

	Contributors:William Norcott, Don Capps, Isom Crawford, Kirby Collins
	             Al Slater, Scott Rhine, Mike Wisner, Ken Goss
	             Steve Landherr, Brad Smith, Mark Kelly, Dr. Alain CYR,
	             Randy Dunlap, Mark Montague, Dan Million, Gavin Brebner,
	             Jean-Marc Zucconi, Jeff Blomberg, Benny Halevy, Dave Boone,
	             Erik Habbinga, Kris Strecker, Walter Wong, Joshua Root,
	             Fabrice Bacchella, Zhenghua Xue, Qin Li, Darren Sawyer,
	             Vangel Bojaxhi, Ben England, Vikentsi Lapa.

	Run began: Tue Jun 27 11:35:11 2017

	Include fsync in write timing
	O_DIRECT feature enabled
	Auto Mode
	File size set to 102400 kB
	Record Size 4 kB
	Record Size 16 kB
	Record Size 512 kB
	Record Size 1024 kB
	Record Size 16384 kB
	Command line used: iozone -e -I -a -s 100M -r 4k -r 16k -r 512k -r 1024k -r 16384k -i 0 -i 1 -i 2
	Output is in kBytes/sec
	Time Resolution = 0.000001 seconds.
	Processor cache size set to 1024 kBytes.
	Processor cache line size set to 32 bytes.
	File stride size set to 17 * record size.
                                                              random    random     bkwd    record    stride                                    
              kB  reclen    write  rewrite    read    reread    read     write     read   rewrite      read   fwrite frewrite    fread  freread
          102400       4    16235    17418    19668    22467     1638     6171                                                          
          102400      16    36653    54856    42832    59549     6150    21621                                                          
          102400     512    81752   130692    97405   107465    56880    13806                                                          
          102400    1024   134536    58596    99396   116019    75389    21479                                                          
          102400   16384    73012    86099    61309   105185   148646    78000                                                          

iozone test complete.

1.1GB write/read test

Code: Select all

root@odroidxu4:/srv/dev-disk-by-id-ata-ST8000AS0002-1NA17Z_Z8410XJ5-part2# dd if=/dev/zero of=test oflag=direct bs=8M count=128
128+0 records in
128+0 records out
1073741824 bytes (1.1 GB) copied, 9.70109 s, 111 MB/s

root@odroidxu4:/srv/dev-disk-by-id-ata-ST8000AS0002-1NA17Z_Z8410XJ5-part2# dd if=test of=/dev/null iflag=direct bs=8M
128+0 records in
128+0 records out
1073741824 bytes (1.1 GB) copied, 8.39087 s, 128 MB/s

mad_ady · Post by **mad_ady** » Tue Jun 27, 2017 7:04 pm

I was thinking more like:

Code: Select all

time cp test test.2

Post by **odroid** » Tue Jun 27, 2017 7:18 pm

Code: Select all

# time cp test_8GB test.2

real	2m13.274s
user	0m0.045s
sys	0m50.420s

Roughly 60MB/sec for local copying (read&write in interleaved-parallel).
But it is not accurate due to caches probably.

memeka · Post by **memeka** » Tue Jun 27, 2017 8:05 pm

any chance for a cheap (no lcd) cloudshell with the controller in this enclosure (and 2x drives if supported)?

mad_ady · Post by **mad_ady** » Tue Jun 27, 2017 8:26 pm

Shouldn't it be faster because of UAS? 60MB/s is something you could expect from mass-storage drivers...

Post by **odroid** » Wed Jun 28, 2017 8:43 am

mad_ady wrote:Shouldn't it be faster because of UAS? 60MB/s is something you could expect from mass-storage drivers...

This 8TB storage box seems to include a 5400rpm HDD and its maximum throughput could be 120~130MB/sec.
So the read + write speed on a single disk could be 60MB/sec reasonably.

Post by **odroid** » Wed Jun 28, 2017 8:49 am

memeka wrote:any chance for a cheap (no lcd) cloudshell with the controller in this enclosure (and 2x drives if supported)?

I think you can stack two 8TB external HDDs and XU4 all together to make a very affordable two-bay 16TB NAS.

Snk · Post by **Snk** » Tue Jul 04, 2017 7:16 am

Following the logic of our friend @odroid, I come to make my contribution.
If we do not have money to buy a Cloudshell 2 and some HD's, we come up with new ideas. Haha
XU4 + 32Gb eMMC Kernel 4.9 + 1TB Seagate Expansion Desktop

Post by **odroid** » Tue Jul 04, 2017 9:18 am

@Snk,
Thank you for the contribution.
We love Poor Man's High-performance NAS.

I also have an Expansion Portable Drive 2TB and I will try to improve the performance in this weekend.

Snk · Post by **Snk** » Tue Jul 04, 2017 11:19 am

@odroid
I believe that for my configuration, the performance was pretty cool.
I will buy a Gigabit switch to maintain this performance ... In a few months, I will buy a unit of this same model from yours, to use correctly here.
I bought 1Tb just to do an experiment, I risked a good money and I saw that it was worth it.
Now, I'm going to go improve performance and then increase capacity.
If you get new optimizations, share here on the topic to exchange experiences!

Post by **odroid** » Tue Jul 04, 2017 4:04 pm

I couldn't wait until the weekend.

I've installed the latest OMV image on an SD card and updated.
OMV image : https://sourceforge.net/projects/openme ... Computers/

Just connected the Expansion Portable 2.5inch 2TB HDD for a quick test.
The performance is quite great. I think the OMV has been well optimised and easy to use.
We need to check why its Samba performance is 15~20% better than our Ubuntu Samba configuration.

Downloading an 8GB file to my laptop from XU4.

Uploading from laptop to XU4.

Helios LanTest (3GB transfer option)

Note that this small Seagate external USB3.9 2.5inch HDD is not compatible with Linux UAS driver.
So it is another proof that the generic NAS performance is not affected by the UAS feature since most NAS uses the HDD not the SSD.

mad_ady · Post by **mad_ady** » Tue Jul 04, 2017 4:41 pm

They might have USB3 interrupts pinned to the big cores. By default all interrupts are pinned to core 0, which is little.

Post by **odroid** » Tue Jul 04, 2017 4:59 pm

No. our Ubuntu assigns the USB IRQs to the big cores while OMV assigns them to the little cores.
Very weird.

Post by **odroid** » Sun Jul 23, 2017 4:18 pm

I had a chance to test the WesternDigital My Book Desktop External Hard Drive 8TB USB HDD.
My friend bought it from Amazon at US$200 to build his own NAS because he doesn't like Seagate HDD.

Its VID/PID is 1058:25ee Western Digital Technologies, Inc. and it is not compatible with the current Linux UAS driver.

But the Samba performance is quite great.

Downloading an 8GB file to my laptop from XU4.

Uploading from laptop to XU4.

Helios LanTest (3GB transfer option)

1.1GB write/read test

Code: Select all

root@odroidxu4:/srv/dev-disk-by-label-WD-8TB# dd if=/dev/zero of=test oflag=direct bs=8M count=128
128+0 records in
128+0 records out
1073741824 bytes (1.1 GB) copied, 6.83797 s, 157 MB/s
root@odroidxu4:/srv/dev-disk-by-label-WD-8TB# dd if=test of=/dev/null iflag=direct bs=8M
128+0 records in
128+0 records out
1073741824 bytes (1.1 GB) copied, 7.30801 s, 147 MB/s

iozone test

Code: Select all

root@odroidxu4:/srv/dev-disk-by-label-WD-8TB# iozone -e -I -a -s 100M -r 4k -r 16k -r 512k -r 1024k -r 16384k -i 0 -i 1 -i 2
	Iozone: Performance Test of File I/O
	        Version $Revision: 3.429 $
		Compiled for 32 bit mode.
		Build: linux 

	Contributors:William Norcott, Don Capps, Isom Crawford, Kirby Collins
	             Al Slater, Scott Rhine, Mike Wisner, Ken Goss
	             Steve Landherr, Brad Smith, Mark Kelly, Dr. Alain CYR,
	             Randy Dunlap, Mark Montague, Dan Million, Gavin Brebner,
	             Jean-Marc Zucconi, Jeff Blomberg, Benny Halevy, Dave Boone,
	             Erik Habbinga, Kris Strecker, Walter Wong, Joshua Root,
	             Fabrice Bacchella, Zhenghua Xue, Qin Li, Darren Sawyer,
	             Vangel Bojaxhi, Ben England, Vikentsi Lapa.

	Run began: Sun Jul 23 09:46:21 2017

	Include fsync in write timing
	O_DIRECT feature enabled
	Auto Mode
	File size set to 102400 kB
	Record Size 4 kB
	Record Size 16 kB
	Record Size 512 kB
	Record Size 1024 kB
	Record Size 16384 kB
	Command line used: iozone -e -I -a -s 100M -r 4k -r 16k -r 512k -r 1024k -r 16384k -i 0 -i 1 -i 2
	Output is in kBytes/sec
	Time Resolution = 0.000001 seconds.
	Processor cache size set to 1024 kBytes.
	Processor cache line size set to 32 bytes.
	File stride size set to 17 * record size.
                                                              random    random     bkwd    record    stride                                    
              kB  reclen    write  rewrite    read    reread    read     write     read   rewrite      read   fwrite frewrite    fread  freread
          102400       4    11961    12917    13657    13407      975     1697                                                          
          102400      16    36688    46307    48070    48766     3995     6688                                                          
          102400     512    99193   170704   142096   144098    58088   105747                                                          
          102400    1024   128864   168531   138373   147353    76938   128194                                                          
          102400   16384   133294   145069   126976   129849   137700   141307                                                          

iozone test complete.

Another proof that generic NAS performance is not affected by the UAS feature significantly.

Snk · Post by **Snk** » Mon Aug 14, 2017 10:11 am

Guys, is there any possibility of creating a NAS this way, but based on Android? I searched Samba for Android but I was not successful in finding it.

mad_ady · Post by **mad_ady** » Mon Aug 14, 2017 2:37 pm

In theory you could either use volkspc if supported by xu4. Or put android + install a linux distro on top and it should allow you to access the disk and create shares

Snk · Post by **Snk** » Tue Sep 12, 2017 5:43 am

Hello everyone, reliving the topic here ... Could anyone tell me if this ORICO enclosure is UAS compliant?

https://pt.aliexpress.com/item/ORICO-95 ... e74590b491

DarkBahamut · Post by **DarkBahamut** » Tue Sep 12, 2017 9:50 pm

That listing and their official website are a bit barren on specs, but this Amazon listing for the same device is more helpful. Chipset is listed as a JMS 56x (Likely 561) and UAS is supported.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/ORICO-9528U3-B ... B072VC5NY8

Snk · Post by **Snk** » Tue Sep 12, 2017 10:29 pm

DarkBahamut wrote:That listing and their official website are a bit barren on specs, but this Amazon listing for the same device is more helpful. Chipset is listed as a JMS 56x (Likely 561) and UAS is supported.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/ORICO-9528U3-B ... B072VC5NY8

Hello Friend! Thanks for the answer!
I'll make the request then to mount a decent NAS. I think it will be worth the investment.

Earth Eater · Post by **Earth Eater** » Thu Sep 14, 2017 3:23 am

Are you running Linux as OS? And eMMC I assume, how much GB?

Post by **odroid** » Fri Sep 15, 2017 8:06 am

Ubuntu, Debian or OMV Linux OS can run.
8GB eMMC or SD card is enough for NAS application.

Earth Eater · Post by **Earth Eater** » Fri Sep 15, 2017 11:15 pm

odroid wrote:Ubuntu, Debian or OMV Linux OS can run.
8GB eMMC or SD card is enough for NAS application.

ok thank you!

Sharp · Post by **Sharp** » Sat Mar 24, 2018 1:08 am

Hello, my contribution with a 4.14 Kernel (ubuntu-16.04.3-4.14-minimal-odroid-xu4-20171213.img):

It's a "from scratch" server, hard drives are in an old pc case's HDD module with a 10 cm fan. I changed XU4 cpu headsink and fan because that I found the old one too noisy.

The temps of XU4 cores (80 C with old headsink/fan and 3.10 Kernel):

Share speed from XU4 to a Windows client:

Share speed from Windows client to Xu4:

Very good stuff for a very low price.

Post by **odroid** » Sat Mar 24, 2018 9:13 am

Great project. I love the "BobiBox" design.

How did you connect two 3.5" HDDs to XU4?

Sharp · Post by **Sharp** » Sat Mar 24, 2018 9:09 pm

odroid wrote:Great project. I love the "BobiBox" design.

How did you connect two 3.5" HDDs to XU4?

Hi odroid, yes that's a lumberman's design

,

The 3.5" HDDs are connected with USB to Sata adapters:

https://www.amazon.fr/gp/product/B00N4J ... UTF8&psc=1

That's not a very good choice becouse HDDs have to be self powered :s, but that works great !

Post by **odroid** » Sun Mar 25, 2018 12:18 pm

Thank you for the link and it looks okay since 3.5" HDD can't be a self-powered device.
Can you tell me which chipset inside?
"lsusb" output might give us the information.

rooted · Post by **rooted** » Sun Mar 25, 2018 12:29 pm

It's ASMedia ASM1153E based, here it's benchmarked

https://www.anandtech.com/show/10779/in ... ges-review

Sharp · Post by **Sharp** » Mon Mar 26, 2018 2:26 am

No prob Odroid, here the lsusb command return about:

Code: Select all

Bus 004 Device 004: ID 174c:55aa ASMedia Technology Inc. ASM1051E SATA 6Gb/s bridge, ASM1053E SATA 6Gb/s bridge, ASM1153 SATA 3Gb/s bridge

I use since 2015 and no prob.

Edit: did'nt saw rooted had already aswered :s

Post by **odroid** » Mon Mar 26, 2018 9:12 am

Okay!

ciciban · Post by **ciciban** » Sat Jun 02, 2018 1:03 pm

Sharp wrote:
It's a "from scratch" server, hard drives are in an old pc case's HDD module with a 10 cm fan. I changed XU4 cpu headsink and fan because that I found the old one too noisy.

Good stuff @Sharp, would had been great if you had couple of more photos taken showing details of the connections. I have one question, how do you power the HDD's and the fan?

Snk · Post by **Snk** » Tue Jun 26, 2018 10:00 pm

Hello, after updating to Ubuntu 18.04 I can no longer reconfigure my samba to use the external HD
Would anyone know to tell me if anything has changed about the way of data sharing on the network in Ubuntu 18.04?

mad_ady · Post by **mad_ady** » Tue Jun 26, 2018 10:09 pm

I too have migrated to 18.04 from 16.04 and samba worked without issues. What does samba say when starting? Does it even start?

Snk · Post by **Snk** » Tue Jul 03, 2018 12:01 am

Hello good afternoon
Could anyone help me how to perform sharing via samba?
After migrating to 18.04 I can no longer use samba, along with the external hard drive, following this tutorial: https://roboott.wordpress.com/2015/03/2 ... tem-samba- and-a-hd-external /
When I restart the card, I lose the connection and no longer start the system.
Thank you!

mad_ady · Post by **mad_ady** » Tue Jul 03, 2018 3:04 am

Here is my smb.conf: http://paste.ubuntu.com/p/CtxmJdN8kR/
I couldn't read the link you posted. But hardkernel has useful examples on the wiki.

Snk · Post by **Snk** » Wed Jul 04, 2018 11:48 am

I have not yet been able to configure the connection in SAMBA.
When mounting the folder, I can not connect to the XU4

mad_ady · Post by **mad_ady** » Wed Jul 04, 2018 2:03 pm

Are you mounting it via fstab? Show us your /etc/fstab and sudo blkid. I recommend you use autofs instead: https://magazine.odroid.com/article/set ... rpose-nas/

Snk · Post by **Snk** » Sat Jul 07, 2018 1:07 am

Is there any incompatibility with samba and Ubuntu 18.04
The same tutorial I used in version 16.04 and the same files, are not working.
Problem still occurs without resolution
I already had to reinstall the system at least 10 times, because of the loss of connection to the putty.
The way to do this is to continue using version 16.04 until you have a solution.

mad_ady · Post by **mad_ady** » Sat Jul 07, 2018 3:10 am

I'm using samba with the configuration above on 18.04 (I upgraded from 16.04) with no issues. You first need to sort out the mount issue and see what causes the disconnects

Snk · Post by **Snk** » Sat Jul 07, 2018 3:19 am

mad_ady wrote:I'm using samba with the configuration above on 18.04 (I upgraded from 16.04) with no issues. You first need to sort out the mount issue and see what causes the disconnects

The problem also occurs after restarting the card.
A new user is created on the system and I can not connect via putty

mad_ady · Post by **mad_ady** » Sat Jul 07, 2018 3:53 am

Have you set a password for the user? Can you log in via keyboard/screen? If yes you should tail -f /var/log/auth.log to debug it further

Snk · Post by **Snk** » Sat Jul 07, 2018 4:44 am

mad_ady wrote:Have you set a password for the user? Can you log in via keyboard/screen? If yes you should tail -f /var/log/auth.log to debug it further

Even with samba installed, the card does not appear on the network.

Snk · Post by **Snk** » Sat Jul 07, 2018 4:46 am

Is there any way to upgrade from 16.04 to 18.04 without having to install the image from scratch?

mad_ady · Post by **mad_ady** » Sat Jul 07, 2018 1:50 pm

If you're on xu4, yes. do-release-upgrade -d if I remember correctly. Do a backup before just in case

Snk · Post by **Snk** » Tue Jul 10, 2018 12:40 am

mad_ady wrote:If you're on xu4, yes. do-release-upgrade -d if I remember correctly. Do a backup before just in case

Now the new is that, I install SAMBA, but the card does not appear on the network ... It's as if the samba was not installed.
Every time I restart the board, it takes a new IP address.
I'm not understanding this, because in 16.04 even restarting it always stayed on the same IP.

rooted · Post by **rooted** » Tue Jul 10, 2018 1:32 am

Is your MAC address changing with each boot?

Snk · Post by **Snk** » Mon Jul 16, 2018 3:04 am

rooted wrote:Is your MAC address changing with each boot?

Actually, every time I reboot the card, the MAC address changes ... Is it the card that is faulty? I remember that in 16.04 it was not so.

rooted · Post by **rooted** » Mon Jul 16, 2018 4:54 am

Snk wrote:
rooted wrote:Is your MAC address changing with each boot?
Actually, every time I reboot the card, the MAC address changes ... Is it the card that is faulty? I remember that in 16.04 it was not so.

I'm not sure how to disable this "feature" but it's why your IP address is changing when you reboot.

You could set a static IP address on the odroid device, this is what I had to do.