Software raid och mobo raid?

[stayhard]

hi!

I just set up my nas4free and was woundering if Im going to use the motherboards raid config or the nas4free software raid?
In bios i have setup sata mode=raid, should I change it back to ahci?

Im going to use 3-4x500gb disks and 1x2tb. I want the 3-4x500gb to use raid-5 and the 2tb without raid, if its possible? Or how should I set it up? ZFS on all disks and RAIDZ1 on 3-4x500gb and without RAID on 2tb? The raid is for music, personal files, pictures/photos etc etc, the 2tb for movies (stream to my other computers)

I also want help to setup the S.M.A.R.T. tests, like what check interval should I have, power mode, critical/informal/difference temp, long or short test, test once a week, day, month?

I appreciate all the help!

[ChriZathens]

Do not use hardware raid.
Whether you will use ufs or zfs depends on your system specs.
So more info will help others to help you better

[b0ssman]

also see the faq
http://wiki.nas4free.org/doku.php?id=faq:0144

[stayhard]

Do not use hardware raid.
Whether you will use ufs or zfs depends on your system specs.
So more info will help others to help you better

Spec:
I3 550 3.2ghz
4gb ram 1333mhz
OS USB 16gb with 4gb swap
250w power supply
HDD 4x500gb and 1x2tb

I will read the faq now

[ChriZathens]

ZFS without ECC RAM is not recommended
I suppose yours is not ECC, right?
Having said that, I don't use ECC on my main NAS, but my valuable data is on my second NAS which does have ECC (see my sig)
Your hardware easily supports ZFS, but to be sure I would go the UFS route (4 disks SoftRaid5 and your 2TB disk as a standalone UFS disk)

[stayhard]

No its not ECC, and if its the best I will go with UFS. And if Im right Im going to have 1,5tb in Raid-5 with 4x500gb? And if one is broken I can change the disk with no data loss? So totally 3,5tb.

Im also going to use a backup NAS, but its just a little box (Dlink DNS320), probally with 2x***gb Raid-1, to backup my personal files and photos.
Hmm 9.1tb storage...not bad