NAS file server for CBC/Biostats

fileserver.md

Network Attached Storage (NAS) for CBC/Biostats

I've priced NAS systems ranging from $1,000 to $7,500 and 12TB to 60TB of usable space.
The intended use of these systems ranges from home office to medium-sized businesses and
all of the systems can handle more concurrent users than we will have (200-1600).

My recommendation is to spend between $4,000 and $6,500 netting 30-48TB of space after accounting for RAID mirroring. These prices include the NAS system, 12 hard disks ranging from 6-8TB per disk, and minor accessories depending on the specific system. The two major choices are:

1. 12-bay NAS system:
   • ~$1350 - standard business class system with sufficient power for a file server (4-core CPU and 6 GB of RAM) Synology DS 2415+
   • ~$2500 - high performance NAS with additional protections from file corruption and more power for add-on services and scaling (expansion units are available that allow for 12-24 more drive bays). (4-core Xeon CPU and 16GB of ECC RAM) Synology DS3617xs
2. Hard drive size:
   • 6TB x 12 at $240 per drive ($2880)
   • 8TB x 12 at $330 per drive ($3960)
   • 10TB x 12 at $450 per drive ($5400)

The $2500 NAS is more than we need for storing files, but I do like the idea of error-correcting code memory (ECC RAM) and having plenty of spare power in a multi-user environment. For the hard drives, I'd recommend the 6 or 8 TB since they provide a better $/GB value than the 10GB. These drives can always be replaced with larger ones as larger drives become available and in-use ones fail.

Qnap and Synology are the two most common names in this price range.
Household storage brands like Western Digital are most common below $1000 and large PC/server brands like Dell and HP are most prevalent above $6,000. The Qnap and Synology offerings strike the right balance of advanced features and ease of setup/maintenance. I've settled on Synology due to an impression that their software and add-on package library are more modern and up to date, but either brand will work well.

On a side note, NAS systems larger than 4 disks include additional server features. Most of these we will not need, but others we may find useful:

• GitLab server
• Cloud backup via Google Cloud Storage (if we contract with Google).
• Docker host for hosting databases, Shiny apps, etc.

Synology add-on library

Also note, that the recommended hard drives for systems this size are professional/enterprise class drives. They are more expensive, but designed to handle the additional heat and vibration of a large NAS environment. They also have longer warranties and faster I/O specifications.

And finally, its recommended to have at least two spare drives on hand for when an active drive fails. One option is to initially only use 10 of the drives, save two for failures, and use the two remaining drive bays for caching frequently used data. This is what the (Optional) SSD cache drives are for. However only certain workloads benefit from cache drives, and our typical use-case of reading and writing large datasets would likely not. A hosted database or git server would likely benefit from the cache. There's a detailed white paper on use-cases for cache drives if we need more info to make a decision.

~$4,000 (useable space: 30-36TB)

• $1,339.00 - Synology DS2415+ NAS System
• $238 x 12 = $2856 - Western Digital Red Pro 6TB WD6002FFWX
• $42.00 - 4GB DDR3 1600mhz PC3-12800 Laptop RAM
• (Optional) $360 - 2x Samsung 850 Evo 500GB SSD for cache

Total $4237 -- $4597

+$1,080 for 40-48TB (8TB/drive)

~$6,000

• $2500 - Synology DS3617xs NAS System
• $238 x 12 = $2856 - Western Digital Red Pro 6TB WD6002FFWX
• (Optional) $360 - 2x Samsung 850 Evo 500GB SSD for cache

Total $5356 - $5716

+$1,080 for 40-48TB (8TB/drive)