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... I decided to do some housekeeping, and clear old crap off my NAS.
It's a 16TB Seagate BlackArmor (4 by 4TB spinners) set as RAID5, so I get a total of 11TB of storage - and I'm a data-rat, I keep everything.
But ... it was under 10% free, so the time had come. And with trepidation I told my system to select 5.3TB of old data and ... gulp ... delete it permanently. This was not an easy "OK" button to press.
All gone, never to be restored. I feel emptier somehow ... 
And look at all that space! My explorer window has echoes now.
"I have no idea what I did, but I'm taking full credit for it." - ThisOldTony
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I have a few Terabyte of files I've hoarded that I know I will most probably never look at again.
But do you think I can make myself delete them? Nooooo! 
Instead I'm getting ready to buy two 10 Tb disks to replace my 5 x 3 Tb just to prolong the suffering and lighten the wallet. 
Anything that is unrelated to elephants is irrelephant
Anonymous
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The problem with quotes on the internet is that you can never tell if they're genuine
Winston Churchill, 1944
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Never argue with a fool. Onlookers may not be able to tell the difference.
Mark Twain
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Some of it I imported from the previous 4TB NAS when I upgraded between 7 and 10 years ago, and some of that Came from the one before that (1TB)!
It was a wrench to press "OK", but I feel better for it. Honest.
The problem with 2 * 10TB is that you can't run RAID5, so a disk failure will lose you data.
I had a disk fail on my old 4 * 1TB NAS and it was no drama - new disk, insert, and it automatically regenerated the content. I could use the NAS the whole time, no data down time.
If one goes on a 2 disk system ... ouch.
"I have no idea what I did, but I'm taking full credit for it." - ThisOldTony
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OriginalGriff wrote: you can't run RAID5, so a disk failure will lose you data.
That's ok, it's the only way I can gid rid of all the old crap...
I don't use RAID anyway. The 5 x 3 Tb I've got are all single disks. I normally upgrade them before it gets to be a problem. I know it's not the best solution, but I don't store any important backups on them anyway.
Anything that is unrelated to elephants is irrelephant
Anonymous
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The problem with quotes on the internet is that you can never tell if they're genuine
Winston Churchill, 1944
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Never argue with a fool. Onlookers may not be able to tell the difference.
Mark Twain
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Hand back your datarat badge, sir - you're not a real one!
"I have no idea what I did, but I'm taking full credit for it." - ThisOldTony
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OriginalGriff wrote: so a disk failure will lose you data.
Mmmhh... I have 2x4Tb, and Raid 1, so 4Tb storage. If one disk fail, the other has a copy of the data.
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I figured if I went through comments, I'd see someone else who does it that way.
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If you do regular (that is, at least daily) incremental backups, you could rather keep one of the two disks offsite, e.g. at your office. After each work session, you copy updated files to a USB stick, and the next day at the office, you flush the stick onto the second disk.
There is a risk of your home disk crashing between your file editing and your incremental backup. But you gain the extra security of having an offsite copy. The offsite copy would usually be unplugged when you are not flushing files from the USB stick onto it, so no malware (e.g. ransomware) can attack the files. The disk is usually unplugged from the power supply when not in use, so it won't be affected by voltage spikes or other irregularities that could affect the drive mechanically or electronically. If I make a grave mistake, overwriting or erasing the wrong files, one copy is still intact in the offsite copy and can be recovered.
While RAID 1 is simple and convenient, it doesn't provide the protection that I want.
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Yep. Backups should be a separate system from "regular data", even if your NAS is RAID. No backups can still leave you with no data if (for example) you are burgled.
And the number of people who consider GitHub to be a backup system is growing ...
"I have no idea what I did, but I'm taking full credit for it." - ThisOldTony
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It's a far far better thing we do...
I'm getting to that point also. I've got a single 8TB disk of which 3TB is set up for some almost 30K photos and what with backups and VMs I'm pushing the limit.
I keep off computer backups on a 1TB Passport for System and a 4TB Passport for Photos and Projects but I'm pushing them too!
So the time is not far off when I'll have to bite, not the same bullet, that would not be practicing physical distancing but certainly a clean well sanitized bullet.
I'm hiding from exercise...I'm in the fitness protection program.
JaxCoder.com
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Ha, where I work they think a 500 GB SSD must be enough, I thought I was running out of space last week but after running the Spacesniffer tool it turned out that I still had some old Hyper-V images left. One of them about 100 GB in size 
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Grief! I have 2TB in my PC alone ...
"I have no idea what I did, but I'm taking full credit for it." - ThisOldTony
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OriginalGriff wrote: I'm a data-rat, I keep everything
Yeah same here
OriginalGriff wrote: delete it permanently. This was not an easy "OK" button to press.
I avoid this by buying a new bigger nas 
Currently have 2 nas systems for a total off about 25TB off storage I think
Only about 30% full at the moment
So that should last me a couple years I think
Everytime I try to delete stuff off it there is that voice in my head going "you know if you delete this you'll need it tomorrow..."
Tom
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I was bloody tempted, but ... I'd like my next NAS to be two things:
1) Significantly bigger than my existing - maybe 4 times the size? Which means 64TB.
2) SSD rather than spinner.
At the current prices, that's going to be the thick end of £2,000 ~ £3,000
And that's just way, way out of my price bracket at the moment!
"I have no idea what I did, but I'm taking full credit for it." - ThisOldTony
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my new nas is 4 off these:
bol.com | WD Red Pro HDD 8TB WD8003FFBX[^]
they are set up with synology's raid system (can't rmemeber the name anymore) so they give around 25tb
still have the old nas but that's "only" a 8tb total I think. Now that I do the math I seem to have more space than I thought
SSD's was just gonna be way to expensive for me
Tom
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But can you access it all?
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Yes. 
"I have no idea what I did, but I'm taking full credit for it." - ThisOldTony
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I don't see myself deleting 5TB worth of data all at once, unless I experience some sort of temporary insanity moment (or whatever it's called, that gets violent offenders off the hook).
What's your typical growth rate? What do you need the newly freed space for?
So far my backup set size is growing slowly enough to match the evolution of single-disk capacity. I currently have 10TB drives - the live one, an offline backup sitting next to it, and an off-site backup. I'd rather be able to keep a backup on a single drive than have a RAID so large that I can't back it up.
The problem (as I see it) with RAID setups is that you can't back them up onto another set of drives, and then bring those drives on another system and "just start using it"...unless the RAID hardware is absolutely identical...? And I've had a RAID controller die on me...with perfectly functional drives...but I couldn't use them with another controller in another box.
As for deleting old stuff...typically the older the bits, the smaller the set...meaning, old programs tend to be a lot smaller than newer ones...same with old pictures (lower resolution) and video files (lower bit rate). So when compared to the total disk capacity, I find it's never worth my time to try to decide what old material to get rid of since it represents such a small percentage of it. It'd be easier to delete the newer stuff, but typically if it's been added to the backup set, it's because I want to hang on to it...end result: I'm a hoarder.
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Good luck with that seagate. I've had nothing but bad experiences with that brand.
Real programmers use butterflies
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I've had it for what 7 or 10 years?
And not a moment's problem - it just works.
"I have no idea what I did, but I'm taking full credit for it." - ThisOldTony
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I'm genuinely glad to hear it. I have two with bad controller boards sitting on a shelf for when I get a chance to have at them and get the data off them.
Real programmers use butterflies
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Check your PSU - I've had occasions when HDDs suffer from poor PSU design, and it can fry the controllers if you get a spike on the mains. Had two identical HP desktops, with different make HDDs and they both died shortly after a thunderstorm.
"I have no idea what I did, but I'm taking full credit for it." - ThisOldTony
AntiTwitter: @DalekDave is now a follower!
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Mine survived a thunderstorm which fried the clock (though installing linux "fixed" it even after reinstalling windows later)
I can't remember if the drives were in it, but it had a high end gaming PSU with fancy capacitors.
Real programmers use butterflies
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There is an old saying, "On a clear disk you can seek forever".
An updated version says that "On a full 8 TByte disk, you can search forever". You can end up with an unbelievably large number of files on that large disks! Searching those directories can be inconveniently slow, and if you need to search files for contents, you might as well do some other task while you wait for the results.
I am in the lucky situation that most of my 26 TBytes is filled with huge video files, so the file count / directory size is moderate. And the files are not subject to contents searching. Actually, my 2 TByte text archive disk takes a lot more time to search than my 8 TByte video/sound disks, because the file count is five times higher.
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My age is showing -
I started on 5 1/4 floppys, 'fixed' to use both sides. Then I bought a 5MB 14 inch platter drive from a surplused PDP-11 (and wrote all the Z80 code to run it with CP/M) - when I got down to about 250K I got a 20MB PC drive - got down to about 500K I got nervouse and bought something larger
I now have 5TB of SSD and a WD 16TB NAS with RAID5 and about 10TB Free. I am starting to worry about the next iteration up.
My take away: you always need 10% more than what you have.
A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, navigate a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects! - Lazarus Long
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