SSD vs HDD?

[justinbest]

Hi all,

Building my first untangle box in a long, long time and I'm curious what the current status of the "SSD vs HDD" debate is for Untangle?

I'm trying to deploy the same hardware across several sites, so I care a little ore than usual about getting it right the first try. Most of my sites have around 10 users. One has around 20 users, but these are not all in at the same time. My goals are to enable additional "virus / spyware" filtering, as well as standardize my VPN remote access.

I've read that Untangle doesn't have TRIM support, but I'm wondering if this is outdated information? Also, I'm not certain I'll need SSD drives for such a small sites -- maybe better to put in 80GB desktop drives instead and save a little cash?

Thanks in advance for sharing any experience you might have.

[sky-knight]

Untangle does not have TRIM support, that comes along with a Debian 6 base OS, which Untangle is based on Debian 5.

You don't use SSD on Untangle if you want performance. The only reason I offer it is price. 32gb SSDs are a little cheaper than the 160gb rotating drive I use. Why not use the 80? Easy, returns are higher and price is the same.

At the moment personally I don't trust SSDs, I have three dead on my desk right now. Kingston, AData, and Crucial.

[hescominsoon]

rotating drives handle higher temps better than ssd's...might be the cause of your high failure rate in smaller appliances..

[sky-knight]

Actually, I had a very fascinating conversation with a tech at Crucial that introduces some interesting theories.

Needless to say, if this guy is right (and I think he is) the drive isn't actually "failing". Should these symptoms manifest on an Untangle server you still need to get off the SSD, but that isn't because the drive is defective, it's because it can't keep up.

[hescominsoon]

really? That's interesting. Of course 4k writes are the weakness of any storage system...i'm wondering if UT is doing a ton of these which cause paging issues for ssd's(which is the main reason TRIM is around)....that would be interesting to see if that's the theory..

[sky-knight]

Unfortunately, it's not in my best interest to elaborate further. I simply responded here to let the OP know that SSD technology doesn't have the "failure" rates that I originally indicated. And to admit that I've misdiagnosed many "failed" drives in the field because of some critical ignorance on my part. There's that i-word again, constant fight on that one.

Anyway, I'm still testing to figure out what is what, but if what I think "is" actually "is", then there you have it!

[sky-knight]

What "is", actually "is".

Actual SSD failures in the last year? 2... both AData. All other SSD drives that didn't match those specific symptoms aren't actually bad, just stuck in a strange place. Support documents will be updated, phone calls will be made.

[YeOldeStonecat]

What "is", actually "is".

Actual SSD failures in the last year? 2... both AData. All other SSD drives that didn't match those specific symptoms aren't actually bad, just stuck in a strange place. Support documents will be updated, phone calls will be made.

The "Transcend" brand you had installed in a few NG units we've had failed too...2x of them on us so far of that brand. Intel brands....like many other things Intel, are showing to be very reliable. Naturally they're pricier. Hence not the first choice of a lot of OEMs.

[sky-knight]

Those "Transcend" drives are utilizing high impact flash, they aren't consumer drives. They should be more capable, but you're still going to see a 1-2% failure rate. If you've had two fail, that's three total in a year confirmed dead. Which would be inline with those odds. Annoying that you got two of them, probably a bad run somewhere.

And yes, use the Intel drives if you can! The primary reason isn't quality so much (at least not anymore). But Intel produces software that will help you predict when a drive fails, it can show you the health of the internal memory and give you a time estimate.

The 32gb drives we use according to the math I did last week should have an average lifespan of 2-2.5 years. In an Untangle. That math is based on my traffic and logging levels here at Intouch, which are considerably more aggressive than normal installations. So given the Engineer's flub room, should be about right for live performance.

[MikeTrike]

I've deployed about 50+ Crucial M4's, I wont deploy anything without SSD's anymore. Unless storage requirements are high that is. For anything more than RAID1, like 5, 6 or 10. I'd opt for RAID friendly SSD's like the Corsair Performance Pro series. I'll be converting my Hyper-V boxes once they get some 512GB version out.

My last remaining Untangle box has a cheap 32GB Kingston. It has been up for over six months now without issue. It's actually an awesomr little NG25 unit.