Software

This is a quick overview about what software I am using and why.

Operating system:

Ubuntu 20.04

I used openmediavault (omv) in the past, but the process of upgrading from one version to another seemed tedious and the fact that Debian (what omv is using) is missing required drivers for the network interfaces of my mainbaord made me look for an alternative OS. In the end I decided to go with Ubuntu because I have another server running it and have had mostly good experiences with it.

I wanted to use Ubuntu Server for a lightweight installation without needless bloat, but that was missing drivers for my mainboard too and I couldn't even boot via live USB, so I had to go with the Ubuntu Desktop version. After successfully installing the OS and setting up a SSH server, I deleted the Ubunutu desktop package and changed the system runlevel target to multi-user so that I can negate the negatives of having to install the Desktop version.

Drive management:

mergerfs

I used mergerfs on my old NAS and loved it, so I wanted to go with it again. A few reasons for that:

easy to setup and maintain
able to add/remove a disk of any size and format whenever I want
failure of one disk does not break everything (only the files on the failed drive are lost)
all individual drives are combined together into one pool, which the user only interacts with

More about how mergerfs works here.

Backup

snapraid

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Other

netdata: For monitoring my system performance/load/temperature/etc.
samba: For sharing directories with Windows and Linux systems
hddtemp: For monitoring the HDDs temperature
smartmontool: For monitoring the HDDs health with S.M.A.R.T.
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