I have recently become interested in mini PCs, but one thing that is stopping me is a feeling that bit rot could cause me to lose data.
Is bit rot something to worry about when storing data for services such as Git, or Samba. I have another PC right now that is setup with btrfs raid1 and backups locally and to the cloud, however was thinking about downsizing for the benefit of size and power usage.
I know many people use the mini PCs such as ThinkCentres, Optiplex, EliteDesks and others, I am curious if I should be worried about losing data due to bit rot, or is bit rot a really rare occurrence?
Let’s say I have backups with a year of retention, wouldn’t it be possible that the data becomes corrupt and that it isn’t noticed until after a year? for example archived data that I don’t look at often but might need in the future.
honestly I don’t think it’s really a significant issue but if you’re worried just use a fs that can repair itself like zfs (not sure if btrfs can do that too but it might)
And if you’re really concerned about data integrity then you should also ensure that your server has ECC RAM.
(not sure if btrfs can do that too but it might)
It can. And they’ll both alert you of problems if you do regular scrubs, which might be enough even with non-raid installs, if you have secondary backups.
How life-or-death critical would it be if you lost one of those files?
Resilient filesystems/raid/multiple backup points should be more than enough.
Resilient filesystems/raid/multiple backup points should be more than enough.
A word of caution on relying on backups without the other types of error prevention you mention: If it takes you a while to notice that bitrot has ruined a file, then it may have already propagated through your backups. The only type of backups that would account for this is archival backups, such as on tape or quality bluray discs.
That is a very good question, it makes me think of better organization for my data. Data such as task lists, and daily notes aren’t necessarily very important, while family photos and documents would be more important.
Acronyms, initialisms, abbreviations, contractions, and other phrases which expand to something larger, that I’ve seen in this thread:
Fewer Letters More Letters NAS Network-Attached Storage RAID Redundant Array of Independent Disks for mass storage SSD Solid State Drive mass storage
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Wait, what’s wrong with issuing “ZFS Scan” every 3 to 6 months or so? If it detects bitrot, it immediately fixes it. As long as the bitrot wasn’t too much, most of your data should be fixed.
If you’re playing with multiple computers, “choosing” one to be a NAS and being extremely careful with its data that its storing makes sense. Regularly scanning all files and attempting repairs (which is just a few clicks with most NAS software) is incredibly easy, and probably could be automated.
I guess, my primary concern was if I didn’t have the computer with ZFS(in my case btrfs but similar thing). Maybe it is for the best that I keep the raid setup to scrub and make sure important data is safe, and use the smaller single disk mini PC for services and data that isn’t as important.
Does the smart thing in omv take care of this? Anyone know? Obviously I’m a novice haha.
Nightly automated runs of the chkbit script is the only thing that alerted me to the fact that either the SSD or storage controller in my Mac Mini had issues and was corrupting data. I was very thankful to have already had the automation in place for that exact scenario.
It theoretically shouldn’t be necessary for filesystems that have built-in checksumming.
