Upgrade to 2,5Gb/s ethernet card

[doze5]

I want to upgrade my LAN from 1Gb/s on MSI B250M Mortar to 2,5Gb/s ethernet card (NIC). Will TP-Link TX201 work with TrueNAS SCALE 22.02.4 without any problems?

 

[pmsan]

I have been using TrueNAS core for some years now, and have searched for a 2.5gb solution without luck for about a year. When scale has stable support for 2.5gb I will probably make the switch too.

I have no first hand experience with scale, but I am a long time user of Linux, and will try my best to help you.

The card you mention has a driver for Linux that can be downloaded. It says in the notes on the download page: "1. For Linux kernel up to 5.17."
As I understand it, scale now uses kernel 5.15 LTS. So the driver should work on a normal Linux install.

I do not know if it is easy/possible to install a driver on your own in TrueNAS scale.

If it is easy/possible, then you should be able to use this network card if you install the driver. You will almost certainly need to use the linux command line. Upload the driver to you NAS, be root, and install the driver.

For my own install, I will wait with switching to scale until I know for certain that there is a 2.5gb card that is supported by the kernel itself without any need for a separate installation of a driver. I see almost all AM5 motherboards now come with 2.5 as standard, so I think it is just a matter of time before we can enjoy more speed on our old cables.

If anyone know of a 2.5gb card with native support in the current kernel used in TrueNAS scale, please let us know!

 

[pmsan]

In a new thread on this forum I found a guy wanting to build with this card: https://www.qnap.com/en/product/qxg-2g1t-i225/specs/hardware
In the specifications it says that it is support in linux kernels 5.x
Also, it says explicitly that it will need the installation of a driver if it is to be used with windows server 2019.

This should indicate that this card is supported without any need for a driver installation. Since Truenas Scale is currently running the 5.15 kernel.

 

[doze5]

pmsan​

Thanks, that is interesting. But still, is here someone that have tested qxg-2g1t-i225 or any other 2,5Gb/s with TrueNAS Scale?

 

[danb35]

Really, the answer is "don't." If you need faster than 1 Gbit/sec, the next viable step up is 10 Gbit/sec with fiber, which is well-documented around here.

 

[doze5]

Only fiber I have is to my ONT :) Fiber at my home for LAN and Jellyfin media server is overkill. There is also power consumption and a price of switch and NICs. To be honest I was considering 10Gb/s on 6e cable, but I would preferred 2,5Gb/s - power consumption and old UTP can stay. Yeah, I am one of those pesky newbies using TrueNAS Scale that OGs complain about :)))

"2.5GbE is BETTER than 10GbE - Here's Why" - I know, that's youtube

2.5GbE is BETTER than 10GbE - Here's Why

This tutorial goes over why 2.5 GbE is probably way better for you than 10GbE#2.5GbE #10GbE #NAS #networkingHire Me! https://www.spacerex.co/hire-me/Support ...

www.youtube.com

 

[danb35]

Fiber at my home for LAN and Jellyfin media server is overkill.

But you need greater than gigabit speeds? If you have that need, how is fiber (or copper DACs) overkill?

The bottom line is that 2.5 GbE is a crap standard with almost exclusively crap hardware (even most of the Intel NICs/chips are trash). If you absolutely must use UTP, 10GBaseT is less crappy, but still a poor choice compared to 10 GbE via SFP+.

a price of switch and NICs.

Compared to the switch linked in the video, look at this one:

MikroTik CRS305 4-Port SFP+ 802.3at/af Switch L5 [CRS305-1G-4S+IN]

The MikroTik CRS305 is a compact yet very powerful switch, featuring four SFP+ ports, for up to 10 Gbit per port. The device has a 1 Gbit copper ethernet port for management access or regular traffic forwarding and two DC jacks for power redundancy. The device is a very sleek and compact...

www.balticnetworks.com

Fully managed, as opposed to the unmanaged switch he recommends. Four ports of 10 GbE + 1 GbE. Can be powered by PoE if desired. Usable CLI. US$33 cost delta. And good used NICs (Intel, Chelsio, Solarflare, all of which are well-supported in both CORE and SCALE) are widely (and inexpensively) available on the secondary market due to their extensive enterprise deployment. And there's an actual upgrade path to higher speeds, if and when that becomes desirable.

I have no idea who SpaceRex is or how much he knows (sure, he has lots of subscribers, but so does LTT, and he's well-known to be a blithering idiot), but his almost-exclusive focus on USB adapters already says his video isn't very relevant to this discussion.

 

[doze5]

danb35​

Thank you. That MikroTik CRS305 looks amazing. Only problem is SPF wire. The ends are "big" and I am not sure if I can put them through my "PVC pipes for wires" in walls - I don't know how you call them in English. Most definitely I will look into that SPF+ technology.

 

[danb35]

"PVC pipes for wires" in walls - I don't know how you call them in English

In US English, at least, they're called conduit--I'm not sure if the Queen's (King's?) English has a different term. Yes, SFP ends are bigger than unterminated Cat5/6/7. OTOH, even if you're using copper DACs, the diameter of those cables is typically smaller--and fiber is much smaller, about 2mm dia. vs. 10mm. And the LC connectors that typically terminate fiber aren't any larger than an RJ45.

That Mikrotik is a nice little switch, I was using two of them on my network for a while and they worked well. They're silent (though they do tend to run warm), the web GUI is adequate (if a bit archaic), and they support reasonable remote management (it's even possible to automate installing TLS certs on them, so you can keep an up-to-date Let's Encrypt cert there). They have quite a variety of others as well, if you happen to need different port configurations. I've since replaced them, along with the Unifi PoE switch and the Dell X1052, with a single Ruckus switch which gives more of everything--but it's noisy af, so you wouldn't want it in the house.

 

[pmsan]

To me it looks like 2.5gb is the new 1gb. I was looking for an AM5 motherboard for my new workstation last month, and all of them had 2.5. Also the new intel NUCs have 2.5. QNAP is all in on 2.5gb and they use Linux as their daily driver. So this is coming to Truenas scale as well.

With scale, truenas get all the drivers from the linux community, so I feel very confident that you can soon run a low end NAS with a stable enough 2.5 connection. Of course it is not as future proof, stable and fast as a 10gbe connection, but it will work just fine for hobby and home usage.

I upgraded to scale this weekend, and will probably go for a two port 2.5 ethernet card. I have maybe 100 meters of old ethernet cables around my house and my NAS is just a reused haswell motherboard from 2014, so it is not something I will spend a lot of money on. However I would like my NAS to keep up with my workstation.

I will probably check out the qnap card as it says it will work on debian linux with kernel 5.x, and as I understand it scale uses kernel 5.15. So it should just be plug and play. But first I must get my new home workstation up and running.

We have a saying "The best thing is the good thing's worst enemy" (translated from norwegian, and probably a bit lost in translation:). I think this is a good description for the relationship between 2.5gb and 10gb right now.

In a professional build with multiple clients, I would not choose 2.5gb on the NAS however.

 

[danb35]

Hey, knock yourself out. But don't say we didn't warn you.

 

[jgreco]