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Network Attached Storage (NAS) for master distribution point

  • May 18, 2018
  • 5 replies
  • 38 views
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Looking to see if anyone has experience/knowledge setting up and using a NAS for a distribution point. I am new to this and am being asked (via our provisioning process) whether to set it up with NSF or CIFS protocol or both.

I am thinking NSF (or both just in case), but I figured I'd ask the community out there on what they are using regarding a NAS..

Thanks in advance!

5 replies

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  • jchurch
  • Valued Contributor
  • May 18, 2018

I would say it depends on your NAS hardware. I/O and spindle count is going to be the key here. this is going to be hammered on by every device in your network.

I had to set up something in a hurry at a temporary remote site. it was just a generic NAS adapter (almost looked homemade) a small board with power, Ethernet, and SATA jacks. it was a CIFS share and it worked fine with only one or two people pulling content at a time. once the whole site started pulling content it slowed to a crawl and the constant abuse killed the drive.

however, our master distribution point is also a CIFS share hosted off our NetApp SAN and that thing kicks ass 24/7 no matter how many people are hammering on it.

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  • benducklow
  • Author
  • Valued Contributor
  • May 18, 2018

Thanks @jchurch . I don't know the specs of the NAS, but I assume it would be a NetApp/enterprise-level device. Seeing you had used CIFS, I suppose I will lean towards that then myself, unless you or anyone else has anything to chime in on regarding NSF... Like I mentioned I can do "both" according to this form I have to fill out, but don't know the pros/cons of it all.. Jamf Support didn't seem to have much info/guidance on the subject either...

cdenesha
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  • cdenesha
  • Honored Contributor
  • May 23, 2018

I think you'll need CIFS so you can mount via SMB, which is how the Macs mount the DP.

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  • benducklow
  • Author
  • Valued Contributor
  • May 23, 2018

Thanks @cdenesha , I proceeded with a CIFS only NAS setup; so far it works with Jamf Admin and the download tests I have done! Now on to seeing how I can make this NAS my master DP and get it rysn'd/replicated out to all the other servers which will be a mix of macOS and Windows file shares...

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  • benducklow
  • Author
  • Valued Contributor
  • June 5, 2018

Another question related to this topic - Is there a script/application that one could use to replication between the NAS and macOS distribution point (assuming the NAS is the master DP). I currently am using a macOS share as the master DP and all the other DPs use a scripted rsync and shared key authentication method. Moving forward I would have a mix of Windows SMB shares, macOS shares and the NAS being the master (if possible).

I appreciate any thoughts and feedback and experience on this!

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