I'm considering switching my backup server to be one of:
Fedora SilverBlue
Debian
Some other well-supported LTS distro
Using one of
btrfs raid5
btrfs single on top of a LVM raid array
ZFS again, but this time only for non-root
Which should I do? And if I go with btrfs raid5, will I lose data?
It does have a UPS battery in the rack with it. I think it can provide ~40 minutes of power, depending on load?
Assuming an annual failure rate of 1%; that btrfs raid5 means you can recover from 1 failure; that there aren't independent other risks (dubious, websearch tells me btrfs raid5 is bad for unclear reasons); and that you probably have less than 40 drives
Then the math says this should be <8%, though I won't push it that far for model risk reasons. I don't think I can contribute much re what specific setup will minimize risk of data loss.
Personally, my next storage server will likely be debian+ZFS with NFS on top
@citrinitas I think regardless of setup, I will use a btrfs root. In my experience so far, trying to get ZFS working on root has just caused pain