Howdy y’all. I’d like to improve network speeds between my nas (truenas scale) and 2 windows desktops. Current networking is 2.5g built into each motherboard. I have a pcie 8x slot available in each machine. Is there any reason I should not or can not put a Chelsio T580-LP-CR in each machine and connect them with direct attach cables? All runs are less than 10 meters. My thought is: nas port 2 to desktop A port 1, desktop A port 2 to desktop B port 1, desktop B port 2 to nas port 1.
Nas has five 8tb drives in raid z1, two 2tb nvme drives stripped, 32g of ram. I do some video editing, lots of multitrack audio work, and play Minecraft with my son. (I know this is stupid overkill for Minecraf) I also have plex running on the nas, but 1g Ethernet servers that to every device in the house just fine.
Is this a good way to improve connectivity? Is there a smarter way? Are there any complications I can expect?
Is your NAS capable of providing 4 GByte/s transfers? Five HDDs in a RaidZ1 would just scratch the limits of 10GbE in a sequential load with 10k SAS drives.
Maybe upgrading to only 10 GbE would be enough for starters. There you can still use cheap-ish RJ45 patch cables and switches are way more affordable than they used to which would get the complicated IP and routing setup out of the way.
And if you want to go the 40GbE way, I would still recommend to get a switch. For testing (especially if you already have those cards available) connecting to each other would work. And don’t use host names if you want to connect via the high speed connections.