2d ago

Need suggestions for setting up backups between a local and remote server

Hi everyone! I am relatively new to self hosting and I am in the process of repurposing an old desktop computer as an offsite/remote server that I will have at a friends house.

My setup:

Local: RPi 4 running openmediavault
Remote: HP EliteDesk SFF running TrueNAS SCALE

My plan was to connect the machines using tailscale and use the borg plugin in openmediavault to create a remote server repo and save deduplicating and encrypted backups from the local server to the remote server. However, it seems that in order to do that I need a borg plugin installed on the remote server for which there doesn't seem to be a truenas app for. I know I could probably install it on the truenas server, but from what I have read, a truenas update could wipe the install and configuration.

Thus, I would appreciate any suggestions on making the above possible, or alternative setups that would help me achieve what I am looking for. My requirements are:

Openmediavault on the local server
Encrypted backups
Machines connected via VPN (tailscale was just so easy so I would prefer to continue using that, but I can be convinced otherwise)

9 comments

The next TrueNAS Scale can do LXC containers using Incus. It's similar to a VM, but more lightweight. You can create a container for any Linux distro and install Borg on that. With previous versions, I googled and found some instructions to run Borg in a container with SSH, or you could use a VM.
Borg also supports dummy SSH targets, that TrueNAS can provide. Apparently, it's lower performance-
Why the choice of TrueNAS Scale? For just a Borg target, you could run any Linux distribution.
- Thanks, I like the idea of running it in a container, I'll have to look into that.
  That is a good question, haha. I wanted to try something other than openmediavault that had a GUI, was designed for NAS, and protects against disk failure (specifically with raidz). However, I think openmediavault actually supports zfs now which might be easier given that I am limited to openmediavault on my local Rpi 4 server.
  
  I was going to mention ZFS, but I suspect Raspberries are too weak for ZFS?
  If you can use ZFS in both sides, send/receive is the bomb. (I use it for my backups.) However, I'm not sure how well encryption would work for your purpose. IIRC, last time I looked at it, if you wanted an encrypted replica, the source dataset should be encrypted, which did not make me happy.
  I'd love to work on making NASes "great" for non-technical people. I feel it's key. Sending encrypted backups through peers is one of my personal obsessions. It should be possible for people to buy two NAS, then set up encrypted backups over the Internet with a simple procedure. I wish TrueNAS Scale enabled that- right now it's the closest thing that exists, I think.

9 comments