FREENAS 7.2 and FREENAS 8.0

After swearing continuously for 3 days I thought I'd share my experience about FreeNAS 7.2 and 8.0. Saying this·...I have to add that FreeNAS wasn't actually build to be a NAS connected to AD.


FREENAS 8.0


Negative points:

* Don't support AD on WIN 2008, don't give you access to the logs as it did in 7.2 (Diagnostics)
* Is an absolute mission to get AD setup and working (if you lucky)
* Is still hung-up about NETBIOS as in version 7.2
* Shutdown button on website
* Everything including SSH, AD is disabled and need to be explicitly enabled via "Services"
* Pity its build on FreeBSD
* CIFS & Windows Shares now 2 different things
* Website layout a bit confusing at first
* Total revamp from 7.2 to 8.0
* No upgrade option AT ALL from 7.2 to 8.0
* Do not use ZFS when connecting to AD

Positive points
* Nice website layout
* You can enable console messages under Settings
* Support VLAN's
* Support Windows Shares, UNIX, CIFS
* Access website without the :80 port indicator
* System - Reporting is nice

AD Debug Logs
Connect via SSH
Run /usr/local/bin/freenas-debug -a
cat /var/tmp/freenas-debug.txt


/usr/local/bin/freenas-debug ?


Logs folders
Console Logs  /var/log/messages/console.log
Machine related logs /var/log/messages


When SSH'ing into the box make sure you've ticked "root" user login under the SSH settings.
When SSH'ing use root and the "Website password" to login.


FreeNAS 8.0

FREENAS 7.2


Positive points
* Access to allot of the system logs from website (fantastic!)
* Much more usable & stable than 8.0


Negative Points
* Require reboot after most changes


After the setup:
* Make a note of the disk setup before you close the window!
* Add the disk  & DO NOT FORMAT
* Add a mount point
* Add a share
* Join AD
* Reboot
* Map the share on your AD, add folders, remove the second Everyone user from the share (The Everyone user that don't have any rights)
* Make sure the share is browsable
* Access the website ie http:10.0.0.99:80




AD Setup
When setting up AD you HAVE To do the following:
* Realize NetBIOS is very important to FreeNAS as this is what it use to connect to AD & network
* Enable the following 
*** EA
*** Dos Attributes
* Add the Server host name as a user on AD
* don't play around with the "net ad join" command as this will mess up AD completely


FreeNAS 7.2