industrialarts

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Everything posted by industrialarts

  1. Thanks - knowing that I should be able to boot to a functioning version of UNRAID without the drives makes it a little easier - and less stressful - to experiment until I get a working setup. Will post with solution when it's up. Thanks again, Mark Springer
  2. I have not tried it yet with the flash drive that boots - I'm a little paranoid to experiment with the only solution that continues to work. So I have several other drives that I have tried to get it to boot with a copy of the files that exist on the working drive. Only one flash drive starts to boot and errors with "can't find kernel image: linux. (bzimage is in the root, so IHNI) So I want to continue to test with the new drive using the 4.7 files. Would it just be a matter of copying the files you indicate AND copying over the old config directory as well? Would that give me a 4.7 version with my old info on the new drive? BTW, I am not sure that the new flash drive will work. I think the other drives didn't work because they are larger than 1G. Also, I don't like powering my hard drives up and down like this - can I disconnect them until I get things stable? Once again, thank for any and all help. Mark Springer
  3. Sorry if this is the wrong forum, but here are my questions with regard to my upgrade problems. Eventually want to be running current release and PRO to add drives. QUESTION # 1 - 4.7 has files that 4.3 doesn't but upgrade says only to copy bzimage, bzroot and memtest from 4.7. I have seen posts that suggest 4.3 needs a new syslinux.exe, which isn't in my 4.3 directory nor is a file named menu.c32 Here was the error I got when I upgraded: VFS: Cannot open root device"(NULL)" or unknown block (8,1) Please append a correct "roor"= "boot" option ; here are the available partitions: 0000495104 sda driver:sd 0004494576 sda Kernel Panic - not Syncing: VFS: Unable to mount root fs on unknown - block (8,1) pid: 1, comm: swapper : Not tainted 2.6.32- unRaid #8 The searches I did on the forum suggested that a newer version of syslinux.exe may fix the problem, thus my question. I have had no problem reloading the files that I had copied before I started and have been able to get back to a functioning 4.3 version. QUESTION #2 It's an old motherboard and so I had to format the drive as a USB-ZIP which has functioned great for years. However, I now want to upgrade to the PRO version to add drives. Can I run the PRO from a drive formatted as USB-ZIP? There is a GUID number on the device page for the flash. Not a Linux genius in the least, so I apologize if these are not very smart questions. Attached is a copy of the syslinux.cfg on the unRaid server Thanks in advance, Mark Springer industrial arts syslinux.cfg
  4. I understand your point, but what my concern is - in the event that both a data drive AND the parity drive were damaged, you would stand to lose more data with larger drives. If a power supply were to fail or just have a long enough period of bad line voltage, then this could be more than just a theoretical concern. And I get the feeling that a lot of the UNRAID users out there are not conditioning the AC line voltage for their server, once again opening up the possibility of multiple drive errors. It would be great if there were a way to back up the parity drive (this from the Department of Redundancy Department) industrialarts
  5. I was thinking about this from a different perspective today. As appealing as it is to add the largest drives possible, you also stand to loose the biggest amount of data (in the event that the parity drive fails when a data drive fails, like from system failure or even a power drop out). So might it be better to add something smaller as you add drives? I realize there are several factors involved with adding drives, but when I upgrade my system, I might not purchase anything larger than 400G (my parity drive is 500G). And then I would never have to think about the parity drive. Just a thought industrialarts
  6. I have a drive I would like to add to the array that has data on. However, the data on that drive is what I want on the server (it has music files). Is there a way to put that drive in the array and keep the data? My configuration will be 500G for parity, 500G storage and then the 320G drive that currently has the music files. It seems a little redundant to have to copy the files to the drive and then put that drive in place. Thanks industrialarts
  7. Thanks, but I still am not sure just how drive space is calculated. For example, if I have 3 500G drives, does that make 1T of storage? industrialarts
  8. I finally got UNRAID up and running to test. I had two 40G hard drives to play with. When I look at the properties in Windows explorer for the new drive (Tower/disk1) I have mapped, it shows the total space to be 40G. Huh? I expected to have the 80g minus the space for parity. I can find no info in the forums or documentation in reference to this. Could someone please explain how this works? Thanks industrialarts
  9. My hardware will only boot from a fllash drive as a USB-ZIP drive; I got my first clue when the flash drive would only show "boot error" when I selected USB-ZIP as the boot device in BIOS. See here for further information - http://syslinux.zytor.com/usbkey.php I found the following site that gives excellent instructions on how to set up the geometry of my flash to mimic a ZIP drive (thanks to Joe L for the tip). First you will need to create a live Knoppix disc (I used Knoppix because it has the MKDISKIMAGE utility as part of it's release). If this is something you are not familiar or comfortable with, proceed at your own risk. When you get Knoppix up and running, then go to this site for setup instructions (preferably on a different computer to make it easier to reference). You will need internet access on the Knoppix computer as well. http://www.knoppix.net/wiki/Bootable_USB_Key Follow all the instructions carefully - except you should skip these steps; they are for loading Knoppix onto the flash. cp -av /cdrom/boot/isolinux/* . mv isolinux.cfg syslinux.cfg rm -f isolinux.bin and cp -av /cdrom/* . rm -rf ./boot While still in Knoppix, open the Iceweasel browser, navigate to the Lime Technology site and download the latest version of UNRAID to the desktop. Extract it with ARK to the flash drive. Now take the flash and attach it to your Windows computer. Find the drive in explorer; right click, select properties and rename it to UNRAID. DO NOT FORMAT - just change the name. Attach the flash drive back on the UNRAID computer, reset the bios to boot from USB-ZIP and see what happens. Good luck - I would be glad to answer any questions, but I am a total newbie to this stuff and really don't know much. industrialarts
  10. Joe Nope, that doesn't work. And if I do it via format, then the machine will no longer boot from the flash. I need to understand how to use mlabel in Mtools. There is a flag -v that I don't understand. I take that back..... Woo- hoooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo! I'm in! industrialarts
  11. I was able to get my old computer to boot from the flash drive by downloading a live version of Knoppix and using this method (http://www.knoppix.net/wiki/Bootable_USB_Key). However, I am new to linux and don't know how to change tie name of the volume to UNRAID. I have not been able to fiigure out if I need to make a volume group or just try to rename the volume or what. Can anyone help? BTW, this was a great introduction to linux Thanks industrialarts NOTE: if you try this, skip these steps cp -av /cdrom/boot/isolinux/* . mv isolinux.cfg syslinux.cfg rm -f isolinux.bin & cp -av /cdrom/* . rm -rf ./boot
  12. Joe I tried to reformat the flash drive per your instructions as well as trying this method (http://www.cepros.com/linux/usb_flash_boot.html). I also reviewed this site (http://syslinux.zytor.com/usbkey.php) and tried to make the diskimage but the mkdiskimage command appears not to be on the live linux I have been using ( I downloaded SLAX but have been working from the command line, not the GUI). I even tried using the parameters you last posted. None of it seems to make the computer think the flash is a zip drive. I think I understand the concept, but do you see anything that might help. The only info I can give is the flash drive is a generic 512M drive. I got it to boot UNRAID on another computer, and I can see it on my laptop when I plug it and can format it from WinXP. The most that has happened so far is that the boot from the USB-ZIP drive says "remove disks orother media. press any key to restarrt" as opposed to "boot error". Thanks industrialarts
  13. Joe I did find some live linux CDRoms and now I have to spend a little more time looking, due to the various versions available. Building a Linux machine was a project down the road, but it seems to have placed itself in my path now. I might as try to pick a release that I will be able to use as a basis for the actual linux machine. Regarding reformatting the flash drive - if I need to reformat it back to a flash drive, can you tell me what the parameters are? Thanks for your help, industrialarts
  14. I agree with Joe L. If the free version was available to boot from something other than the flash drive so I could test UNRAID on the system I have. When the time came for me to upgrade I would gladly spend the extra money and invest in a system that was hardware dependent. Unfortunately, all I have so far is a system that I have spent some time on that still doesn't work - that makes it kind of a science project. Which is OK - UNRAID looks like a very cool product and if my litlle bit of "R & D" helps in any way, that's great. I just wish I could get UNRAID up and running for a test; I would be glad to support it by buying the upgraded software versions later or by donating money for the software that runs on the system I have. That being said, I will invest a little more time to see if I can get it running on the hardware I have available; I really want to use UNRAID for it's feature set. If not, then I will probably "move along" and support FreeNAS, which I got up and running fairly easily on the computer I have available. Too bad I wasn't as lucky as Bill that my old hardware didn't run UNRAID right out of the gate. industrial arts
  15. I think I will try the ZIP drive/ linux boot CD idea. Do I need to have linux loaded on the machine or will I be able to access the linux functions you mention from the boot disk? ( I have no linux experience - yet ) I'll let you know how it goes. Thanks to all.
  16. I might try to flash the BIOS - but since the options for booting from the USB are in the BIOS menu already, shouldn't that mean it has support for it? I've never flashed BIOS successfully before, so instead of taking the chance, I might forgo UNRaid for a while and go with FreeNAS (which I've already tested on this computer). UNLESS - Is there some way to boot from a CDROM? Thanks again.
  17. i have tried all of your suggestions. The only difference that occurs is when I disable all the other boot options and make the first boot drive the USB-HDD, it stops at "Verifying DMI Pool Data" and gives me a bllinking cursor. If I set the second boot option to USB-ZIP, I still get BOOT ERROR. There is no other boot options page on this computer. I have tried all the various USB configurations for boot options and keyboard/mouse options. I have managed to get the software to load on two other computers I have here (with other network problems ensuing, but one thing at a time). However, this is the only computer I have available to be the server. The motherboard is a Gigabyte GA-81DML (http://www.gigabyte.eu/Products/Motherboard/Products_Spec.aspx?ProductID=1346) and the bios is Award 6.00PG (1984-2001?) Pentium 4 processor. Thanks for your help.
  18. Nope, but I can access boot options from the bios setup.
  19. I cannot get the computer to boot from the flash drive. I have tried all the various choices for the first boot drive (USB-HDD, USB-ZIP, USB-FDD, USB_CDROM) and no luck. I have tried to format the flash drive using the various HP tools that I have been able to find as well. I have not been able to determine the motherboard manufacturer and the flash drive is generic. I am going to try a suggested brand of flash and also try to configure it to boot linux, if all else fails. I really want to use unRaid, so any suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thanks. industrialarts