JarDo

Wow. Great post. I don't know if Subsonic is for me or not, but I've needed something new to play with on my unRaid box for some time now. Thank you.

I don't believe so. Not at this time anyway. I believe that unRaid is missing 1 or more kernel modules needed to get Hamachi to run on Linux. See http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=477.0

Joe, You are welcome, but really, it is my way of thanking you. I'm trying to encourage the use of unMenu because it is such a useful mod. I can't imagine unRaid without it. (Well, I can, but unRaid would be much more complicated to manage and not near as much fun without unMenu. Yes, I think unRaid is fun. There I said it. I'm a geek.)

See attached for an iftop .conf file for the unMenu Package Manager.

See attached for an htop .conf file for the unMenu Package Manager.

TEST RESULTS: I don't think the 'stop array' button closes loop devices. When I tried to stop the array while an ISO was mounted the screen went blank with "e 0 " in the top left corner. Then when I went back into unmenu the ISO was still mounted.

This is very cool. My only difficulty with it is having to dig down into the file structure to unmount iso's prior to stopping the array. I tried to add a link to unmount iso's from the front page listing of mounted iso's by changing line 520 to: out_str = out_str loop_iso[a] "<a href=\"http://" MyHost ":" MyPort "/share_iso?dir=" loop_iso[a] "&unshare_iso=" loop_iso[a] "\"> UnShare ISO</a><br>" It only kinda works. When you click the link it throws the following error: "Sorry: Access to invalid-directory/ is not permitted." However, it does appear to unmount the iso. I admit... I don't know AWK syntax at all. It would be nice if the Array Management plugin could close all loop devices when the 'Stop Array' button were pressed. In my testing I accidently mounted "backup.iso.uibak". It mounted it as "backup.iso" but since that file doesn't really exist (notice the file extension) I am unable to unmount it!!

Oh, Boy!! I don't quite know what to think. I see the point to both of your positions. unRAID still continues to do for me exactly what I bought it for and all the additional features added since the time of my original purchase were not benefits that I was anticipating at the time I made my purchase. But since that time, my unRAID server has become a big part of my life. Of course I've installed many of the great additions contributed by the members (unmenu, unraid_notify, unraid-web, etc...) and I use many of the user-contributed utilities (i.e. preclear_disk). I found the period of time that all these contributions were being made in full-force exciting. I love to tinker. But, it seems to me that the user contributions have slowed in the last few months as the contributors are waiting for a future release that is supposed to include new hooks allowing these contributors to extend their creations (to the benefit of users like myself ) For that reason I'm hopeful for a v5.0 release. And yes, I'd probably pay for it just to keep with the release that the contributors are using (Who I believe should not have to pay). In the mean-time unRAID has encouraged me to spend hours every day working on my own personal utilities. I've come a long way teaching myself shell scripting (BASH is quirky to say the least) and am working on a project to populate (sync) a database (MYSql) with information about my music collection (which is much too large now to manage without the ability to query a database) I'm about finished with this part. Next, I'm going to tackle PHP and put a UI on top of that database. When I get that far, I too will share with the community if anyone is interested.

Very useful (and impressive) update. I am running 4.5-beta6 and I can confirm that my experience is that the cache drive provides no increase in write speed.

Well, tried the manual spin-down a couple of ways and the darn thing keeps spinning back up! Just got home. Gone all day. All drives are spun down except for Drive 8 and Parity.

I have 9 WD Green 1TB drives in my array (one for parity). Currently drive #8 has no data on it at all. This drive is included in a few shares, but it is completely empty. The strange thing is that this drive never spins down. The remainder of the drives do, but not this one. Can anyone think of a reason why this might be? Again, the only thing diferrent about this drive from the others is that all the others contain data.

I have a gigabit ethernet network.

My understanding is CAT5 v.s. CAT6 is a question of quality. Your sure to get solid 100mbps performance from CAT5. Your sure to get solid 1000mbps performance from CAT6. Manufacturers won't guarantee 1000mbps performance with CAT5 cables, but I've never had a problem. --- Again, this is only my understanding.

On my machine I'm beginning to question the benefit of a cache drive. I just implemented the following drive as a cache drive: SATA_WDC_WD800JD-00HWD-WMAJ91139205 My protected array consists of 9 WD 1TB Green drives (1 as parity) - When I write to a cached share I get 5.53 MB/s throughput. - When I write to an un-cached share I get 4.80 MB/s throughput. - When I write directly to a disk I get 8.63 MB/s throughput. It seems to me the best option is to write directly to a disk, which is what I was doing before. Thoughts? Comments?

So, Just to be clear... If "Min free space units are in 1024-byte blocks" (as stated in the first post of this thread), then if I have a share configured with 2 or more drives with an allocation method of "Fill-Up" and a "Min. free space" of 5368709120, then: 1) The share will continue to place files on the lowest numbered disk(x) until disk(x) has less than 5GB of free space. 2) Then, the share will move to the next higher disk(x) specified as an "Included disk(s)" 3) and, use of a Cache drive will respect these rules. I'm just asking. JT

Very good explaination Joe. I believe that I now completely understand. It looks like you really tried to think of everything when you wrote the preclear script. I did start a 3rd preclear with the -n option believing it worked in exactly the opposite manner. I guess I'll just let it finish.

Well, I ran the drive through 2 pre-clear cycles with no error. I'm now running a 3rd with the -n option (don't know why it just looked like a good idea that wouldn't hurt.) Now I'm beginning to become comfortable in the knowledge that there is nothing wrong with this drive and I think I'll redeploy it as a very large Cache drive until I need to use it to add more space in my protected array. One more question though... I was thinking about what Joe said about why & when unRAID will mark a disk as 'Disabled': Well, as it happens, this particular disk was completely full with .ISO files (99% full, 15GB free). I haven't intentionally written to this disk for months, and there should have been no writes happening to this drive at the time that unRAID disabled it. Could this mean that unRAID is writing to the disk for its purposes, or is there another reason (besides a failed write) that unRAID will disable a drive? JT

Joe, A couple of questions: 1) When I run the -t option on a disk that I recently precleared, one of the messeges it says about the drive is: "Partition 1 does not end on cylinder boundary." What does that mean? Is this a bad thing? 2) The -n option is described as follows: "Do NOT perform preread and postread of entire disk to allow SMART firmware to reallocate bad blocks in the clearing process." Could you explain this a bit more, please? It sounds like something I would always want to do, but since it is an option and not a default I thought I'd ask you to be sure. JT

Thank you Joe for the good information. I realize that all this info is available somewhere on the forum, but while I'm freaking out about a drive failure - searching a forum is not as comforting as a response from someone like you. I thought I had read somewhere that a pre-clear wouldn't save any time when replaceing a drive. Thanks for the clarification. I have the new drive in right now rebuilding as I type this response. I'm feeling pretty good about my prospect for success, and I'm feeling pretty good about unRAID right now. I'm running Western Digital Data Lifeguard tests on the drive that "failed" right now too. It already passed the short test, and the extended test is running right now. If it passes I think I'll use it as a cache drive until I need more space in my array.

The attached SMART report was pulled for Disk 5 hours after relocating the server to an air conditioned space. The current value shows as 118. At a value of 118, the RAW_VALUE is 32. I believe in this case a value of 118 from the temp sensor factors to a value in centegrade of 32c. If the drive went thermal and actually hit 225 degrees F, I think my server would have caught fire!! If the current value is 118 I don't understand how 107 could be my worst value? Maybe the value the temp sensor reads actually goes down as the temperature goes up. From the sounds of it I could actually try to rebuild onto this drive. But, I'd be afraid if it didn't work that I'd lose my chance to rebuild onto a new drive. That being the case, I think I'll replace the drive with a fresh one. Then I'll test this drive outside of the system and maybe use it as a cache drive if it still looks to be OK. BTW: When I replace a drive using the procedure described (as opposed to adding a new drive) do I still need to run the pre-clear script on the drive first?

Thank you Joe. It looks to be a very simple procedure. All my drives (7 data & 1 parity) are 1TB WD Green drives. I just need to go and get another one and pop it in. While the bad drive is still in the system I'm trying to find clues as to why it is 'disabled'. Looking at the smart status report it isn't immediatly clear to me why this is the case. I've attached a copy.

Well, I know that unRAID was developed for just this reason so I'm trying to not freak out. I have a drive disabled and I truely believe that it is dead. I came home today to an overheated server. It was my bad as I keep my server in the garage and it hit well over 100f today. Before I shut down there was already evidence that something bad happened to drive #5 (unable to query SMART data). So, I wasn't surprised to see that after I moved the server to an air-conditioned space, let it cool down, and restarted that when it came back up drive #5 was disabled. I'm running a long-SMART check on it now but I believe that I'm going to have to replace the drive and rebuild. Could someone please point me in the direction of a procedure so that I do this correctly. I'd sure hate to lose what I have on drive #5. EDIT: I've attached a syslog that is from the first reboot mentioned above.

I just wanted to take the opportunity to send my fellow unRAID friends a message from Japan. I've been here for a week and I fly back home tomorrow. Unfortunately I've been too busy working to see any sights, but I do have a few pictures. From my experience thus far I have to say the culture here is amazing. The most impressive diferrence is the level of respect people have for one another. That fact alone makes me want to move here. The Japanese people have a wonderful work ethic too. When it is time to work, work gets done. But, when work is over these folks know how to have a good time. I used to think I was born in the wrong century. I know believe that I was also born in the wrong country.

Hmmph... I'm running v4.5-beta6 and I have the following: /lib/modules/2.6.29.1-unRAID-Special/kernel/drivers/ata/ /lib/modules/2.6.29.1-unRAID-Special/kernel/drivers/hid/ /lib/modules/2.6.29.1-unRAID-Special/kernel/drivers/ide/ /lib/modules/2.6.29.1-unRAID-Special/kernel/drivers/md/ /lib/modules/2.6.29.1-unRAID-Special/kernel/drivers/message/ /lib/modules/2.6.29.1-unRAID-Special/kernel/drivers/net/ /lib/modules/2.6.29.1-unRAID-Special/kernel/drivers/scsi/ But, I do not have: /lib/modules/2.6.29.1-unRAID-Special/kernel/drivers/hwmon/

First off... I love this utility. I've used this while adding the last 3 - 1TB drives to my server and it's great to not have the hours of downtime. I just added another disk to my system yesterday and the preclear utility finished with the following message. I don't remember ever seeing this before. Can someone tell me if this looks like anything to worry about: ============================================================================ S.M.A.R.T. error count differences detected after pre-clear note, some 'raw' values may change, but not be an indication of a problem 19,20c19,20 < Offline data collection status: (0x80) Offline data collection activity < was never started. --- > Offline data collection status: (0x84) Offline data collection activity > was suspended by an interrupting command from host. 54c54 < 1 Raw_Read_Error_Rate 0x002f 100 253 051 Pre-fail Always - 0 --- > 1 Raw_Read_Error_Rate 0x002f 200 200 051 Pre-fail Always - 0 ============================================================================ I've attached a copy of the preclear syslog entries.