jsdds

Hi. I’m a longtime Unraid 4.6 user. It’s finally time to start using some larger hard drives so I need to upgrade. In order to go to version 5, I first have to upgrade to version 4.7. So here’s what I need help with: 1. I have a WD20EARS drive that I have been using as my parity drive. It has the jumper installed so I must have used the –a option when preclearing it but I can’t remember. It has, however, been working flawlessly for years. When going to 4.7 and then to version 5 after that, what precautions do I need to take with this disk? Can I use it in my upgraded server? Do I need to remove the jumper? Can I just leave it as is while setting the 4.7 server to 4K default? After that, what about the settings in the version 5 server? Do I need to preclear it again? Can I continue to use it as a parity drive? 2. I also have a WD10EACS disk. (No jumper.) Do I need to do anything special with this disk? All my other disks are Hitachi drives of various sizes. As you can see, I’m a bit confused so thanks in advance for the help! Jeff

Hi all, I've been running my tower trouble free for over a year. Thank you all for that as your advise, in this forum, has helped tremendously! I was wondering if I should preclear new hard drives that I intend using in other systems? I'm building a new ESXi server with ten drives and I'd like to burn-in the drives before I put them into the server. Thanks in advance for the help! jsdds

In my experience, I can't tell you how many problems can be caused by an inadequate or unreliable power supply. If I were you, I'd invest in a good single rail power supply with a rating of 20% more power than you will need. In the long run it will save you much trouble.

So that's where the occasional sounds are coming from in my unraid server.

My two 5K3000 drives passed 3 cycles each of pre_clear without any problems. My single 7K3000 also passed 3 cycles in record time. One of the first hard drives I bought was a 100MB for $995.00. I can't recall the brand. (Did I just reveal my age???)

Hi Guys, I precleared my first Hitachi 5K3000 drive (3 cycles) and got the following results: ** Changed attributes in files: /tmp/smart_start_sdi /tmp/smart_finish_sdi ATTRIBUTE NEW_VAL OLD_VAL FAILURE_THRESHOLD STATUS RAW_VALUE Temperature_Celsius = 206 253 0 ok 29 No SMART attributes are FAILING_NOW 0 sectors were pending re-allocation before the start of the preclear. 0 sectors are pending re-allocation at the end of the preclear, the number of sectors pending re-allocation did not change. 0 sectors had been re-allocated before the start of the preclear. 0 sectors are re-allocated at the end of the preclear, the number of sectors re-allocated did not change. ============================================================================ ============================================================================ The temp never went above 30 degrees C, that I saw. I don't remember seeing that change in SMART attributes before. Is it anything to be concerned about? Thanks for the help.

That's great info! Thanks.

Just to be clear then. Are you saying that the HD204UI drives, without the /JP, were in fact updated to the new firmware? Thanks.

Me too.

I wouldn't be comfortable with that setup. I've had two Raptors (a 74GB and a 150GB) fail on me over the past few years. Striping three of them and using that array for such a critical part of your system seems a bit of a risk. Also, the heat generated by and the power consumption of three 10,000 RPM disks should be considered. If it's speed your interested in, why not consider something like: http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0345740 I realize this path would give you a smaller cache and might cost a bit more but you'd probably end up with a more dependable tower.

Hey Opentoe... Nice build. I'm thinking of ordering one of those iStarUSA 5x3's for my Antec 1200 case. (I wish the power led was blue; oh well.) I was wondering, I've read in reviews that you have to power-on each drive with a pen tip. Is this true? Also, do you need to do that at each reboot or just the first time? Thanks for helping me make a decision about this drive case.

Compatibility Guide: http://www.hitachigst.com/tech/techlib.nsf/techdocs/EA3C2532A751C279882577DF0059E290/$file/DS7K3000_CompatGuide_final.pdf The 7K3000 is also on sale at Newegg. ($99.99 with promo code EMCKHKG39.) It's a 7200RPM version. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822145473&nm_mc=EMC-IGNEFL020311&cm_mmc=EMC-IGNEFL020311-_-EMC-020311-Index-_-InternalHardDrives-_-22145473-L06A

I have the same problem using the button on the User Scripts menu of unMenu. (See my post in the General Section of the forum.) http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=10685.0 I have an Asus P5B Deluxe motherboard.

Update: After much trial and error, I have found the following. --If I have wake on PCI AND PCIe in the BIOS set to enabled, I can power-on from a powered-down state (using the Power down button on the Main control page). Both PCIe and PCI wake enabled seem to be required even though I have the on-board PCI ethernet adapter disabled. The on-board PCIe ethernet adapter is enabled. --I can still not use the S3 Sleep button on the User Scripts page. I have my BIOS set to "Repost Video on S3 Resume" and I have suspend mode set to "S3 only". My server will only power-on partially with the fans running and the unraid server non-responsive.

I want to be able to put my Tower to sleep during certain times of day. I've been trying to get wake on lan to work but have not been totally successful. I can put my tower to S3 sleep using the button on the "User Scripts" page of UnMenu but waking up seems to be the challenge. When I send a magic packet (UDP) to port 7, the server wakes up to some degree. The fans power on but that is it. I can't access the server through the website or on a console monitor and keyboard connected directly to the Tower. So, just to recap... --The sleep command seems to work as my server goes to sleep on command. (So BIOS setup seems to be correct?) --The magic packet is being received by the onboard NIC and the machine is powering up to some degree. --My server, while regaining some power, seems to not wake up completely as I can't interact with it until I hold the power button for 5 seconds to do a hard power-off. It will then power-on normally when I press the power button again. What am I doing wrong here? Any help would be appreciated. I've read through most of the threads dealing with WOL but have come up empty. I have an ASUS P5B deluxe MB. Thanks in advance for the help. jsdds

Thanks Joe. I feel a lot less anxious now. jsdds

I'm preclearing a 2Tb EARS drive and letting it go through three consecutive cycles. The first cycle took 28 hours, the second 20 hours, and the third cycle seems to be going even quicker. The test is currently in Post-Read going at about 110 MB/s at 10% complete. I don't remember that high a speed for the first two cycles. Disk temp is 23 degrees C. Is it normal for preclear cycles to speed up like they seem to be. Is this a bad sign that parts of the disk have been marked bad by a prior cycle? I guess I'll find out sometime after midnight tonight but I wanted to see what you all thought. Thanks

Ahemmm... it's got 8 + 2 PATA ports allowing 12 drives in total. How do you get only 4 SATA ports? Hi nia. Thanks for the reply. Sorry but I meant to say the P5B has 6 PCIe SATA II ports (but now I know it's really verses the 4 PCIe SATA II ports on the A8N. I might be wrong but I believe the Silicon Image 3114R controller supports only SATA I (a speed of 1.5 vs 3.0 Gbit/s) and is on the PCI bus and not the PCIe bus. So as far as my understanding goes, there are 4 SATA II PCIe based ports and 4 SATA I PCI based ports on the A8N. I'm still just learning about all this and if I'm wrong in my understanding, please let me know where. Thanks

For some reason I didn't think that the JMB 363 was PCIe but it I guess it is. With 8 SATA II ports on-board I guess it is a winner. While not as good as the officially sanctioned P5B (no intel LAN or on-board video) this board looks pretty good. Given the fact that I'll now have 3 different controllers (Supermicro 8 ports, Southbridge 6 ports, JMB 363) how should I arrange my drives: parity on JMB 363, cache on Southbridge, data on Southbridge and Supermicro? Thanks for the help!

Thanks for the reply theone. I guess that is the real issue. Is the P5B Deluxe completely compatable with unraid?? Is anyone out there using this board with unraid? The A8N has been tested and is known compatible according to the Hardware Compatibility list.

Hi all, I'm trying to decide which motherboard to use in my unraid server. I already have the A8N-SLI Premium up and running, preclearing some 2TB ears drives. I just realized that I have another motherboard in my spare parts closet, the P5B Deluxe. Which MB do you think would give me the best performance and stability? The P5B is intel based while the A8N is AMD and Nvidia. I know that the P5B has 6 PCIe SATA ports verses the 4 on the A8N so that's a plus. It also has an Intel sata controller verses the Nvidia chipset. I have the Supermicro PCIe 8 port SATA card so I don't know if the extra two ports are that meaningful. I currently have 9 drives but that number will grow with time. Again, I'm really most concerned with performance and stability. Neither board has Intel LAN or on-board video. If any of you are familiar with these two boards I'd appreciate any input. I've put links to the manuals below. http://dlcdnet.asus.com/pub/ASUS/mb/socket775/P5B%20Deluxe/e2668_p5b_dlx.pdf http://dlcdnet.asus.com/pub/ASUS/mb/socket939/A8N-SLI%20Premium/e2435_a8n-sli_premium.pdf Thanks in advance for the help. jsdds

I do telnet into Tower but I use "screen". Thanks for the help and the commands bjp999.

I just received my two 2TB WD20EARS. I'm running them through the Western Digital Data Lifeguard Diagnostics long smart test while I build my unraid server. So far, one passed and the other is being tested. (Takes about 5 hours.) Is the Lifeguard Diagnostics test revealing of disk issues? I am going to preclear them starting tomorrow. If I wanted to let them go through the test three times, what command line parameters would I use if my EARS disks are jumpered (7-? Also, I know I can preclear multiple disks at the same time but can I use preclear while the server is serving files or does it need to be stopped? Thanks for the help. jsdds

Yup. I may have to pick the 650TX just to be sure. The price is right with the rebate and free shipping from amazon. In my experience, the modular design is a mixed blessing. You do save on space but if you have a lot of computers all with modular designed power supplies, its easy to mix them all up and even misplace them. Then when its time to upgrade, and you need some more connectors it can take some time to work it all out.

Hi all, I just purchased a key and am putting together a new server and trying to do it from existing parts. The question I have is what do you think about the Corsair HX620w power supply. It has three rails but the manufacturer claims that there is circuitry to divert power if a rail is overloaded. This feature would make it the equivalent to a single rail system, wouldn't it? That would allow this power supply to deliver 50A of power. I want a reliable system and if necessary will purchase a 650TX. I only have 9 drives at the present but will be expanding over time. I'm using an ASUS A8NSLI-Premium MB with a Highpoint 1740 SATA card that I happened to have. (Only a PCI card.) Any help or advice would be appreciated. Thanks, jsdds