Frank1940

Any chance that you might consider adding 'Turbo Write' as an 'Tips and Tweaks' option for ver 6.1.9 and earlier? I know that it has been added to the beta series but it would be nice to have it available from the GUI for the stable versions. I also realize that it will not be in the "standard" place but anything is better than have to go to the CLI!

Some observations on Flow Control settings: First, if you look at my hardware listings for my two servers, you will note that they both have low power CPU's and an Intel Network card installed. The network cards were installed during the ver 6 beta program because of problems with playback of high data-rate BluRay ISO's. The Intel cards solved that playback problem but they introduced a new issue with a large number of dropped packets when playing back a BluRay ISO. Since this didn't cause a problem, I simply lived with the situation. The players I use are Netgear NTV550 media players and they are installed at each three different media centers throughout my home. (Apparently, the NTV550 flood the server with packet requests when playing high bit rate material!) Second, connecting everything together was (and remains) a logistical nightmare. The main switch is a 16-port Gb switch to which the router and its associated modem are connected. Both servers are also connected to this switch. One on the media centers is on the same floor as this router and it is connected directly to this switch. The other two media centers are on a different floor of the house. I managed to get a cat5 cable to a center location on that floor and I installed a 8-port Gb switch there. During construction, I did install a cat5 cable to the general areas where these media centers are. What I never realized at the time was that in a few short years everything in the media center would expect to have its own Internet connection! So the solution to that problem was to install 5-port 10/100 switches at each one and all of AV gear at that location is connected to it. (10/100 switches were much cheaper and most of the time, only one device will ever require at high data rate.) As you can see, one media center is on the same switch as both servers and the other two media centers are three switches away from either server. So the Tips and Tweaks plugin gets released and I installed on my Test Bed server to see how it worked. Wow, I thought as I looked at it and read the help files that were included with it. Plus, I had seen a post in another thread that said that turning off the Flow Control would solve the dropped packet problem. So I decided to test it. I did this by determine the number of packets received turning a timed fifteen minute segment of the same BluRay ISO. (I used the same segment for all of the tests.) With both Flow Control 'on' NIC Offloading 'on', the percentage of drops was 152% of the total packets received. With the Flow Control 'off' and NIC Offloading 'on', the percentage of drops was 1.96%. With both settings 'off', the percentage dropped to 1.48%. Wow, thought I. This looks like a no brainer. I next installed the new plugin on my Media server and set both Flow Control and NIC Offloading to 'off'. After a lunch, I went down to one of the other media centers to watch a movie. I picked a nice comedy that was contained in a BluRay ISO. The studio logo had not finished before the video playback stalled and proceeded in 'slooow moootion'. I thought perhaps it was an anomaly. I stopped the playback and restarted. Same thing. Tried another movie, same thing. I ran up the stairs to change both setting back to 'on'. The problem was gone. To make a long story short, it appears that if you go through more than ONE switch, you could have problem with playback if you turn the Flow Control and NIC Offloading 'off'. One point I want to make at this juncture is that you may want to tone down your recommendation about turning these two parameters 'off' and suggest that issues can arise in networks that have any complexity in their makeup. If one wishes to experiment to be sure to test with high data-rate material on all of the end points to make sure that problems are not being introduced!

I don't know if you will get a response from bonienl or not. S3 sleep is/has been a source of problems for the past few years. Some people have absolutely not problems using it and other have absolutely no luck! One thing, I do recall from a few years back is that the MB often has a part in any problems. You should check to see if your MB has a BIOS update. Google your MB and s3 problems. Go to the manufacturer's website and download all manuals, search his forums. Read those manuals and see if you have the BIOS set up correctly. Try posting your problem in a separate thread in the User Customization portion of this forum. A separate thread (properly titled) will focus on YOUR problem and is much more likely to be seen by someone who can help.

I got this one a couple of weeks ago. Works fine in my Media Server and was plug-n-play. Only caution is that the chip set has had issues in the past with virtualization.

Well, one reason is if you use NFS. Whenever I have setup a device to use NFS (although the reason to do so is much reduced with the more recent versions of SAMBA), I have had to use the server's IP address to setup the mount point. If there is a way to do it without having that IP address, I am not aware of it... I have the IP address. I just assign it in my router instead of in unRAID. unRAID used DHCP to get the assigned IP from the router. It is always the same, known IP because my router has that specific IP address reserved for the MAC address of my unRAID server. Same for all of my other devices. They all use DHCP but they all have known, unchanging IP addresses because I set them up in my router. Everything managed in one place but everything has a known, unchanging IP address. True, you can do that. On my old cheap router (pre 2010), there is a table for up to eight reservations. (I have 15 addresses currently assigned on my router via DHCP and that does not include the two servers!) Of course, you have to know the MAC address. I know that the Network Settings page for unRAID servers has that information but then you have to explain to how to find both that address, the current IP address of the server that was assigned through DHCP and how to find the proper place in the router settings to be able to make the proper entries. Either way will work, you make your choice. Perhaps, you would like to write up an explanation of how to do the reservation method in any user's router that will be easy for the neophyte to follow?

Well, one reason is if you use NFS. Whenever I have setup a device to use NFS (although the reason to do so is much reduced with the more recent versions of SAMBA), I have had to use the server's IP address to setup the mount point. If there is a way to do it without having that IP address, I am not aware of it...

In the "Use static IPs" section, I would suggest setting the IP address in the upper end of the range. The reason being is that not all ( if any) of the cheaper routers keep track of static IP addresses. Many of them depend on the user to enter the appropriate IP address in a reservation table on the router. If the static IP address is at the bottom of the range, then the router may assign that address to some new device that requests an IP address via DHCP. (There was a fellow who had this happen a while back and I only suceeded in helping him when I noticed that there were no DHCP requests in his log file. He had used an address of 192.168.1.12 and something was coming on line and grabbing that address. He can tell you that two devices with the same IP address don't coexist peaceably!) I think this problem may be a much bigger issue as more and more wireless devices starting using the Internet (Internet of Things). I know when My kids and Grandkids arrive at my house, the first thing they do is turn on the wireless access point and my network suddenly acquires another half dozen or so devices (phones, tablets, laptops, etc.) Plus, every AV and video device in my house now wants to be connected. I can wait until my refrigerator and door bell want to connect... Going to the high end of the range, means that you have two hundred plus devices that connect before you get into address conflict trouble and most of the cheaper routers will choke trying to handle that many devices simultaneously. (I have a friend who was an IT guy at a High School and he said that 50 active connections was about the limit.)

Try this: Run the make_bootable script/batch file If in Windows XP, double-click make_bootable (make_bootable.bat). It should open a DOS window, and run syslinux.exe. If in Windows 7 or later, right-click on make_bootable (make_bootable.bat) and select Run as Administrator. If using a Mac, double-click the file make_bootable_mac and enter your admin password when prompted. Note: during the process of running this script, the flash device may seem to disappear and reappear. I surmise you will also have to run as Administrator on Win10. EDIT: It has been a long time since I did this but I seem to remember that you do have to hit the 'Enter' key at least one time in the DOS window.

I would be believing what the kernel is telling you until you have more substantial evidence that that assumption is wrong! What I suspect is happening is that you have a problem with the bonding of the CPU cooler to the CPU chip. Perhaps it is old/misapplied heat sink compound or a loose heat sink. You should also check that CPU cooling fan is running.

OK, let's discuss this a bit. Are you getting Receive 'Errors' or 'Drops'? Drops (actually a dropped packet) are a minor issue at worst and are an indicator of a problem ONLY if one exists. 'Errors' are another issue. Ignore the 'Drops' if that is what you are seeing. If it's 'Errors' let's discuss that... Basically, you are right about the RealTek driver that comes with ver6 of unRAID. Back in the development phase (beta or RC) of ver 6, LimeTech made a change in the way the kernel was handling processor functionality to optimize Dockers and VM's. This had an impact with the RealTek driver with certain slow processors like the Sempron. (The RealTek NIC use the CPU to emulate hardware and is a performance hit on CPU performance. That is way it so cheap! The Intel Network card does all of that work on that on the card!) The only time this problem comes to the forefront is the playing of high bit-rate BluRay material. What I think is happening is that your media player's receive buffer starts to get empty and it floods the server with (unnecessary?) requests for data. The RealTek driver generates an interrupt for each of these requests and the Sempron gets so overloaded servicing these requests, that its data delivery rate is slowed down and eventually you have a 'hole'. If the hole is long enough, you may see it in the video but I have a feeling that with the very short ones, you (1) can hear the 'hole' or (2) the decoder loses lock and it takes a few mSec to relock. I can't recall if anyone else has tried the Intel PIC card (Today, it is more expensive than the PCIe card) so I can't really tell you if it solves the problem. So you are moving into uncharted waters. If you are in the U.S., you could try the PICe card using Amazon 30 day refund window.

No apology necessary. Just wanted you to be aware that bonienl had seen your post and had commented on it. Unfortunately, he did not quote your post in it so it was easy to miss. Bonienl is also the developer of the GUI as well as these plugins. I believe that the GUI updates (at least at this time) are tied to the releases of the core unRAID package. It could well be that some code was modified in the GUI (or a package was added to unRAID) to allow this plugin to function.

You might also want to read through this thread: https://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=39350.0 I ended up solving the problem with the purchase of an Intel Network card. This is the card that I bought: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001CY0P7G/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o01_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Thank you, Frank. That was very informative. I don't see what you say I should see. Here's what I see instead. I'm on version 6.1.4. I've installed this twice and uninstalled between installations. Is there anything else I can do? Did you read this reply from the developer of the Plugin?

I think most modern CyberPower UPS's also works with APCUPSD... oddly like Squid said APCUPSD doesn't have a great list of supported UPSs. This is a true statement. Just avoid the really cheap ones in either brand. I would recommend one with no less than 450W rating. I am using one, I seem to recall that it won't turnoff the UPS after the server has been shutdown. There are two disadvantages to this issue. First, sometimes the UPS bleeps when it is running on battery so you have this constant bleeping until the power comes back on. Second issue is that even though the server does shutdown, the power supply is still on and a certain amount of power is being delivered to the MB. This is will continue to drain the battery so that when the power does come back on, it will take longer (perhaps, much, much longer) for the battery to complete its recharge. This becomes an issue only if you have a second power outage before the battery has enough charge to power the server through the second shutdown process.

What is the Local Master in SMB and does it involve the Internet? I answered a query recently and complied a response which is referenced here: The next post suggested that the information be added to the WIKI. I could see it going into the Networking section (#10) but I am unsure the way to do this. Do you want to be the one controlling this since you are revising the entire FAQ? I would be happy to rework this post and make it a bit more general if that would help.

You are actually asking about a couple of different things. First, your 'Wireless Modem' (actually a wireless router/modem) is only involved with the Internet (also referred to as WWW) and the assigning of IP Addresses for devices inside of LAN for the purposes of becoming a portion of the world wide Internet. This is what allows you to connect to sites like Google, Amazon, and CNN. Things that are on the outside of you router/modem are said to be on the WAN (Wide Area Network) and things inside of the router/modem are said to be on the LAN (Local Area Network). In unRAID, we use the LAN to connect to the GUI. Everything on the Internet is accessed by its IP address and a DNS server looks up things like CNN.com and returns back the proper IP address. The router portion of your Router/modem does this for your LAN. SMB is a second network that is totally independent of the Internet. However, it does require that all of the computers which attach to it have an IP address. There are two ways (in the modern world) to get an address assigned. The first way is to use a DHCP server. (SMB itself does not have any DHCP functionality built into it.) This will be done by your Wireless Modem. The second way is to assign the IP addresses manually. (We used to have to do this back in the days when we used dial-up modems.) (Many of us still assign assign static IP addresses to our unRAID servers. It seems to make life much simpler if one wants to use the NFS protocol.) With unRAID, most of us use SMB to gain access to the files on the array. On the SMB network, the Local Master is the server that translates your server/client name to its IP address. One more point, ANY computer or other device that runs SMB can become the Local Master. There is no restriction and many Devices (and ALL MS Windows computers) are enabled! (BTW, SMB does not require a router/Modem to work! I ran SMB on 10Base2 which was a length of RG-58A/U coax between two or more computers back in the early 1990's! And, furthermore, the original intend of SMB was to allow very small networks of computers to work together without the need of a dedicated server.) So Yes, you do require two Masters (if you like) on your physical network. (By the way, they use the same physical layer and hardware to conduct their communication.) One to administer the LAN and WAN portion and the second to control SMB portion. Now. let's look at the second part of your question. Go to the "Settings" page, then click on the "SMB" icon (Microsoft flag), then you will see three tabs on that page. Now, click on the "Workgroup Settings" tab. That is where you will find the information on which server is the Local Master. You will NOT see the yoda symbol UNLESS your server is the Local Master. It does not become the Local Master just because you gave it permission to be come the Local Master--- BTW, that is what the "Local master browser:" allows. It must also 'win' the periodical 'election' to become the Local Master! You also have to give it permission to monitor which computer is the Local Master by enabling the "Monitor local master election:" option. IF your server is not the Local Master, you will have to go to this page to find out which one is. If you are having an election problem, let's take that up in a separate thread.

This is what you should be seeing: Except that normally you would expect Rose also to be a candidate for election to local master, in case Elsie1 goes off-line for some reason. In other words, I would set Local master browser to Yes on both servers. Doing so simply makes them both available, without forcing either. Perhaps "Local master browser candidate" would be a less confusing name. You have an excellent point. However, there can be reasons why you might not want a particular server to be a candidate. First one is that (and in my case) Server Rose is my test bed. It shutdown down rather regularly. It gets rebooted a couple of times a week. From that standpoint, it almost as bad as the Windows clients that are on the network. Second thing to consider is how many servers does a network contain. The more servers that you make eligible, the more likely that that a new server will be elected periodically. I have always noticed that SMB networks are much more stable when the same Local Master is always assigned for each Workgroup. If that server goes down, then one can activate easily another server to serve as the Local Master if the primary server can not be restored quickly. (There are ways to influence the election but it requires some planning and some knowledge of how SMB is implemented.) Before I had a permanent Local Master on my SMB network, it was always a crap shoot as to whether I could find all of the SMB connected devices on any given day.

This is what you should be seeing:

A backup of your USB isn't really required (other then the key) to restore your array from a clean start. This is true if nothing goes wrong!!!! But a full backup of original Flash Drive (with the array STOPPED) is perhaps that BEST insurance that all will go smoothly!

You need to define a bit more clearly what you mean by "start fresh". If you want to save all of the files that you saved to your unRAID array-- by that, I mean the 'data' files' --- the answer is yes. First, thing you need to is print out a "Array Device' on the 'Main' tab, and the following page on the 'Settings' tab 'Network Settings' page. You will need those to basically setup your server to present the present appearance on the network. Than stop the array and backup the ENTIRE contents of the present setup to a safe place where you can easily find it. Now install unRAID on your Flash Drive as a new install using LT's instructions. Use the printouts to setup 'Network Settings' and to assign the data drives correctly. After a REBOOT, You will have your "fresh start".

Try this command: grep preclear /var/log/syslog | todos >> /boot/preclear_results.txt It will use the more standard lf/cr format for line endings

One thing to check is, if you are using an ad blocker, that you have 'whitelisted' the unRAID server.

For all you are using ver 6.2 beta, JoeL has posted up a sed command line which will correct the problem in his preclear script for ver 6.2. You can find it here: http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=13054.msg464653#msg464653 I run the script on my Test Bed server successfully BUT I have not tested it to see if it fixed the problem.

Are you sure about this? [i'm not at home this month, so can't test this] I'd have thought the "Auto" mode would use turbo write if all disks were already spinning; normal writes otherwise. IF that is the case, the easiest way to turn on turbo writes for a group of files [e.g. if you're getting ready to copy a bunch of large media files] would be to simply click on the Spin Up button in the GUI. Not that I am aware of. What the Help for the Setting is as follows: " Selects the method to employ when writing to enabled disk in parity protected array. Auto selects read/modify/write." But that is not real clear but it sort-of implies that the read/modify/write method is the Auto method. But then, one has to ask, "Why have three choices rather than two"? I did a search and this post of yours was all I found: https://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=39554.msg370736#msg370736 Do you have any other references of release notes to indicate that such a feature was ever added? Perhaps, someone from LimeTech could jump in and provide a definitive answer.

I assume that the 'cache' you are referring to is a cache drive. Yes, you are correct and thanks for pointing that out. There will be power used by the cache drive when the data is first written to that drive, and by (at least) two disks (parity and a data disk) plus the cache Drive drive when it is written to the protected array. So any power savings might well be insignificant--- especially for arrays with small numbers of data drives.