Newbie Question On Hdd Usage

[QuadT]

Question from a super newb-

 

I set up my unraid server a while back and haven't tinkered with it much since then but I'm curious as to why it looks like only the parity disk is in use? Is that normal or a setting I messed up? I thought I set it up for redundancy but if I'm looking at this chart right I think there's only data on one Hdd.

 

Here's a snip to show what I mean:

 

This has probably been answered already somewhere else but I couldn't find it in my, admittedly short, searching.

 

Thanks!

[trurl]

Your screenshot doesn't include the parity disk. 

 

Attach Diagnostics to your NEXT post in this thread 

[QuadT]

Sorry about that, the parity disk is on the line above that isn't pictured. That disk that is in use is the only disk in the array that looks to be storing any data.

 

Here's a more complete picture:

 

tower-diagnostics-20211007-1907.zip

Edited October 8, 2021 by QuadT
forgot diagnostics

[trurl]

OK, so your question is really about why disk1 is the only one being used so far.

 

Allocation Method is one of the settings for each of your user shares. Highwater is the default and is a good compromise between using all disks eventually without constantly switching between disks just because one disk might briefly have more free space than another.

 

For your specific disk assignments, since disk1 is 4TB, the first decision point is at half of that, or 2TB. Then, since disk1 would still have as much free space as any other disk, it would continue to be used until the next halfway point, at 3TB. Then then next disk would be chosen.

[ChatNoir]

This should help https://wiki.unraid.net/Manual/Shares#Allocation_method

[QuadT]

This is great info, thank you for that!