More Graceful Drive Removal

[neumann13]

I would like to see a function where we can mark a drive for removal and have unraid evacuate all the data off in the background. That way we don't have to risk the long parity rebuild and the uncertainty of the New Config function.

 

Alternatively, I'd be happy with some other method of achieving this goal. Basically, I'm just looking for an easy built-in way for gracefully removing a drive without risking the data.

 

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As I understand, the current process for removing a drive is to use the New Config tool and hope for the best. However, when I have tried this in the past, it tells me that my parity drives will be destroyed. If the parity drives are destroyed as part of this process, then it seems what I need to actually do is evacuate the drive first, before using the New Config tool. If I don't, then the data on the drive being removed is also lost, yes?

The documentation makes it seem like we can just pull a drive out using New Config and that no data will be lost and everything will be fine. But when I go to actually do it, unraid is telling me that my parity drives will be wiped. If they're wiped, then the data on the drive cannot be rebuilt. So either the docs should reflect that risk or my understanding of the whole process is incorrect (and the docs and New Config flow should be modified to spell that out more clearly).

 

In any case, it would be nice to have a more graceful method of removing drives that still have data on them.