I'm sure my options are pretty slim, but just wondering what someone might be able to help me with here. I'm kind of a noob when it comes to this stuff. I've had the server for a while, but I set it up with my own research and always planned on upgrading the cache drive for redundancy at a later date. Well that mentality bit me in the butt as now I have a failing cache drive and I'm not sure what can be done to recover my VM which no longer works. 

I figured out the drive was failing when I attempted to open a Windows 10 VM and it went straight into automatic repair. I'm still unable to get into the VM as it runs into errors if I try to do a startup repair, or System restore, or an image recovery. This is what led me on my path to figure out what was wrong and when I noticed that my cache drive said it had an error with a “thumbs down” under the smart column in the dashboard. I’ve attached logs below if anyone can use that to tell me what exactly went wrong as I’m curious, but my real issue is that now I need to replace the failing cache disk with a new cache pool, but I’m wondering if this will be possible, and how much data I’m going to lose?

I currently run a plex server and file share out of this server, along with occasionally creating VMs to play around with. I have one windows 10 VM that remains on this server which has a main purpose of hosting Minecraft worlds for my niece and nephew and some others.

I’ve purchased 2 new SSD’s to replace this old one that’s failing, and create a cache pool so this issue doesn’t happen again. I’ve read plenty of forums describing how to replace cache drives, and how to create cache pools, so I think I have the process down, but my issue is that after I’ve shut down the dockers and VMs, and after I’ve set the shares to “yes” for my appdata, domains, and system files; when I try to move this data from my cache disk to my array, it will not work. The mover just stops by itself after a few minutes. I believe this is because the cache SSD drive is failing.

If I can’t move these files over, will I still be able to change the cache drive/pool without loosing everything? Is there a way for me to do this and still maintain access to the VM and plex data and my server settings, and anything else? I imagine that most of the ~55GB of data that is currently on my cache drive is just plex data that I still have on other computer’s on my network, so even if it's lost on the cache drive, I would likely be able to get that back if the drive is lost, but how do I rebuild the dockers and settings that I had before? Is this all stuff that’s only saved in the files that are currently on the failing cache drive that won’t copy over? All posts I've read seem to mention a process for how to create cache pools or replace the cache drive, but none of them seem to mention what to do if the information doesn't copy over. This is really my main question. If I'm unable to copy this information to the array, is there anything I can do? What will this affect if I still try to replace when it won't copy over?

I hope someone can help me out with this, and if the answer is that I’m totally screwed I get it, but I’m just looking to see if I’m over thinking this, and there might be another way to rebuild everything, and/or that settings might be saved somewhere else. Feel free to let me know how much trouble I’m in and laugh at my mistake! For those that might be reading this and learning about the benefits of a cache drive and have put off buying another SSD to create a redundant cache pool, hopefully this post can help you too!

jebsnas-diagnostics-20221217-0827.zip

Edited December 17, 20223 yr by Jebberino84
Wanted to clarify why this post is different from other's I've read. Last couple sentences of second to last paragraph should explain how this is different.

Device does appear to be failing, you can try cloning it with ddrescue.

Thank you for this information. Unfortunately, the replacement disks I purchased to make the new cache pool are 500GB each. The failing cache drive is a 1TB drive I had from a friend's build when I built this PC. I will have to wait to clone this cache drive until I can find another spare 1TB drive for cloning. I will try to do this in a couple days if possible and report back because I think I have one in an old Laptop I no longer use that is in storage, but it will take me a couple days to find the time to get it.

 

In the meantime, for my own curiosity, and so anyone else reading this might also know, if cloning does not work, or even if it leaves bad sectors or some missing data, will I be able to create a new cache drive pool from scratch and how would this affect my current setup of unriad?

This is really my main question I didn't see answered anywhere else in any forums. I may be miss-understanding how all of this works of course, but if I am unable to recover data from the cache drive, will the data that is stored in the "system" file, the "appdata" file, and/or the "domains" file prevent me from being able to access my VM? I believe I can set the plex part of my server back up with no issues, but is there a way for me to create a new VM which would access the data, or "minecraft world" that my niece and nephew built in it? The data that the VM uses to boot and to run would be in the cache drive, but the actual data for the minecraft world should be somewhere on my main array, right? However the only way I've ever accessed that data was through the VM and I don't believe there is a "share" setup in unraid when you create a VM with the data it contains. Is there a way for me to find this information on the unraid array and move it to a new VM without the VM data on the cache disk?

1 hour ago, Jebberino84 said:

will I be able to create a new cache drive pool from scratch and how would this affect my current setup of unriad?

Yes and how much it will affect you depends on what was there, for example if you had docker and VMs on cache you'll lose that, obviously any other data there will also be lost.

I've got a new-to-me SAS PCI-e card that should be arriving on Friday since I've used up all my SATA ports on my motherboard already. I'll also be stopping by our storage during the week to grab the laptop. I just want to say, I read posts on these forums all the time, and I see you answering posts constantly! You're a great guy whose helped many people with these items in the past and I appreciate your help today! I hope you have a great holiday season, Jorge! As I mentioned before, I'll likely report back by this weekend after I have time to work on this. Thanks again for your help!

I just realized that I never posted back on here. For anyone else who might read this, I wasn't able to recover the old information. I instead started over and created new VMs after replacing the Cache drive and creating a chache pool with 2 SSDs. Let this be a lesson to anyone out there with only 1 SSD and no redundancy! Try to get a second SSD so if one fails, you still keep all your data!