Migrating to different hardware

[paqman]

Sorry if this has been discussed to death.  I do see that it looks pretty easy and simple to migrate an unRAID installation to new hardware.  With a few small exceptions, just plug the hard drives into the new server, boot up to the USB, and everything should move over fine.  

 

My question is, is it wise to do this on purpose?  I am trying to minimize downtime on my current file server, so I would like to build my unRAID array on an old Dell Poweredge server, get it all set up and working the way I'd like, and then move it all to my current hardware.

 

But I realize that just because I can, does not necessarily mean I should.  Are there drawbacks to standing up my new server this way?

[JonathanM]

Hardware specific tweaks will need to be undone or redone or added.

 

VM's with passed through hardware can cause serious headaches, because the identification of the hardware can change, for instance if you had a video card passed, and the new hardware has the USB controller at that address, Unraid will lose access to the USB boot stick as soon as the VM is started.

 

That said, it's definitely doable, you must be aware of the differences. Setting all the array and all services to not autostart before the final shutdown on the old hardware will allow you to take stock of everything on the new build before you hit start.

[paqman]

9 minutes ago, JonathanM said:

Hardware specific tweaks will need to be undone or redone or added.

 

VM's with passed through hardware can cause serious headaches, because the identification of the hardware can change, for instance if you had a video card passed, and the new hardware has the USB controller at that address, Unraid will lose access to the USB boot stick as soon as the VM is started.

 

That said, it's definitely doable, you must be aware of the differences. Setting all the array and all services to not autostart before the final shutdown on the old hardware will allow you to take stock of everything on the new build before you hit start.

Thanks!  Yeah I am not going to start with any passed through hardware or VM's or anything fancy.  It's going to have plex, transmission, home assistant, S3 sync, and maybe one other simple docker container.  But there shouldn't be anything hardware specific that I'll be doing.