Flash Problem Solved

[chiaramontef]

Just posting this so others might benefit.

 

My 36 hours of struggle getting my Unraid server to boot back up isn't the star of the show here, but found the flash drive process to be extremely finicky and wanted to share "what worked for me".

 

Currently running 6.9.2, but don't think think that's pertinent here.  Some things that happened to me that have been covered in other posts:

 

• I noticed a licensing error in Unraid, essentially my flash was offline entirely.  Rebooting seemed to correct the issue, however, only temporarily.
• Further licensing errors and rebooting resulted in "bond0" not found (using mode 6), which there have been lots of posts about on older and some new versions than what I'm running. 
• Inevitably, this was an issue with my flash drive going bad, diagnostics couldn't be written and configurations from the /config directory weren't applied so when I did boot from my "bad" flash drive I would just be stuck with an APIPA address (169.254.x.x.).  One of the key tells here, among others, since "bond0" can be a bit of a red herring is trying to capture diagnostics.  You can run the command by simply typing "diagnostics" without quotes into the command prompt and you'll get the expected feedback, but when you remove the drive and put it in another computer in an attempt to read or upload the logs, you'll see nothing was actually able to be written to the drive.
• I had an unused/same Sandisk USB 3.0 16GB Ultrafit drive that I purchased 8 years ago, with the original one that had been running fine for the previous 8 years, but after applying the backup to this one, same issue, "bond0" can't write diagnostics, yadda yadda.
  • Yes, I'm aware 3.0 not needed, but working fine and from the same 2-pack that I purchased long ago for this very reason. 
  • Using the flash creator tool or the manual copy/paste "make bootable" made no difference.
  • Using a 2.0 USB port vs. a 3.0 port also made no difference.
• Every other, albeit very old, flash drive I had laying around and tried, nothing worked.  Either couldn't use it or if I could, same error "bond0".

I found it hard to believe that all my drives were bad, but knowing my newest one was 8 years old, I decided to pick up some new drives. I wasn't experiencing any other hardware issues on my server at least so I went to the store and picked up a few different varieties to ensure I was covered.  Keeping them all at 32GB or less (for FAT32).  Picked up some Lexar (USB 2.0/32GB), Sandisk (I know the history here, but purchased anyway, 32GB USB 3.0). 

 

Inevitably I got it working on the Lexar, here is how:

• The official flash gui didn't work, even though there were no errors on the process.  After I put my backup on there I kept getting can't find boot disk messages.  (Double/Triple checked all boot settings and boot devices).  My Lexar flash was being picked up fine in the BIOS and the only bootable device.  Also ensured fastboot=off, no dice.
• The manual process didn't work, again even though successful, after formatting FAT32 and labeling "UNRAID", and successfully running makebootable.bat with no errors, still didn't boot.
• Through all of this, it's not worth going into detail, but I did try different versions and restore points, none of which helped. Tried different varieties of only copying bz* files or just my config folder when the situation called for it.

 

What did help and what I'm hoping might help others, was Rufus 4.1.  I know that has been covered to some degree in other posts, but what worked for me was a bit different that what I found at least.

 

Solution: I used my Lexar (32GB/USB 2.0) drive (port didn't matter) and Rufus 4.1 with the following settings:

• Boot selection "Syslinux 6.04 w/MBR partition
• BIOS (no UEFI for me, older server)
• I did tick the box to add fixes for older BIOSes
• Volume Label "UNRAID" of course and FAT32; quick format is fine.

 

Then I merely copied all my files from my most recent backup except for ldlinux.sys and ldlinux.c32

 

Put the drive back in my server and it booted right up without issue, right to the Unraid bootloader menu, then successfully to my login prompt.  No more "Bond0" messages which is definitely a red herring, but at least a well documented one.

 

At this point, I'm not messing with it for a little while, but I am interested to see if this method works on some of the other flash drives I had laying around.

 

Hope this helps!

Edited July 12, 2023 by chiaramontef
grammer