Migrating strategy? (from old box to new/bigger box)

[Stumpy]

So. I have an unraid pro box but want to move to new hardware. I am not sure how to do this as I only have one license. That is, I currently have an empty (no OS) box filled with empty drives - if I had unraid pro on both boxes I'd just move everything to the new unraid box but since I dont I am not quite sure how to best migrate. Since drives can be read even without unraid I suppose I could transfer my unraid pro license/install to the new box then install linux on the old box and then kind of move everything over drive by drive? I am thinking/hoping there is an easier way I am just not thinking about

 

Suggestions would be super welcome!

Edited July 24, 2023 by Stumpy
added more detail

[Veah]

Move your licensed USB to new hardware and set it up.I  f you have another pc and a USB drive dock, could plug in the old drives individually and move that data to your new unRAID via network.

 

Or populate new unRAID with old drives and swap them out individually starting with parity.  That could take quite a long time for the disk rebuilds.

 

Or...

 

I think I saw a Spaceinvaderone video a while back outlining a scenario where he was able to populate a drive then install it in an array by tweaking something and some voodoo magic, not 100% sure on that one tho.

[sphbecker]

It sounds like your plan is to use all new drives in the new system. You could always setup a 2nd USB device with an unRaid trail.

 

Keep in mind that unRaid uses file-level spanning, not block-level stripping, meaning that each drive in your system has a readable standard linux filesystem, either with an incomplete collection of files, but combined represents all of your files. That means you can easily plug the old drives into the new system, don't add them to the new array, just leave them as stand-alone drives and copy the files to their new destinations. Ignore the parody drive, it isn't needed for this. You could also use an Ubuntu live USB to boot the older server and copy the files over the network, but unless you have a 10GB network, that will take far longer.

[ConnerVT]

It is difficult to give advice on a best plan without more details.

 

How much data are you needing to move?  Does the current server need to be up and available, or can it be down for some time?  Are you putting all new drives in the new server, or will some/all of the drives in the current server end up in the new server?

 

Every migration is different, depending on the situation.  The devil is in the details.

[Stumpy]

20 hours ago, sphbecker said:

It sounds like your plan is to use all new drives in the new system. You could always setup a 2nd USB device with an unRaid trail.

 

Keep in mind that unRaid uses file-level spanning, not block-level stripping, meaning that each drive in your system has a readable standard linux filesystem, either with an incomplete collection of files, but combined represents all of your files. That means you can easily plug the old drives into the new system, don't add them to the new array, just leave them as stand-alone drives and copy the files to their new destinations. Ignore the parody drive, it isn't needed for this. You could also use an Ubuntu live USB to boot the older server and copy the files over the network, but unless you have a 10GB network, that will take far longer.

Thanks. Good to know thats not a totally bonkers idea as it was all I had at the moment. Certainly not the worst chore but I was hoping for something else (what that something else is I have no idea - so might be doing this)

[Stumpy]

22 hours ago, Veah said:

Move your licensed USB to new hardware and set it up.I  f you have another pc and a USB drive dock, could plug in the old drives individually and move that data to your new unRAID via network.

 

Or populate new unRAID with old drives and swap them out individually starting with parity.  That could take quite a long time for the disk rebuilds.

 

Or...

 

I think I saw a Spaceinvaderone video a while back outlining a scenario where he was able to populate a drive then install it in an array by tweaking something and some voodoo magic, not 100% sure on that one tho.

 

Thanks, I looked through his videos and was able to find one video that seemed relevant but it seems to assume you will be moving the drives over as well which I hadn't planned on doing. 

[Stumpy]

16 hours ago, ConnerVT said:

It is difficult to give advice on a best plan without more details.

 

How much data are you needing to move? 

 

Does the current server need to be up and available, or can it be down for some time?  Are you putting all new drives in the new server, or will some/all of the drives in the current server end up in the new server?

 

Every migration is different, depending on the situation.  The devil is in the details.

 

I'd be moving about 20TB

No, I can do without the current server being up for a few days / yes, it can be down for a few days

Yes, I have other drives in the new server

No. None of the old server drives would be going to the new server

 

the devil is toooootally in the details. sigh.

[ConnerVT]

20TB isn't an extreme amount to move.  Not the fastest to move across a 1GB LAN, but not totally unbearable either.  I'll suggest two different options:

 

1. Treat the new server as a hardware upgrade -

Think of it as replacing the CPU/MB/Power Supply/Case.  Put the drives from your current server in the new system (including any cache/pool drives).  Before shutting down your old server for the last time, be sure to update any plugins and turn off the Start Array Automatically as well as VM and Docker services.  Boot from your current licensed flash drive, and sanity check that all runs correctly as expected.  Move on to starting the array, Unraid should remember your drive configuration and start normally.  You can then start up Docker, and this should also start normally, as your appdata is still in the same place as it was in the old server.

 

Once the system has proven itself functional and stable, you can start swapping out the disks.  Start first with the Parity Drive, and let parity rebuild.  Then a data drive, and let that rebuild.  After this, you can move data from old drives to the new one (assuming there will be less drives in the new system than the old) or just swap in another new drive.  (Unraid Docs for details)  Lather, rinse, repeat.

 

Some benefits of going this route:  Limited amount of down time (as array will be accessible through emulated disk during rebuild); stays true to your current configuration (less chance to name/config something wrong and messing things up); data always 100% in sync between old and new servers during migration transfer; old server drives are in hand as an effective backup in case you have any issues.

 

2. Create Trial USB for new server -

You can build the new server hardware with all the drives as you want in the final server.  Create a Trial USB for the new server.  Then you need to configure it all.  Afterwards you transfer all of the data from the old server to the new server.  You can do this via you LAN, or using Unassigned Devices and pulling a drive from your old server, put it in a USB enclosure (or attach internally in the new server if there are available connections, IMHO a PITA) and copy the data.  Continue until all is transferred.  (Note:  You will want to either enable Turbo Write or just not enable your parity drive until all is transferred).  After all is done, you can copy the contents of your new trail flash drive over that in the license one (SAVE your *.key file from the old USB config folder first!), then copy the license back to the original flash drive.

 

The benefit of doing it this way (at least, copying by LAN) is zero down time of the server.  But it doesn't guarantee the data will be 100% in sync, as a file/folder you copied at the beginning of the process may have been updated/added/changed before all is done copying.  But personally think that this is way more prone to error.

[Stumpy]

Wow, thanks ConnerVT! those are brilliant ideas, that hadnt even crossed my mind, super appreciated!

 

I dont have many dockers that I am worried about transferring over, really I think only podgrab is the one I'd want to retain the index of files it had downloaded. Ultimately the most important thing to me is to maintain file integrity. I am hoping to set up my new box with a small zfs pool and then use unraid for smaller more important things (music, docs, photos) and then use my disks for some of my larger media.

 

Cheers