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USB Flash Drive Died - How to Recover Array?

Featured Replies

Hello,

 

My USB Flash Drive died.  Putting it into other computers, it had the dreaded write protection error, letting me know that it was unrecoverable.  Luckily, I was able to get nearly all of the data off of it.

 

I purchased a new flash drive, ran the Unraid USB Flash Creator on it, then copied over all the files I had (overwriting the files that were put in place), and finally ran the "Make Bootable" batch file.

 

I then spun up my server--and it works!  Server is online, I was able to login using my existing information.  However, I now have a blank array.

 

Is there any way to find out the order of disks in my previous array?  I have 18 total disks, 2 of which are parity.  I can try and upload any files as necessary.

 

Thanks!

Solved by trurl

  • Community Expert

Your array assignments are in config/super.dat on the flash drive, and pools are in config/pools folder. 

 

Were you able to copy these?

 

All settings from the webUI are in config, that is all you need to add to a new install to get all of those settings back. 

  • Community Expert

You must always have a current backup of flash. 

  • Author

Thanks for the response trurl!  I know that I should have automated backups of the flash--I think years ago I, very stupidly, set this up to backup to the array.

 

It looks like /config/super.dat was one of the compromised files that did not transfer over.  However, I do have a super.old

 

How can I read this file?

super.old

  • Author

Also, considering this is a new flash drive, what is the best way to go about getting my license changed over to the ID of the new flash drive?

 

I currently have a Trial.key, Plus.key and Pro.key inside the /config/ directory of the boot drive, obviously all referencing the previous flash drive.

 

Should I delete all three of these and reboot?

  • Community Expert
1 minute ago, m0rphl1ng said:

Also, considering this is a new flash drive, what is the best way to go about getting my license changed over to the ID of the new flash drive?

 

I currently have a Trial.key, Plus.key and Pro.key inside the /config/ directory of the boot drive, obviously all referencing the previous flash drive.

 

Should I delete all three of these and reboot?

You need the latest valid licence to be there, the others should be deleted.

  • Author
1 minute ago, itimpi said:

You need the latest valid licence to be there, the others should be deleted.

Thanks.

 

All three were previously there on my old flash drive.

 

During my Unraid journey, I purchased a plus license, then purchased an upgrade to pro.

 

Just to clarify--I should have only the pro.key file there, even though it isn't linked to this flash drive?

  • Community Expert
  • Solution
12 minutes ago, m0rphl1ng said:

Ooh, I have a diagnostics from three weeks ago.

 

It contains a super.dat

 

Can I just shut down the server and copy this onto the flash drive, then reboot?

If you haven't changed any disk assignments since then.

  • Community Expert

I see there was also a pools folder in config in those. You need that too.

  • Author

Thanks @trurl and @itimpi I am back online.

 

Summary for any posterity that comes across this thread:

 

Initial problem: USB Flash Drive died and user did not have a valid backup.

 

Solution: 

  1. Get every file you can off your dead flash drive.
  2. Purchase new flash drive
  3. Run Unraid USB Flash Creator on new drive
  4. Copy over every old file you can
  5. Copy over any old files, like the /config/super.dat file that contains your array information (disk order) from your most recent diagnostics zip
  6. Delete any old .key files, only keeping the most recent
  7. Run the make_bootable.bat
  8. Start up unraid with your new flash drive installed
  9. Check to make sure your array is correct, and go through the wizard to assign your Unraid key to the new drive
  10. Set up automatic backups of your flash drive to be stored somewhere other than your Unraid server
  11. Thank the awesome community for bailing you out!!!
  • Community Expert
6 minutes ago, m0rphl1ng said:

Set up automatic backups of your flash drive to be stored somewhere other than your Unraid server

Unraid Connect plugin will keep flash backups on the Unraid cloud for you.

  • 1 year later...
On 1/28/2024 at 1:48 PM, m0rphl1ng said:

Thanks @trurl and @itimpi I am back online.

 

Summary for any posterity that comes across this thread:

 

Initial problem: USB Flash Drive died and user did not have a valid backup.

 

Solution: 

  1. Get every file you can off your dead flash drive.
  2. Purchase new flash drive
  3. Run Unraid USB Flash Creator on new drive
  4. Copy over every old file you can
  5. Copy over any old files, like the /config/super.dat file that contains your array information (disk order) from your most recent diagnostics zip
  6. Delete any old .key files, only keeping the most recent
  7. Run the make_bootable.bat
  8. Start up unraid with your new flash drive installed
  9. Check to make sure your array is correct, and go through the wizard to assign your Unraid key to the new drive
  10. Set up automatic backups of your flash drive to be stored somewhere other than your Unraid server
  11. Thank the awesome community for bailing you out!!!

 

Just wanted to thank you for this, saved me a lot of strife

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