I've been running Unraid since 2013 and around 2020 set up a second server for the purpose of having one for file storage and one for VMs and Dockers. As time has gone on and I've replaced drives with larger drives it makes less sense to have the 2 and I'm in the process of consolidating.

The system that is going to remain now has double parity and I am moving files over (using rsync over the network, I know I could mount them as unassigned but this allows me to keep services running for longer)

I have 2 questions:

1) The system that is going away has double parity, I would like to reuse the larger of those (Parity 1) as a data drive in the remaining system, is there a way to pull that drive and not having to rebuild parity in the system that is going away? (Meaning can you have a Parity 2 and not a Parity 1) if so, what are the steps?

2) On the remaining system my appdata folders and VM folders are a mess, multiple locations. I plan to add 2 new SSD 1TBs as a pool, what is the safest way to go about moving all of the appdata from all of their locations to a single location on the new SSD Pool?

2 minutes ago, elbobo said:

(Meaning can you have a Parity 2 and not a Parity 1) if so, what are the steps?

You can, stop array, unassign pariy1, start array, done.

2 minutes ago, elbobo said:

2) On the remaining system my appdata folders and VM folders are a mess, multiple locations. I plan to add 2 new SSD 1TBs as a pool, what is the safest way to go about moving all of the appdata from all of their locations to a single location on the new SSD Pool?

You should be able to use the mover for that:

https://docs.unraid.net/unraid-os/manual/shares/user-shares/#moving-files-from-a-pool-cache-to-the-array

https://docs.unraid.net/unraid-os/manual/shares/user-shares/#moving-files-from-the-array-to-a-pool-cache

1 hour ago, JorgeB said:

You can, stop array, unassign pariy1, start array, done.

You should be able to use the mover for that:

https://docs.unraid.net/unraid-os/manual/shares/user-shares/#moving-files-from-a-pool-cache-to-the-array

https://docs.unraid.net/unraid-os/manual/shares/user-shares/#moving-files-from-the-array-to-a-pool-cache

Thank you for confirming that the Parity Issue is a non-issue

For the 2nd question, the issue is I currently have appdata in the following locations (from the Docker Page Mappings)

/mnt/user/appdata

/mnt/cache/system/docker

/mnt/cache/appdata

I have a feeling I should be able to point the /mnt/cache/appdata one to /mnt/user/appdata without any issues since the /mnt/user/appdata should include the /mnt/cache/appdata which just leaves me with 2 locations.

My original thought was to

1) repoint /mnt/cache/appdata to /mnt/user/appdata and /mnt/cache/system/docker to /mnt/user/system/docker to get them all allowing the fs to direct them

2) Use the mover to move everything to the array

3) Stop the dockers that are pointed at /mnt/user/system/docker

4) Use Rsync to keep permissions and move all folders from /mnt/user/system/docker to /mnt/user/appdata

5) Edit the dockers to look at new directory

6) Start the dockers

7) Use mover to move to the new "AppData and VMs" Cache pool

Just want a sanity check to make sure what I'm thinking makes sense, especially since I'm the kind of person who got it into this mess in the first place.

Thank you

Edited May 26, 20251 yr by elbobo
typed cache instead of user after I had suggested I repoint.

12 hours ago, elbobo said:

/mnt/cache/appdata

12 hours ago, elbobo said:

/mnt/user/appdata

These two are the same and I assume the other one is the image, but post the diagnostics.