Hello,

I am totally new to Unraid and have been running a trial version for almost a month (I purchased a license but have yet to activated it). One of the first things I did was change from USB boot to internal nvme boot and use TPM for license type. I also am using a seperate SSD cache drive for my Appdata and System files. Unfortunately, I did this BEFORE I found out that the internal boot drive counts as one of my 6 drives. Now I would really like to revert back to the USB boot but I'm not having any luck. I made a backup zip of the boot drive using the "Boot Device Backup" option. I then used the Unraid USB Creator to custom mount this zip to a USB drive. But when I try to boot from this USB, nothing happens, the boot order screen just reappears. So I tried the manual method where I named my USB "UNRAID" and manually extracted the backup zip to the drive, but still no luck. I have tried both manual and the Unraid USB creator method on 3 different USB drives, which all displayed a GUID. (Kingston 4GB, Iomega 8GB, and Transcend 4GB, all 2.0 drives.)

I have checked all bios settings to make sure Secure boot is off, CSM is off, IOUMM is enabled, etc.

I've run out of options, but was able to reinstall my nvme boot drive and I'm at least back to square one.

Any thoughts to what I may be doing wrong? I have tried everything I could find online which is why I am here.

Is there a way I can copy the info from my nvme drive to a USB?

If I do a clean install will I lose the data in my array? (I have 2 - 4TB WD RED PLUS, one data, one parity)

What about the data on the cache drive?

Really hoping there is a solution that I have not discovered as I really do not want to start over.

Am totally loving Unraid after trying TrueNAS, OMV and Zima OS. Just regretting not understanding evertything fully before diving in.

Many thanks in advance for any info which could help.

Jon

Edited August 15Aug 15 by Burndaddy

Create a stock install using the USB creator; see if that boots. If it still doesn't, Unraid is not the problem, but most likely the flash drive or a BIOS setting, if that boots, restore only the config folder from the backup, overwriting all files.

Thanks for the reply JorgeB,

Was able to boot the USB with new stock install. Is there a particular method I need to use to restore my backup config to the USB?

Should I use the built-in file manager in Unraid or is there another particular method I need to use?

Also, after I do that, other than changing the boot order in my BIOS, are there any settings in Unraid that need to be changed?

Sorry for the noob questions, I just don't want to fubar everything. ;)

I really appreciate your help, thank you.

11 hours ago, Burndaddy said:

Is there a particular method I need to use to restore my backup config to the USB?

You just need to copy the complete config folder from the backup to the flash drive, overwriting existing files; you can use any method you like.

Thank you, JorgeB.

I temporarily allowed SMB access to the boot drive nvme and simply copied the config folder to flash, replacing stock config.

Back to booting from flash drive.

I appreciate your time.🍻

Edited August 18Aug 18 by Burndaddy