May 31, 200818 yr Hi, i added a new disk but now i have two disk with status unformatted, i stop the array, reboot the system but disk's unformatted are always here what can i do ? if i format the disks i lost my data ? :'( Thanks for help My interface : http://ecaillet95.free.fr/lime.JPG
May 31, 200818 yr unRAID will show a disk as "unformatted" whenever it is unable to mount the "reiserfs" file-system that it expects to exist on it. A disk can fail to be moiunted (and as a result, show up as "unformatted") when ANY of the following occur: The disk is defective (although most times, if defective, it will show up as missing) The disk has a different kind of file-system other than "reiiserfs" (A disk with an NTFS file-system, or FAT file-system, of ext2 filesystem will show as unformatted) The disk was "busy" (If a disk is already mounted, it cannot be mounted again. If a disk is "busy" it cannot be un-mounted. If you telnet to unRAID and "cd" to a folder on a drive, it is "busy." Or if you, or a script you add, is reading or writing a file at the time the un-mount of that disk is attempted, it is "busy" and will not be unmounted. Either can result in the drive being falsely reported as "unformatted" since unRAID can not properly unmount the disk, and then subsequently re-mount the disk.) The disk has a corrupt reiserfs file-system. The disk is really unformatted. (It may even be partitioned, but no file-system was ever created on it) If disk1 AND disk5 have no files on them, and they are really both unformatted because you are just now starting to assemble your array, then you should be able to use the "Format" button to format them. However, if either disk1 or disk5 has files on it that you do not want to lose, do NOT use the format button, as it will erase those files and (obviously) re-format the disks. If disk1 and 5 are "really" unformatted, use the "Format" button. If anything else, post a copy of your syslog, describe how the two disks were added, what you think is on them, and we'll advise. Instruction on how to save a copy of the syslog are here: http://lime-technology.com/wiki/index.php?title=Troubleshooting Joe L.
May 31, 200818 yr (Great explanation, added to the "Best of the Forums" (http://lime-technology.com/wiki/index.php?title=Best_of_the_Forums) As Joe L. has said a number of times before, rebooting can often resolve an unformatted disk issue if due to a "busy" situation (see third bullet in Joe's explanation). (This user apparently already tried that.)
May 31, 200818 yr Author Thanks for your answer, disk 1 and 5 have data and i don't/can't loose it. I already restart my server and it don't work.
May 31, 200818 yr Have you had a chance, as Joe suggested, to capture your syslog? It *may* help us see what unRAID is seeing, in regard to those 2 drives. And any other info as to the 2 drives and the new disk would be helpful. [seems strange to see a green ball by one of the 'unformatted' drives] Also, this is where I would boot my BootItNG disk, and take a look at each of those disks. If you have a good partition manager, on a bootable disk, you can use it to examine the partition structure on each drive. If not, look into downloading the Parted Magic live CD at http://partedmagic.com/wiki/PartedMagic.php. There is also an fdisk tool in the unRAID distro, but be very careful with whatever tool you use. You can easily make things MUCH worse. Unless you are comfortable using tools like these, I would make no changes at all, tell us or show us what you see, and let us advise you. Once we know about your partition integrity, we can make further recommendations, such as using TestDisk to recover partitions, or reiserfsck to repair your file systems. By the way, what disk is the new disk you just added?
May 31, 200818 yr Author Hi, you can get my syslog file here : http://ecaillet95.free.fr/syslog.txt I answer to your answer in few minutes Big thanks for help.
May 31, 200818 yr You started this thread with the words: I added a new disk Did you ever format the new disk? Do you expect one unformatted disk at this time? (and the other is un-expected) Which disk did you add? The reason I ask is that sometimes, Linux will scan and assign disks in a different order when it encounters new hardware. This might result in /dev/sda now becoming /dev/sdb... In other words, perhaps you did not notice the serial numbers had switched on the display. If you are expecting one unformatted drive, I suspect that you have transposed the parity drive with one of your data drives. The parity drive would fail to mount as a data drive, and therefore would appear as unformatted. The new drive is really unformatted, so it represents the other "unformatted" drive. How you proceed now is critical to not losing your data. I hope you did not press the "format" button... ("Or, even worse in this case, the "Restore" button) Step 1. Stop the array using the Stop button. Step 2. Verify the disk serial numbers... If you are not certain which of the 500Gig drives has your files, and which has parity we need to check each in turn. Step 3. Go to the Devices page and un-assign the parity drive. If it is the data drive, we do not want to write anything to it at this time to clobber your data. Step 4. You can attempt to re-start the array with the parity drive un-assigned. (It might start, it might not... does not really matter) Step 5. Post a copy of your syslog. Most important, post a copy of your syslog. A screen print of the devices page can't hurt either. Do not use the "Restore" button. Do not use the "Format" button. Either can cause you to lose your data if you have your disks mis-assigned. You will need to test each disk in turn to see if it has a file system. The one you might have accidentally assigned as parity might need to be "repaired" So, after we get a few more facts from you, we can give more advice. For each data disk partition expected to have a file-system... (They will be /dev/sdb1, /dev/sdc1, etc. or /dev/hda1, /dev/hdb1 for IDE devices.) you will need to run the reiserfsck program on it in turn. You will not need to check the parity drive, it never has a file-system. Once we are sure we have identified all the correct device names for the data drives, and done any repair using reiserfcsk, we can assign then correctly on the Deices page and go about re-assigning, and then re-computing parity. When we get a screen shot of the "Devices" page, or a copy of your syslog we can describe what to do in more detail. Joe L.
May 31, 200818 yr Author Hi, big thanks for your explanation. <Did you ever format the new disk? Do you expect one unformatted disk at this time? (and the other is un-expected) No i never format the new disk and i expect one unformatted disk. <Which disk did you add? The new disk is SAMSUNG HD501LJ / S0MUJDSP617138. <The reason I ask is that sometimes, Linux will scan and assign disks in a different order when it encounters new hardware. This might result in /dev/sda now becoming /dev/sdb... In other words, perhaps you did not notice the serial numbers had switched on <the display. With this explanation i understand my problem, certainly Linux assign disks in a different order, and i did not notice the serial numbers <If you are expecting one unformatted drive, I suspect that you have transposed the parity drive with one of your data drives. The parity drive would fail to mount as a data drive, and therefore would appear as unformatted. The new drive is really unformatted, <so it represents the other "unformatted" drive. I can find the parity drive serial number because it is in a first slot of my tower and it's a SAMSUNG brand. I'm going to check this. But for be extra sure, if i read this disk on my PC (Windows XP) what format i have ? <Step 3. Go to the Devices page and un-assign the parity drive. If it is the data drive, we do not want to write anything to it at this time to clobber your data. I don't understand this ; if i do not assign a parity drive i can't start my array. I don't understand the word 'clobber', sorry i'm french Next chapter in few hours
May 31, 200818 yr Hi, big thanks for your explanation. <Did you ever format the new disk? Do you expect one unformatted disk at this time? (and the other is un-expected) No i never format the new disk and i expect one unformatted disk. <Which disk did you add? The new disk is SAMSUNG HD501LJ / S0MUJDSP617138. <The reason I ask is that sometimes, Linux will scan and assign disks in a different order when it encounters new hardware. This might result in /dev/sda now becoming /dev/sdb... In other words, perhaps you did not notice the serial numbers had switched on <the display. With this explanation i understand my problem, certainly Linux assign disks in a different order, and i did not notice the serial numbers <If you are expecting one unformatted drive, I suspect that you have transposed the parity drive with one of your data drives. The parity drive would fail to mount as a data drive, and therefore would appear as unformatted. The new drive is really unformatted, <so it represents the other "unformatted" drive. I can find the parity drive serial number because it is in a first slot of my tower and it's a SAMSUNG brand. I'm going to check this. But for be extra sure, if i read this disk on my PC (Windows XP) what format i have ? The parity drive is just a collection of bits, each bit position a result of math done on the equivalent bit position across all your drives. It will appear to windows as nothing it can understand at all. I would not bother installing your parity drive on a windows PC, it will be ureadable for sure. As long as you are certain a specific drive is the parity drive, then it is ok to assign it the parity slot. <Step 3. Go to the Devices page and un-assign the parity drive. If it is the data drive, we do not want to write anything to it at this time to clobber your data. I don't understand this ; if i do not assign a parity drive i can't start my array. I don't understand the word 'clobber', sorry i'm french Next chapter in few hours I think your English is perfectly fine. Clobber, in this case, is "slang" for overwrite important data. I wanted you to un-assign the data drive you might have assigned to the parity slot so you would not write to it any more. Once you figure out the correct parity drive, it is ok to re-assign it to the parity slot. The advice is still good. un-assign the data drive from the parity drive slot, and then properly assign the parity drive to the parity slot. Now, when you go back to the main page it might be possible to start the array. It will not be completely recovered, but you should see only one unformatted drive (if you are lucky) If it does start, do not write anything to it just yet. Odds are your data drive file system needs to be checked and repaired. Odds are high it got some corruption when it was in the parity slot. Again, do not press "Format" or "Restore" If the array starts, good, but if it does not, just report back once more with what you see. Joe L.
June 2, 200818 yr From your screen shot I can see that a small number of blocks were written to the currently assigned "parity drive" (But was actually your data drive accidentally assigned to the parity slot) These blocks written to the device may have overwritten something important, or may have just written to the disks housekeeping area of the file system. Regardless, we will need to do a file-system check to repair whatever might have been damaged. You might want to run the reiserfsck check on all your data drives in turn. Odds are only disk1 will have anything to fix. Once you assign the drives to their proper slots, use the procedure described in the wiki to check the reiser file-systems. (If you are able to start the array you can use this procedure, if the array can not start, let us know and we can give alternate instructions.) http://lime-technology.com/wiki/index.php?title=Check_Disk_Filesystems While you suspect file-system damage, do not write to the suspected damaged disk. In your case, do not write to disk1. It would probably only make things worse. Once all your file systems are fixed, you will need to do a full parity "Check" using the "Check" button. That will repair any parity bits that might be out of sync. (there might be a few errors, do not worry. They should not appear if you check parity a second time.) Joe L.
June 3, 200818 yr Author Hi all, some news, some good news i did a reiserfsck --rebuild-tree and the computer has turned all night, and now it's ok, i have all my HDD, i formatted the new one, i'm going to launch a parity check now. 10000 thanks to you for yours advices Cheers
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