Greetings all,

One of my drives apparently failed during write. However it was a connection issue rather than a real HDD issue.

Now the drive is "redballed" and array does not bring it back on.

 

What do I want to do? I just want to green it, the data is fine, I know.

The wiki info is dated (I'm at 5.0) and the recommendation ("mdcmd set invalidslot 99" etc.) does not seem to work.

 

What is the 5.0-ready, textbook way to place a drive back online?

 

Thanks!!

If you are absolutely positive it was the cable that caused the red-ball... with the array stopped, un-assign red-balled drive, start array, stop array, then add previous red-balled drive back to the same disk#, start array and then let the data rebuild and parity check finish. That's how i had to fix my drive/cable issues on my machines and a couple others. I dont think there's an easier way than that, especially if there was data on the drive.

Thanks for the quick response!!

 

I guess I will now start the process you described. As far as I understand it, this process will rebuild the disk from the parity. Actually I was hoping there's a way to tell the array "trust this drive, it was just disconnected, I know what I'm doing"; some wiki pages hinted this is possible, but provided directions that were valid in unRAID 4 and not in 5.

 

Thanks again!

I was hoping there's a way to tell the array "trust this drive, it was just disconnected ...

 

There is.    Just do a New Config => assign all your disks and check the "Trust Parity" box.

 

That will assign all the disks as you've set them AND assume the parity disk is good.  DO NOT do this if you have ANY doubts ... but if you're certain, then it will work fine.    Note that despite my warning, it's not much different from just rebuilding the drive -- that obviously "trusts" that parity is good as well -- otherwise your rebuilt disk wouldn't be good 

Actually I was hoping there's a way to tell the array "trust this drive, it was just disconnected, I know what I'm doing"

Keep in mind, if there were any operations done to the drive while it was red balled, whatever changes were made are not on the drive, they were done to the parity, so trusting the drive will undo those changes.

Yes indeed.    That's why I noted that if there are ANY doubts about the validity of the drive, you should not do the New Config w/"Trust Parity" option.

 

The real lesson of this (and many other threads where various issues are discovered and sometimes actions have already been taken that make full recovery "iffy" at best) ... is the importance of BACKUPS 

 

Thanks all. This is very helpful. You don't get into these parts until you actually need to :-)

The disk is almost done being rebuilt and things look fine.

 

garycase, when you mention "new config" - this is done by "initconfig", no GUI support for this, correct?

garycase, when you mention "new config" - this is done by "initconfig", no GUI support for this, correct?

 

Sure there is.    Your first post indicates you're running v5.0 ["... I'm at 5.0"]  ==> so you simply go to the Web GUI, click on the Utils tab; then click on New Config.

 

... and you're right again, obviously.

Thank you. Live and learn.