Not at all happy. wanted to remove a drive from array, so looked in FAQ here: http://lime-technology.com/wiki/index.php/FAQ_remove_drive

 

Says nothing about it forgetting all your drive assignments. Mixed up 2 hitachi drives when I reassigned them (one data and one parity), now its rebuilding parity on my data drive: so 2TB gone. It's shocking the FAQ says nothing about it destroying the config.

 

With flexraid, I can easily split up a raid and reassemble using meaningful names, etc.

 

The data's gone from your UnRAID array ... but not from your backups.    Just copy it back from the backups after the parity rebuild is completed.

 

For future reference, anytime you're redoing a config, it's a good idea to assign everything EXCEPT parity; then Start the array and confirm it doesn't shown any unformatted disks (unless you expect them -- i.e. a new disk or an old parity disk); and then ... when you're sure all's okay ... Stop the array and assign the parity drive.

 

It does not forget all your drive assignments. YOU forgot your drive assignments and mixed up parity with data. That would do it.

It does not forget all your drive assignments. YOU forgot your drive assignments and mixed up parity with data. That would do it.

 

This is true however the FAQ said nothing of the sort.

I accept it was my mistake, and I'm not looking to blame anyone. it was all movie ISO's and I'm going to start replacing those with MKV's, so would have to re-rip anyway.

 

I did have screen shots of all config screens, but having several drives from the same manufacturer, means the numbers are similar.

 

A few take always:

 

• The FAQ (which seems to be the manual), should fully detail what's going to happen and cautionary notes
  
• I think it's poor that there is no simple "Remove Drive" function in the UI (even if, in the background it disbands and recreates the array)
  
• IMHO, it would make sense for unRAID to put some kind of identifier on each drive (e.g. a simple text file) and warn the user if they assigned, for example, the previous drive 1 to drive 2 when starting the array. It's better to have a single nag when doing something as critical as managing the array's drives, than making the mistake I made.
  

 

 

I accept it was my mistake

 

A few take always:

 

The most often use of my backups is to recover from user error.

 

Sent from my mobile

 

 

• The FAQ (which seems to be the manual), should fully detail what's going to happen and cautionary notes
  
• I think it's poor that there is no simple "Remove Drive" function in the UI (even if, in the background it disbands and recreates the array)
  
• IMHO, it would make sense for unRAID to put some kind of identifier on each drive (e.g. a simple text file) and warn the user if they assigned, for example, the previous drive 1 to drive 2 when starting the array. It's better to have a single nag when doing something as critical as managing the array's drives, than making the mistake I made.
  

I tend to agree.  I don't see why a remove drive function doesn't exist.  I don't think it has to be extravagant just as simple as drop drive(s) from array and invalidate the parity drive so that a parity rebuild is required.  All without having to remember the drive serial numbers and doing an "init config" and possibly make your mistake because you mix them up.

 

Also as to data loss:

I had a somewhat similar problem I tried to rebuild on top of a full cache drive of data.  I stopped it before it got too far and was able to use reiserfsck to recover all but ~200GB of data on a 2TB drive.  So it you stopped it soon enough you might have similar results if you run the "reiserfsck" tool.

Thanks for reply Bob. It was a few hours into parity rebuild when I noticed. I assumes it would clear the parity drive first, so didn't bother trying any recover anything. As it was movies I'm going to rerip anyway, was no big deal, will just take a few weeks of putting 2-3 movies a night into my PC to re-rip

I do agree that the official documentation is lacking. It's also out of date.

 

For future reference, I've removed drives many times from my arrays and one very valuable tip to follow is:

 

When you assign drives, assign all the drives apart from the parity using the screenshot from the previous configuration. Then start the array. Go through every drive (i.e. \\tower\disk1, \\tower\disk2, and check all the data is there. Then, and only then, stop the array and add the parity drive.

 

If you do that, you pretty much can't go wrong -- if you had accidentally assigned the parity drive to a drive slot, there wouldn't be any data on (for example) \\tower\disk3 .

I've always suggested doing exactly that => assign everything EXCEPT parity and confirm the array looks good.  Not only would a miss-assigned parity drive not have data; but UnRAID would want to format it when you Started the array => that's a good clue that you've got something assigned wrong 

...  will just take a few weeks of putting 2-3 movies a night into my PC to re-rip

 

Since you apparently planned to re-rip anyway, I suppose that's not all that bad.  But "... a few weeks ..." of time sure seems like a good case for backups !! 

 

Note that your comment that "... it was all movie ISO's and I'm going to start replacing those with MKV's, so would have to re-rip anyway " isn't correct => if you've already got the ISO's, there's no need to re-rip, you can simply create MKV's from the ISO  [MUCH faster and easier than re-ripping].    In fact, you can set up a batch transcode to do an entire folder full of ISO's without intervention [i.e. you could do your entire collection if you wanted => obviously the transcoding would run for a LONG time, but it'd take about 5 minutes of "your" time vs. all those hours of "computer" time.

 

...  will just take a few weeks of putting 2-3 movies a night into my PC to re-rip

 

Since you apparently planned to re-rip anyway, I suppose that's not all that bad.  But "... a few weeks ..." of time sure seems like a good case for backups !! 

 

Note that your comment that "... it was all movie ISO's and I'm going to start replacing those with MKV's, so would have to re-rip anyway " isn't correct => if you've already got the ISO's, there's no need to re-rip, you can simply create MKV's from the ISO  [MUCH faster and easier than re-ripping].    In fact, you can set up a batch transcode to do an entire folder full of ISO's without intervention [i.e. you could do your entire collection if you wanted => obviously the transcoding would run for a LONG time, but it'd take about 5 minutes of "your" time vs. all those hours of "computer" time.

 

 

I did this recently. ~300 DVD ISOs took less than a day to convert to MKVs and copy to a new folder on unRAID.

I do agree that the official documentation is lacking. It's also out of date.

 

For future reference, I've removed drives many times from my arrays and one very valuable tip to follow is:

 

When you assign drives, assign all the drives apart from the parity using the screenshot from the previous configuration. Then start the array. Go through every drive (i.e. \\tower\disk1, \\tower\disk2, and check all the data is there. Then, and only then, stop the array and add the parity drive.

 

If you do that, you pretty much can't go wrong -- if you had accidentally assigned the parity drive to a drive slot, there wouldn't be any data on (for example) \\tower\disk3 .

 

Good tip. Never occurred to me. For some reason I was thinking I could start the array without a parity drive

...  will just take a few weeks of putting 2-3 movies a night into my PC to re-rip

 

Since you apparently planned to re-rip anyway, I suppose that's not all that bad.  But "... a few weeks ..." of time sure seems like a good case for backups !! 

 

Note that your comment that "... it was all movie ISO's and I'm going to start replacing those with MKV's, so would have to re-rip anyway " isn't correct => if you've already got the ISO's, there's no need to re-rip, you can simply create MKV's from the ISO  [MUCH faster and easier than re-ripping].    In fact, you can set up a batch transcode to do an entire folder full of ISO's without intervention [i.e. you could do your entire collection if you wanted => obviously the transcoding would run for a LONG time, but it'd take about 5 minutes of "your" time vs. all those hours of "computer" time.

 

I'm in the process of building a backup server (building new main server and current will become backup). I've never backup up my ISO's, because a) I have the original data on disk and b) it would have cost over $1000 to build a device, which would be in same structure as main server, so fire, etc. would wipe them both out. Currently trying to figure out how to get an environmentally acceptable enclosure in detached garage in Chicago (separate thread)

 

Regarding making the MKV's, a few comments

 

1. I've yet to find a tool to do it all automatically. DVD Fab is closest, but still have to makes sure it's selected correct title (e.g. theatrical vs director's cut and correct sound (e.g. TrueHD or DTS-MA)

 

2. I don't have enough disk space to do them all at once. I'd want to check every MKV before deleting ISO. (Still deciding whether it's worth investing in more drive capacity to keep ISO's - current thinking is, it's not)

 

3. My time is same (give or take) even if batched, because of 1. Even doing over a few weeks, the net time is same. I still have to load every disk/iso (agreed it would be a bit quicker to load ISO if DVDFab supports this), make/check selection and add to queue. I accept, I could add 10 to a queue in ten minutes and that would take 3 days to do my way (1 every morning and two every evening), but there's no rush to get it all back (first world problem)

 

 

I haven't done it with BluRay, but for DVDs, I can confirm that MakeMKV command line works great.

I haven't done it with BluRay, but for DVDs, I can confirm that MakeMKV command line works great.

 

Yeah, DVD's are a piece of cake. BD's are whole different kettle of fish