Transferring Files and Adding a Cache Drive to your unRAID® Server


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I like your Blog writeups.

 

On this one, the graphics are a bit out of sync...

about 2/3 of the way down, at:

EXAMPLE AVS-10/4...

There's a graphic with 5 slots/4slots/5 slots.

Each slot is shown filled with a drive, and the drive size is shown.

In the next graphic, the webGUI shot, shows a different setup...only six disks, and the sizes of the installed disks are different between the two graphics.

But what actually intrigued me most was the comment about using 'Slot 9' for cache...I fear that will spawn all kinds of questions about 'why'?

--Is that just a best practice to keep things organized?

--is there a technical requirement for using slot 9?

--and on my generic-86 box, I only have 5 slots, so which slot should *I* use?

 

I know, I know, 'Picky Picky'.  ::)

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I like your Blog writeups.

 

On this one, the graphics are a bit out of sync...

about 2/3 of the way down, at:

EXAMPLE AVS-10/4...

There's a graphic with 5 slots/4slots/5 slots.

Each slot is shown filled with a drive, and the drive size is shown.

In the next graphic, the webGUI shot, shows a different setup...only six disks, and the sizes of the installed disks are different between the two graphics.

But what actually intrigued me most was the comment about using 'Slot 9' for cache...I fear that will spawn all kinds of questions about 'why'?

--Is that just a best practice to keep things organized?

--is there a technical requirement for using slot 9?

--and on my generic-86 box, I only have 5 slots, so which slot should *I* use?

 

I know, I know, 'Picky Picky'.  ::)

Thanks Dale, great catch.  I just changed the first diagram and used the the concept of slots instead of disks.  Slots 1-5 are for 3.5" drives on the left, slots 6-10 are for 3.5" drives on the right, and slots 11-14 are for the 2.5" drives in the middle.

The reason we have the far right slot allocated for the Cache disk is just due to how TomM likes to wire the AVS-10/4.  The motherboard has two SATA3 ports and four SATA2 ports.  He has the far left and far right slots attached  to the SATA3 ports as he uses the far left for Parity and the far right for Cache, and they can benefit from the extra speed.  The other four SATA2 ports are attached to slots 2-5.  The remaining 8 slots are attached to a SAS2/SATA3 add-on card.  Slots 11-14 are 2.5" and can accommodate SSD Flash drives, also great for using as Cache due to their speed ("Cache Pool" feature coming soon  :)).

 

TomH

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  • 3 weeks later...
  • 4 weeks later...

This is a great article and i wish i had this when i first setup my unraid.

when i first setup my unraid i used this guide http://tinyurl.com/k6pglbp because i was going to use all of those apps.

 

However recently i change my cache to a bigger drive and I hosed it. So i started essentially new. I realize that i had setup my cache and apps incorrectly and they only thing using my cache was the apps.

 

so my question is this, once i set a share name say "media" and create my sub folder (movies music etc) and choose the setting use cache *YES* do i have to create the same file structure on the cache drive as the share? so when SB or CP move files to their final resting place on the cache drive  mover will move them to the array from cache?

 

I might just start fresh since my data will still be there. with no plugins and go from there after the parity finishes.

 

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This is a great article and i wish i had this when i first setup my unraid.

when i first setup my unraid i used this guide http://tinyurl.com/k6pglbp because i was going to use all of those apps.

 

However recently i change my cache to a bigger drive and I hosed it. So i started essentially new. I realize that i had setup my cache and apps incorrectly and they only thing using my cache was the apps.

 

so my question is this, once i set a share name say "media" and create my sub folder (movies music etc) and choose the setting use cache *YES* do i have to create the same file structure on the cache drive as the share? so when SB or CP move files to their final resting place on the cache drive  mover will move them to the array from cache?

 

I might just start fresh since my data will still be there. with no plugins and go from there after the parity finishes.

I'm glad you found this post useful. 

 

Once you enable the Cache on your "Media" Share, it will be automatically replicated on the Cache drive (preferred method).  While you can duplicate the Shares on the Cache, make sure there aren't any typos/misspellings or else the data won't get transferred.

 

As you capture data from SB or CP, it will automatically go to the Cache drive first.  The Mover will take care of moving any new data to the array at 3:20 am (default setting), unless you change the time.  Once the transfer is successfully completed, the original files on the Cache will be deleted.

 

TomH

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  • 2 weeks later...

on more question, i have a share that has a a ton of media, i set the cache to "yes" but it did not replicate the folder structure? how do i get it to do it?

 

thanks

 

Just write to the share -- it should cache the write, which will cause the necessary folders to be created on your cache drive.  Reading from a share has no impact on the cache drive.

 

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  • 8 months later...

I don't know if this is out of scope.  But maybe there should be an addition on how one might transfer from an unRAID server to another.  I'm going from an unadventurous unRAID implementation (Media server/ Data backup) to trying to test EVERYTHING I've been reading in the blog.  Pathetically copying from one server to the other without using my Windows 7 as an intermediary has been consuming my time.  I am going to try to some directions a fellow unRAID user was kind enough to post...but an addtion to this blog might be quite helpful for us low to mid (barely) level skillsets.

Thanks (as always)

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