Hi all,

 

I hope I'm posting in the right area.  I'm running unRaid 4.7.  I set up my server a couple of years ago and haven't had any problems until now when I noticed that my files aren't being moved to the right drives.

 

I have two 2TB drives and a number of user shares.  User shares are set up as follows:

 

TV (parent) > TV > Series > Season

 

Movies (parent) > Movies> Movie Title

 

TV is set to Split Level 3 and Movies is set to Split Level 2 and both have Min. Free Space set.  Each user share was set to high-water allocation and I just noticed that Disk1 is full while Disk2 is empty.

 

I panicked and changed the allocation method to Most-Free.  To test the changes, I downloaded an episode of a TV show to see which disk it was allocated to.  I expected it to be sent to Disk 2, since it has the most free space, but it was still allocated to Disk 1.

 

I've been reading the manual over and over and I can't seem to figure out where I'm going wrong.  Is it an issue with the Split Level?  Allocation Method?  I'm completely lost.

 

Thank you!

 

I believe the way your splits are set up, once the folder 'Family Guy' is started on a physical disk, all future episodes will end up on that physical disk.

Personally, I find the whole 'split level' discussion valuable only in two cases:

1. Mac TIMEMACHINE must always be on ONE disk. (use INCLUDE, and not Split Level)

2. For DVD rips where you end up with multiple VOB files, you want ALL the files associated with a movie to be in on the same disk. That way, the VOBs are all spun up as they play, and you don't get a pause in the middle of the action scene as the film reels are changed, I mean, a new disk spins up.

 

Dumb question: Is it really neccessary to use the split levels, or can i just use the allocation method?

I'd guess that 90% of users don't need split levels.

The 10% that remain have ripped entire DVD's with all the little files contained therein.

 

The unRAID defaults almost always work fine, until someone runs into a specific need.

 

If all your files are like the screenshot- each TV episode is a .mkv or a .mp4-  then 'no', you don't need split levels. Allocation across disks will work just fine for you.

 

Split level has precedence over allocation. The split level should be 4 in order for disk2 to be used for Season12.

Dumb question: Is it really neccessary to use the split levels, or can i just use the allocation method?

 

It's not necessary to use either -- UnRAID will work just fine without them.    As already noted, there are a few cases where you want all files associated with a specific folder to be stored on the same disk (e.g. DVD VOB's) that it can be handy -- but it's not required, and UnRAID will still work just fine even if those files are on different disks.

 

Thanks for everybody making me a bit smarter on that topic.