I've been running 4.7 for awhile but want AFP so thought i should upgrade.  I downloaded 5.0.6 which directed me to

http://lime-technology.com/wiki/index.php/Upgrade_Instructions

 

In there it says :

 

Version 4.7

Prepare the flash: either shutdown your server and plug the flash into your PC or Stop the array and perform the following actions referencing the flash share on your network:

Copy the files bzimage and bzroot from the zip file to the root of your flash device, overwriting the same-named files already there.

If present, delete these files from the flash (sorry, you will have to re-enter all your users after booting this release):

config/passwd

config/shadow

config/smbpasswd

Reboot your server. Once boot-up has completed, you should see "Stopped. Configuration valid." array status with all disks assigned correctly except for the Cache disk. If you previously had a Cache disk assigned, you will need to re-assign it manually and re-apply any unique configuration settings for it.

Carefully examine the Identification strings for each disk. If you see "MBR: error", or "MBR: unknown" for any disk, do not Start the array; instead post your finding in the Forum announcement thread for this release. If everything looks ok, click Start to bring the array on-line. Note: there is a new configuration setting on the Disk Settings page called "Enable auto start". If you set this to "Yes", then upon next server boot, if the array is valid, then it will be automatically Started (this is the old behavior).

Go to Utils/New Permissions and execute that utility to change file ownership and permission settings. This is necessary for proper operation of the 5.0 security model.

Go to Users page and re-enter all of your users. If you plan on using SMB and/or AFP with either Secure or Private security mode, you must enter at least one user because the 'root' user name is no longer permitted for network share authentication.

 

 

So can i just go from 4.7 directly to 5.0.6 by following those steps or do i need to do upgrade to each major version in order until i get to 5.0.6?

No, you should have no difficulty going from 4.7 to 5.0.6.  Here is another guide which was compiled when the majority of users were upgrading and addresses the issues that some people had during the process.

 

    http://lime-technology.com/wiki/index.php/Migrating_from_unRAID_4.7_to_unRAID_5.0

 

Please understand that most people had absolutely no problems.  The most important thing to remember is not to panic!  If you get some unexpected error (like a disk not formatted, disk missing, etc.), stopped IMMEDIATELY and get help!!!!

 

There is also some incompatibility of some plugins.  (Simple Features is one.  It had been replaced by Dynamix.)  Be prepared to address that issue by applying the proper upgrades. 

 

One thing, I would do is to stop any plugins and run a non-correcting parity check on the array.  If you have any errors, address that issue before starting the upgrade.  And follow the advice to make a backup of the 4.7 software on the flash drive before you start the upgrade process.

 

To give yourself peace of mind, I would recommend doing a non-correcting parity check as soon as you have the array working again under 5.0.6.

 

Ok great, I'll make sure to run a parity check before and after the upgrade.  My version of unraid is pretty stock the only plugin i have is unMenu and used it to schedule a monthly parity check. 

Oh, one more thing.  Print out a copy of the drive assignment and the drive serial numbers.  Then before you start the array after upgrading, check to see that assignments are still the same.  It is particularly important the parity and cache drives assignments are the same!  (I understand that version 5 of unRAID doesn't really care about the data drives that much.)

Ok the upgrade went very well.  Now i gotta add more disks to my array and I should be all set for a few more years.

 

Thanks!

Chris

 

... Now i gotta add more disks to my array and I should be all set for a few more years.

 

Or just start replacing your disks with new 6TB drives 

... Now i gotta add more disks to my array and I should be all set for a few more years.

 

Or just start replacing your disks with new 6TB drives 

 

I personally think one should more carefully analyze the situation than to simply say "go to 6TB drives".  With current drive life being approximately three years, you could be replacing those 6TB drives (due to failure) before you ever got close to filling up the array using drives with that capacity. I believe you would be better served to figure out how fast you add to the array and based your decision on what size array you will need three years down the road.  As that time approaches and the freespace is becoming an issue then you repeat the process.

 

Once I had made that decision on potential array size, I would purchase a drive large enough to support that array size and replace my parity drive with that new drive and add the old parity drive to the array.  Any drive that might fail in the next year would be replaced with the same size drive as the parity drive. 

 

Of course, if two plus years down the road, any drive would fail, I would stop and analyze what the situation (freespace and drive costs at that time) is to determine if that might be an appropriate time to up the parity size again.