MDEnce Posted February 18, 2015 Share Posted February 18, 2015 I finally filled up my old array. In case it matters my config is: unRAID Server Pro - version: 5.0-rc16c drives: parity 2tb drive 1 - 2tb drive 2 - 2tb drive 3 - 1.5tb drive 4 - 1.5tb drive 5 - 1.5tb drive 6 - 1.5tb drive 7 - 1.5tb (BAD) drive 8 - 1.5tb cache 500 MB So I have 2 new 3tb drives, 2 new 2tb drives and another 1.5tb drive that I want to add to the array. I know that one of the 3tb's will need to be the new parity drive. First trick was getting them all in one case. Swapped the box for my desktop tower, used 2 3in2 mounts for the 5.25" bays, tweaked with the 2.5" mounting rail, and finally got all 14 drives in the case. Next trick is getting signal to all these drives. MB has 6 SATA connectors. Mono Price card gave me 4 more for the original 10. Just ordered a PCI-e (only open slot on MB) 4 port card for the rest. In the mean time I plugged the BAD 1.5tb drives cable into one of the new 2tb drives, and it is slowly being added. Meanwhile, I see that v.6 is out, and the docker looks like something I want to try. It also looks like I may not need a dedicated cache drive with v.6 SO the question is how do I: 1) swap the 2tb parity for a new 3tb parity drive; 2) add the rest of the new drives (when thePCI-e card arrives); and 3) upgrade to v.6; all in the most efficient way? Link to comment
itimpi Posted February 18, 2015 Share Posted February 18, 2015 I finally filled up my old array. In case it matters my config is: unRAID Server Pro - version: 5.0-rc16c If you are going to stay on v5 then it would be sensible to update to the v5 final. Note however that the Simple Features GUI (if you are using it) is incompatible with v5 final, but Dynamix (which has superseded it) can be used as an enhanced GUI. drives: parity 2tb drive 1 - 2tb drive 2 - 2tb drive 3 - 1.5tb drive 4 - 1.5tb drive 5 - 1.5tb drive 6 - 1.5tb drive 7 - 1.5tb (BAD) drive 8 - 1.5tb cache 500 MB So I have 2 new 3tb drives, 2 new 2tb drives and another 1.5tb drive that I want to add to the array. I know that one of the 3tb's will need to be the new parity drive. First trick was getting them all in one case. Swapped the box for my desktop tower, used 2 3in2 mounts for the 5.25" bays, tweaked with the 2.5" mounting rail, and finally got all 14 drives in the case. Next trick is getting signal to all these drives. MB has 6 SATA connectors. Mono Price card gave me 4 more for the original 10. Just ordered a PCI-e (only open slot on MB) 4 port card for the rest. In the mean time I plugged the BAD 1.5tb drives cable into one of the new 2tb drives, and it is slowly being added. Meanwhile, I see that v.6 is out, and the docker looks like something I want to try. It also looks like I may not need a dedicated cache drive with v.6 Many people use a cache drive to host apps, docker conatiners and VM's with v6 even if not being used to enhance performance for writing data files (which still applies). SO the question is how do I: The 3 questions are largely independent and need not be done in the order you list them. 1) swap the 2tb parity for a new 3tb parity drive; Do a parity check to ensure all drives are OK; stop the array; change the drive assignment to the new parity drive; restart the array to recalculate parity. You should keep the old parity drive around until this is finished if you want to be able to revert in the case of any issues arising. This is the same whether you are using v5 or v6. 2) add the rest of the new drives (when thePCI-e card arrives); and Ideally you use the pre-clear script first to preclear them first (to minimise array down time) and confidence check them. Then the process is stop the array; assign the drive (s); start the array (the drive will show as unformatted); select the option to format the drive. If you do not pre-clear the drives before adding them then the array is unavailable while unRAID writes zeroes to them which can take many hours for large drives - if pre-cleared first this delay does not happen. The process is the same for v5 and v6, the only difference is the v6 will by default select XFS format (although you can change this to Reiserfs or BTRFS if you want) and v5 always uses Reiserfs format. 3) upgrade to v.6; Note that you have to decide if you are going to use the same USB flash drive for v6 as you currently use for v5. A lot of us have taken advantage of the current offer to get another key for $30 while v6 beta is running so that we can have a separate USB key for v6 and later when we are happy we no longer need v5 then the v5 Flash drive can act as an emergency backup against the v6 flash drive failing. Assuming that you are NOT going to get a new key for v6, in preparation you should back up the files on your current flash to an external system (e.g. PC) so you can easily revert if so desired. Since all v5 plugins (32-bit) are incompatible with v6 (64-bit) there is a lot to be said for now proceeding as if it were a new system and formatting the flash and following the process for a new system. You would want to copy you rlicense key and the configuration files from your backup to bring the existing configuration across unchanged. One thing to note is that if you add new drives in v6 they are formatted to XFS by default. If you want to use those drives on a v5 system then you need to select reiserfs instead when adding them. all in the most efficient way? As was mentioned the order probably does not matter. It really depends on what you want to try out first. Link to comment
tdallen Posted February 18, 2015 Share Posted February 18, 2015 I view XFS as one of the nice features of v6. Therefore, I'd 1) Upgrade Parity 2) Upgrade to v6 3) Add drives in XFS format Go slowly, backup your USB stick after each step and carefully review syslogs. Keep in mind that all of your plugins will need to be updated. If you are hurting for disk space it may make sense to add the drives before upgrading, but I'd minimize the disks to be added to avoid the further upgrade from ReiserFS to XFS. Link to comment
MDEnce Posted February 18, 2015 Author Share Posted February 18, 2015 unRAID Server Pro - version: 5.0-rc16c If you are going to stay on v5 then it would be sensible to update to the v5 final. Note however that the Simple Features GUI (if you are using it) is incompatible with v5 final, but Dynamix (which has superseded it) can be used as an enhanced GUI. Tried Simple Features, preferred unMenu, but due to port conflicts with SAB, I've just been using the stock unRAID GUI Meanwhile, I see that v.6 is out, and the docker looks like something I want to try. It also looks like I may not need a dedicated cache drive with v.6 Many people use a cache drive to host apps, docker conatiners and VM's with v6 even if not being used to enhance performance for writing data files (which still applies). OK. I just thought with the "Cache Pool" feature of v.6, having a separate cache drive was unnecessary. I don't run VM's, but I do host my v.5 plug-ins on the Cache drive. The 3 questions are largely independent and need not be done in the order you list them. The numbers were not meant to denote an order, only that there was more than question. Do a parity check to ensure all drives are OK; stop the array; change the drive assignment to the new parity drive; restart the array to recalculate parity. You should keep the old parity drive around until this is finished if you want to be able to revert in the case of any issues arising. This is the same whether you are using v5 or v6. OK, I kind of knew this was how to do this, just wanted confirmation. The fact that v.6 will change the file system though is useful info. I'll likely keep the old parity drive intact until I have the new set-up running well. Then I'll preclear it and add it back as another data drive Ideally you use the pre-clear script first to preclear them first (to minimise array down time) and confidence check them. Then the process is stop the array; assign the drive (s); start the array (the drive will show as unformatted); select the option to format the drive. If you do not pre-clear the drives before adding them then the array is unavailable while unRAID writes zeroes to them which can take many hours for large drives - if pre-cleared first this delay does not happen. The process is the same for v5 and v6, the only difference is the v6 will by default select XFS format (although you can change this to Reiserfs or BTRFS if you want) and v5 always uses Reiserfs format. So you are suggesting I create a new flash (using my 2nd key) for a v.6 system, so I can revert to v.5 in the future if I want to. But to do so, I'll need to EITHER add the new drives before I upgrade to v.6, OR change the file system format to Reiserfs, so if I do revert back, v.5 can still read my data. 3)Note that you have to decide if you are going to use the same USB flash drive for v6 as you currently use for v5. A lot of us have taken advantage of the current offer to get another key for $30 while v6 beta is running so that we can have a separate USB key for v6 and later when we are happy we no longer need v5 then the v5 Flash drive can act as an emergency backup against the v6 flash drive failing. I bought 2 keys originally, but have only used 1 (can't find the email though - stupid gmail) What's the "current offer" (and do I even need to worry about it if I already have an extra key)? BTW, thanks for your detailed response. I found it helpful. Link to comment
MDEnce Posted February 18, 2015 Author Share Posted February 18, 2015 I view XFS as one of the nice features of v6. Therefore, I'd 1) Upgrade Parity 2) Upgrade to v6 3) Add drives in XFS format Go slowly, backup your USB stick after each step and carefully review syslogs. Keep in mind that all of your plugins will need to be updated. If you are hurting for disk space it may make sense to add the drives before upgrading, but I'd minimize the disks to be added to avoid the further upgrade from ReiserFS to XFS. What do you perceive the benefits/PRO's of XFS to be? On the CON side I can see the inability to revert to v.5. (But if I get v.6 working the chance of reverting in the future are very slim) Also, if I were to go XFS, wouldn't I want to have the new Parity drive formatted in XFS too? (so then shouldn't I add it after the upgrade?) And wouldn't that also entail moving all the stuff from my old drives to the new XFS drives, so I could then reformat the old drives in XFS? () Honestly I've not done my research on all the changes with v.6, (I've been working the hardware issues out first) but I have no fear of giving it a shot. I just don't want to regret not doing things as efficiently as I might have, after the fact. Link to comment
Squid Posted February 19, 2015 Share Posted February 19, 2015 What do you perceive the benefits/PRO's of XFS to be? On the CON side I can see the inability to revert to v.5. (But if I get v.6 working the chance of reverting in the future are very slim) Also, if I were to go XFS, wouldn't I want to have the new Parity drive formatted in XFS too? (so then shouldn't I add it after the upgrade?) And wouldn't that also entail moving all the stuff from my old drives to the new XFS drives, so I could then reformat the old drives in XFS? () Honestly I've not done my research on all the changes with v.6, (I've been working the hardware issues out first) but I have no fear of giving it a shot. I just don't want to regret not doing things as efficiently as I might have, after the fact. While ReiserFS is rock solid on v5, with v6 there have been some bugs in it that have been introduced by the later versions of the kernel that v6 is using. The developer of Reiser is currently in jail for murder, so there isn't any development happening. The usage of ReiserFS outside of unRaid is very low and dwindling rapidly. The Parity Drive has no filesystem. It is merely used so that unRaid can rebuild the contents of a data drive (in conjunction with all of the other drives) should a drive die. With v6 you can have a mixture of data drives in ReiserFS, XFS, or BTRFS and the system will be able to rebuild any of them should one die. See here: http://lime-technology.com/wiki/index.php/FAQ#How_does_parity_work.3F And yes, switching from Reiser to XFS means copying all the data from the Reiser drive to a new one formatted XFS, formatting the old drive as XFS, and copying the next drive. Link to comment
MDEnce Posted February 19, 2015 Author Share Posted February 19, 2015 While ReiserFS is rock solid on v5, with v6 there have been some bugs in it that have been introduced by the later versions of the kernel that v6 is using. The developer of Reiser is currently in jail for murder, so there isn't any development happening. The usage of ReiserFS outside of unRaid is very low and dwindling rapidly. The Parity Drive has no filesystem. It is merely used so that unRaid can rebuild the contents of a data drive (in conjunction with all of the other drives) should a drive die. With v6 you can have a mixture of data drives in ReiserFS, XFS, or BTRFS and the system will be able to rebuild any of them should one die. See here: http://lime-technology.com/wiki/index.php/FAQ#How_does_parity_work.3F And yes, switching from Reiser to XFS means copying all the data from the Reiser drive to a new one formatted XFS, formatting the old drive as XFS, and copying the next drive. Thanks for the info. I'd kind of known that Parity might not need a file system, but glad to have that confirmed. Which means the Parity drive can be changed at any point I guess. I think I'll do it first, so I have "extra" protection (at least until I get the array back up with the new drives added, at which point I'll likely preclear the old Parity drive and add it back as extra data) I was just reading the "Format XFS on replacement drive / Convert from RFS to XFS" thread, so I know what's in store with an XFS conversion. You've convinced me that if I'm going to v.6, I'll want to convert everything to XFS (at least eventually - I'd probably try for maybe 1-2 drives a week or something once everything else is up and working right). Now I will just have to read up on using 64 bit plugins -vs- using Dockers for SABnzbd/SickBeard/CouchPotato and PLEX (And when I get them up and running I can look back into CrashPlan and try my hand at getting OpenVPN to work) Thanks for the help. Link to comment
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