Nightmare for a newbie.  All drives connected on the same SATA power cable got fried.  I suspect a power surge or the power supply was faulty and nuked em.  One of drives even caught fire. 

 

I used to have parity + 6 data drives.  I know for sure I lost the parity drive and 2 data drives.  I am running version 4.7.  While I waited for replacement parts, I managed to extract whatever files to my Windows PC from the still healthy data drives.

 

As of now, I have rebuilt the hardware and the system boots up normally. This time around, I would prefer to have parity, cache, and just 3 data drives.  Problem is, no matter how I arrange the drives there are always 3 red dots and I cannot get the array to start.

 

Would appreciate help on what to do next? 

 

PS - should I, or is it possible to upgrade to a more recent version of unRaid?

 

 

I would certainly upgrade to a newer version.    Since you're effectively starting from scratch, I'd save your key file (IMPORTANT --  you do not want to lose that);  then reformat the flash drive; copy the files for v6.1.3 to it; and then run Makebootable on the flash drive (you have to do this with admin privileges).

 

Then copy your key file to the Config folder; and now you're ready to boot to the new version of UnRAID.    Then just assign your data drives -- but NOT the bad drives -- and you're ready to go.

 

Thank you so much for the quick reply.  It sounds like a good plan.  Can you explain how to save the key file?  I want to be sure not to screw it up.

 

 

Just copy it from the flash drive to your PC.    It's named Plus.key or Pro.key (depending on your version) and should be in the Config folder.    As I assume you know, it's uniquely tied to your flash drive, so it only works with that drive.

 

 

... Also, I believe that once you boot the system, you'll need to go to the Tools tab and run the "New Permissions" script to get access to all your files.    This is a one-time requirement when upgrading from v4.7.

 

Ok great.  I'm going to give it a shot now.  Thanks again.

As I assume you know, it's uniquely tied to your flash drive, so it only works with that drive.

Now may be a good time to upgrade to a new flash device, as the current one is likely many years old by now. One of the new features in unraid is the ability to easily move your license to a new stick. If you take your existing key file, and copy it to the config folder on a brand new USB stick with unraid V6 installed, it will walk you through transferring your license to a new stick on first boot. 

My flash drive is about 3 old.  Would like to get this up and running asap so I've just followed gary's instx. 

 

Now staring at the new GUI.  Must say, it was a good upgrade.  Thanks again gary.

Nightmare for a newbie.  All drives connected on the same SATA power cable got fried.  I suspect a power surge or the power supply was faulty and nuked em.  One of drives even caught fire. 

 

I used to have parity + 6 data drives.  I know for sure I lost the parity drive and 2 data drives.  I am running version 4.7.  While I waited for replacement parts, I managed to extract whatever files to my Windows PC from the still healthy data drives.

 

As of now, I have rebuilt the hardware and the system boots up normally. This time around, I would prefer to have parity, cache, and just 3 data drives.  Problem is, no matter how I arrange the drives there are always 3 red dots and I cannot get the array to start.

 

Would appreciate help on what to do next? 

 

PS - should I, or is it possible to upgrade to a more recent version of unRaid?

 

 

Sorry to hear this happened to you. I believe the most important and crucial component in a computer is the power source/supply. That is one piece of hardware I have never been cheap with and have been lucky. I also use a voltage regulator on my most important/expensive electronics. After hooking up the voltage regulator I see it flash to amber and back to green through out the day. I've made sure my electrical wiring is good, grounded and solid. It is also fairly new construction. Apparently just dirty power from the electric company. They do make a 230/2340V model too.

 

http://www.amazon.com/APC-LE1200-Automatic-Voltage-Regulator/dp/B00009RA60

 

 

The Line-R's are excellent units ... they're essentially just an APC UPS without the battery and inverter.  A good UPS with AVR is even better, since it also ensures that the system never suffers from an unplanned power loss  [since the UPS control software will do a graceful shutdown on power loss, that isn't "unplanned"]

 

That APC unit does look pretty cool.  Thanks for the heads-up.  BTW, the power supply was a 3.5 year old Corsair AX750.  They have since sent me a new updated AX760.

For a server you're better off buying a quality UPS with AVR than just the Line-R.    As I noted above, the Line-R is essentially just the AVR part of one of their UPS units ... provides excellent regulation with boost and trim in addition to superb transient protection (i.e. it's a very high quality surge protector) ... but a UPS will do that PLUS provide automatic battery backup in case of failures AND will automatically gracefully shut down your server in the event of a sustained outage.

 

So what capacity or size should I be looking for?  What's min and what's overkill?

This is an excellent unit that has enough output capacity for just about any UnRAID setup:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16842101393

 

While I've NEVER had an issue with a quality APC UPS working fine with modern PC power supplies (which use active PFC);  there is some potential for these power supplies to have issues with the waveform provided by a UPS when it's running on battery.    A UPS with a true sine wave output eliminates this potential.  The APC units with this feature are notably more expensive, but CyberPower has a true sine wave unit that's much more affordable:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA0ZX2C28620

 

Either of those UPS units would be excellent for your server.

 

Fabulous, I think I'll pick up the UPS APC unit.  It's sad I lost some data but at least I ended up with an upgraded unraid and it all the damaged parts were replaced under warranty.  I'll spend the $$ on the UPS APC as insurance. Thank you again for helping me get back up and the great advice. 

For some reason every UPS I ever owned the batteries always died prematurely. Good quality batteries should last a few years and I never got that out of any APC units. Although what was very weird is the software that came with one of their UPS's kept telling me the battery was bad, but then I reset something in the software or told it I replaced the battery and the UPS is still working fine with plenty of standby power. I've had power outages and it worked fine. I think there's some kind of timer in APC's circuitry to flag the battery dead which would prompt the user to buy fresh batteries, hence make them more money. I actually got 2 other APC smaller UPS's to think there was a new battery installed and all of a sudden started working fine again. I never had a Cyberpower model, but would suspect there isn't much differences in them.

All of my UPS's are APC, but I buy all my replacement batteries from Chrome Battery.  I usually get about three years out of them.

Most of my UPS's are either APC or CyberPower, and they've all worked well.  I've not had any pre-mature battery failures ... I've always had at least 3 years life out of all of them, which is a reasonable expectation.

 

Your server will be FAR more reliable with a good UPS ==> no surges; no low or high voltage conditions; and no unplanned power outages.