I am currently in the process of building my first unRAID machine. I'm at the point of installing my hard drives. One of the drives contains the data I want to keep, the rest contain various versions of that data. (Hate manual backup, that's why I decided to try out unRAID.) But I'm a bit nervous as to going any farther without really understanding what the software installation will entail. What should I do with the data on the drives so that the data I want to be preserved, will be preserved?

 

Thanks in advance!

~Narthur

 

EDIT: Just found this topic, which answers my question.

I am currently in the process of building my first unRAID machine. I'm at the point of installing my hard drives. One of the drives contains the data I want to keep, the rest contain various versions of that data. (Hate manual backup, that's why I decided to try out unRAID.) But I'm a bit nervous as to going any farther without really understanding what the software installation will entail. What should I do with the data on the drives so that the data I want to be preserved, will be preserved?

 

Thanks in advance!

~Narthur

You can physically install the drives in the server, but if a drive has data you wish to keep DO NOT ASSIGN IT TO THE ARRAY on the DEVICES assignment page.

 

Any drive you assign as a data drive will be reformatted by unRAID, and any data on it overwritten.  Any drive you assign as the parity drive is completely overwritten with parity data.

 

You can assign any drive that has data you no longer want.

 

If the drives have an NTFS file-system, you can mount them as read-only and copy the data from them to drives you have assigned to the array.

Instructions are here in the wiki: http://lime-technology.com/wiki/index.php?title=Copy_files_from_a_NTFS_drive

 

Joe L.

Thanks! However, I'm not sure I'll be able to do it that way. I have two 1tb drives and one ~250gb drive. Correct me if I'm wrong, but if I install the two drives with the data I won't need (one 1tb and the 250gb), the 1tb will be used as parity and I won't have enough room to off-load my other 1tb onto the machine.

Thanks! However, I'm not sure I'll be able to do it that way. I have two 1tb drives and one ~250gb drive. Correct me if I'm wrong, but if I install the two drives with the data I won't need (one 1tb and the 250gb), the 1tb will be used as parity and I won't have enough room to off-load my other 1tb onto the machine.

You assign the drives, unRAID does not assign them.  Yes, the parity drive must be as large, or larger than then the largest of your data drives.  Assuming the 2 1TB drives are identical in size, then either can be assigned (by you) as the parity drive.

 

You do not need to assign a parity drive initially...  so, you could assign the 1TB drive and 250 Gig drives as data drives, copy from the remaining 1TB drive to them, then assign that last 1TB drive as the parity drive.

 

There are some risks, as you will be without "parity" protection until one is assigned and parity initially calculated.  The only other way would be to purchase a new 1TB (or larger) disk.

 

Joe L.

Thanks! However, I'm not sure I'll be able to do it that way. I have two 1tb drives and one ~250gb drive. Correct me if I'm wrong, but if I install the two drives with the data I won't need (one 1tb and the 250gb), the 1tb will be used as parity and I won't have enough room to off-load my other 1tb onto the machine.

You cannot preserve data. One option you have is to:

1. Set up an array with no parity consisting of the 1tb and the 250gb disk with data you don't need to keep.

2. Copy the data you need from the 1tb with data you want to keep to the 1tb in the array.

3. Verify the copy was successful.

4. Add the 1tb that was outside the array to the array as parity.