It has been a few months since I've done a parity check and just did one a couple days ago.  It appeared to have completed just fine, but then maybe a day later I noticed one of my data drives had a red x next to it.  It seems odd that the drive did fine with the parity check, but then failed some time afterwards.  Anyway, out of concern that it might be harmful to leave the server up and running, I shut it down.  Now I see after reading the wiki I shouldn't have done that and gotten a syslog before shutting down the server.

 

So I've just powered the server up again and the red x remains.  I'm attaching the diagnostics and sys log files as the wiki said I should.  Any guidance on what I should do from here is really appreciated.  These log files are pretty much greek to me.

tower-diagnostics-20170202-1807.zip

tower-syslog-20170202-1810.zip

Disk 4 is the one that has the red cross - this one: WDC_WD20EADS-00W4B0_WD-WCAVY7298247

 

The good news is that its SMART report is good and the power cycle brought it back on line. The bad news is that the power cycle lost the evidence that would have shown why it was dropped. The chances are that it was a cable problem so power down again, check the SATA and power cables to that disk, then power up and start the array and let the emulated Disk 4 rebuild onto the same disk.

 

Thanks.  Does the rebuild start automatically once I start the array or do I need something specific to start the rebuild?

I think I figured it out.  I had to stop the array, unassign the disk, start the array, stop the array, assign the same disk, and then start the array.  I think its rebuilding now. 

Yes, you got it!

 

...  I'm attaching the diagnostics and sys log files as the wiki said I should...

Is there a single wiki article that actually says that, or are you basing that on multiple wiki articles, possibly related to older versions?

 

The reason I ask is because the syslog is already included in the diagnostics zip, as you can see if you open it up. So no need to post syslog, just diagnostics.

...  I'm attaching the diagnostics and sys log files as the wiki said I should...

Is there a single wiki article that actually says that, or are you basing that on multiple wiki articles, possibly related to older versions?

 

The reason I ask is because the syslog is already included in the diagnostics zip, as you can see if you open it up. So no need to post syslog, just diagnostics.

The only time you need to post the diagnostics and the syslog.txt file is when you're running FCP in troubleshooting mode

...  I'm attaching the diagnostics and sys log files as the wiki said I should...

Is there a single wiki article that actually says that, or are you basing that on multiple wiki articles, possibly related to older versions?

 

The reason I ask is because the syslog is already included in the diagnostics zip, as you can see if you open it up. So no need to post syslog, just diagnostics.

 

 

Sorry.  I think I just misread it.  The wiki can be found here:

 

http://lime-technology.com/wiki/index.php/Troubleshooting#What_do_I_do_if_I_get_a_red_X_next_to_a_hard_disk.3F

 

"Either do it yourself, or create a forum post about your problem in the General Support board for your unRAID version. Make sure you attach either the diagnostics zip or the syslog and SMART report for the drive, with a description of what happened, and which drive is at fault."

...  I'm attaching the diagnostics and sys log files as the wiki said I should...

Is there a single wiki article that actually says that, or are you basing that on multiple wiki articles, possibly related to older versions?

 

The reason I ask is because the syslog is already included in the diagnostics zip, as you can see if you open it up. So no need to post syslog, just diagnostics.

 

 

Sorry.  I think I just misread it.  The wiki can be found here:

 

http://lime-technology.com/wiki/index.php/Troubleshooting#What_do_I_do_if_I_get_a_red_X_next_to_a_hard_disk.3F

 

"Either do it yourself, or create a forum post about your problem in the General Support board for your unRAID version. Make sure you attach either the diagnostics zip or the syslog and SMART report for the drive, with a description of what happened, and which drive is at fault."

Diagnostics not only includes syslog, but also SMART for ALL drives, and a lot of other things that are useful. Easiest for everyone to just post diagnostics. I always like to check the other drives SMART before proceeding with a rebuild since if they have problems there could be problems with the rebuild.

 

If you are running FCP - Troubleshooting, as Squid said, you would also have a syslog that would be more recent than the one that got saved to diagnostics, so in that case, both diagnostics zip and the more recent syslog that was also saved can be useful. This would typically only apply when your server is no longer responsive and the only information you could have is if you had been running FCP - Troubleshooting so these got saved to flash. See the Fix Common Problems plugin documentation for more about that.

Drat...it happened again, but this time it wasn't after a parity check.  I just received a notification this morning that there were read errors on Disk 4 and now there is a red X next to that drive.  This time I did not reboot the server and I downloaded the diagnostics.  They are attached if anyone can decipher what these might mean for me.

tower-diagnostics-20170324-2019.zip

disk4 has dropped offline so a write to it failed, resulting in the disk being disabled. And no SMART reported for it. Check connections and see if you can get another diagnostic that includes SMART for that drive.

14 minutes ago, trurl said:

disk4 has dropped offline so a write to it failed, resulting in the disk being disabled. And no SMART reported for it. Check connections and see if you can get another diagnostic that includes SMART for that drive.

 

Thanks.  I powered down and replaced the sata cable to Disk 4.  I brought the server back up and the red X persists on Disk 4, but I think I have SMART data for it now.  Please see the attached.

tower-diagnostics-20170324-2054.zip

SMART for disk4 looks OK. You can rebuild it to itself.

On 2/2/2017 at 8:37 PM, JP said:

I think I figured it out.  I had to stop the array, unassign the disk, start the array, stop the array, assign the same disk, and then start the array.  I think its rebuilding now. 

 

3 minutes ago, trurl said:

SMART for disk4 looks OK. You can rebuild it to itself.

 

Thanks. I did that once before, but I don't think I replaced the sata cable like I did this time.  Do you think I'm better off just replacing the drive given the two failures or should I just continue to use it?

What I do in these situations, i.e., SMART looks fine but there were multiple failures, is move the disk to another server or swap both cables with another disk on the same server.

Doesn't look like the drive is at fault and it's not very old. I think I would keep using it, maybe do an extended SMART test after you rebuild.

 

SATA connections can be troublesome. The connector must be fully on and straight. Sometimes people try to bundle their cables to make things neat, with the result that it will pull on the connection until it gets loose.

 

I see from your diagnostics you have an Adaptec 1430SA. I have one of those in my backup server, and I know it doesn't have locking ports on it. Don't know if that is where your problem is connected or not.