Preclear plugin


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12 minutes ago, ars92 said:

I may be missing something but with this plugin i am able to easily see and get notifications on the pre clear progress.

I can also see the progress on UD with this plugin installed (still on 6.3.5)


If i used unraid for the preclear all i see is "formatting" and i have no idea on the progress of the preclear.

Does unraid's built in preclear show progress and notifications on progress?

Really useful when preclearing large drives and you are an unpatient person :D

Sent from my LG-H990 using Tapatalk
 

UnRAID does not have a built in preclear plugin. UnRAID doesn’t preclear drives. UnRAID will clear a drive as part of the process of adding it to your array. This has always been the case. The only thing that has changed is that you do not have to wait for the clear process to complete before the array comes online.

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Incorrect, you'll see clearing and the progress is shown in the same place as a parity check, and you'll get a notification when complete.
UnRAID does not have a built in preclear plugin. UnRAID doesn’t preclear drives. UnRAID will clear a drive as part of the process of adding it to your array. This has always been the case. The only thing that has changed is that you do not have to wait for the clear process to complete before the array comes online.
Thanks for the clarifications.

Sent from my LG-H990 using Tapatalk

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Really sorry to chime in on this - I've read 4-5 pages back and I just want some assurance...

 

I'm putting another 8TB Ironwolf in my array this evening.  Not sure yet whether I'm replacing a drive or adding.  First drive change since uninstalling Preclear.

 

I don't need the drive straight away, and can afford to run some extended SMART tests before trusting it.  What I can't really afford though is for my Array to be offline for a long time.  Can I drop the drive in, format it and add it to the array now?

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Just now, Cessquill said:

What I can't really afford though is for my Array to be offline for a long time.  Can I drop the drive in, format it and add it to the array now?

Since v6.2 the array won't be offline when adding a new drive, it will be cleared first on the background and only the you can format, but array will be online during the entire process.

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If you just drop the drive in then unRAID will start clearing it (takes 8+ hours for a 8TB drive).     During that period the array is available for use.   When the clear finishes you will be offered the option to format the drive (which only takes a few minutes) and you are then ready to use the disk.

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wow, been a while since I've read this thread, and I'm still on 6.3.5.  After reading the past few pages, I have removed the Preclear plugin and then upgrade to 6.4.1.

 

Seems I can just use the Seagate disk tool to confirm the drives are good, and then just add them to my array.

 

I don't see a need to even bother with the script at this point.  I think things got more simple.  :)

 

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Can we please, once for all, do a guide on how to pre-clear guides for the newest versions of unRaid?

 

We have the first post of this thread that has a video etc saying how awesome it is and it would be crazy to don't test the drives. Yet we have to browse in the middle of the thread to figure out what to do if we only used the plugin so far.

 

A new video, or some tutorial with screenshots would be really good right now.

Edited by Polopollo
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Can we please, once for all, do a guide on how to pre-clear guides for the newest versions of unRaid?
 
We have the first post of this thread that has a video etc saying how awesome it is and it would be crazy to don't test the drives. Yet we have to browse in the middle of the thread to figure out what to do if we only used the plugin so far.
 
A new video, or some tutorial with screenshots would be really good right now.
Problem is with guides, as someone that does the odd one myself, is that they're an enormous amount of work, and often become outdated quite quickly.

IMHO the problem with preclear is nobody is quite clear what the end solution is going to be.

Best bet for my money at the moment is to use the script via terminal.

Sent from my LG-H815 using Tapatalk

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9 minutes ago, Polopollo said:

Can we please, once for all, do a guide on how to pre-clear guides for the newest versions of unRaid?

 

We have the first post of this thread that has a video etc saying how awesome it is and it would be crazy to don't test the drives. Yet we have to browse in the middle of the thread to figure out what to do if we only used the plugin so far.

 

A new video, or some tutorial with screenshots would be really good right now.

Since this plugin is currently deprecated and will not install on the latest unRAID release not sure that the effort would be worthwhile.

Edited by itimpi
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21 minutes ago, cyan said:

which script is the newest.?. it's been a while since I use preclear command version.

 

You download the latest preclear shell script (version 1.15) and apply this patch.  The patched version  still works on the 6.5.0-rc releases.  

  

      https://lime-technology.com/forums/topic/12391-re-preclear_disksh-a-new-utility-to-burn-in-and-pre-clear-disks-for-quick-add/?page=53#comment-460592

 

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Thanks so i took the link "https://raw.githubusercontent.com/gfjardim/unRAID-plugins/master/plugins/preclear.disk.plg" install it manually

 

but got this error:


unRAID version (6.5.0-rc6 - GCC 7.3.0) not supported.
plugin: run failed: /bin/bash retval: 1

 

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So now i need to find preclear_disk.sh script  and change as they say and it would work via Plugin in UI again, or only by those shell commands?

 

Thanks

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20 minutes ago, killeriq said:

Thanks so i took the link "https://raw.githubusercontent.com/gfjardim/unRAID-plugins/master/plugins/preclear.disk.plg" install it manually

 

but got this error:


unRAID version (6.5.0-rc6 - GCC 7.3.0) not supported.
plugin: run failed: /bin/bash retval: 1

 

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So now i need to find preclear_disk.sh script  and change as they say and it would work via Plugin in UI again, or only by those shell commands?

 

Thanks

As I said, Frank1940 posted a link to the script and patch above.

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I have just successfully precleared a disk using the patched plugin using unRAID version 6.5.0 Stable.  See here for the patched version:

 

       https://lime-technology.com/forums/topic/54648-preclear-plugin/?page=72&tab=comments#comment-632655

 

 

Now for some words of caution!!!!

 

First the original preclear plugin has caused problems for some users.  This patched version does NOT address those issues.  If you have any unexplained problems after installing it, uninstall it first to verify that might (or might not) be causing your problem.  No one is going to be able (or willing) to help you if you have an issue with the this plugin!!!

 

Because of these problems, the Fix Common Problems plugin will complain about its installation.  Only you can decide whether to ignore this warning,.  But you do so at your own risk.

 

This patched version comes from a source which has not been vetted in any manner.  Use it at your own risk.  You can lessen this risk by reading the succeeding posts after the one linked above.  You will observe that the one users determined that the only change made was the one which allowed the plugin to work.  He also listed the md5 sum for the file that he checked.  You should verify that you are getting the exact same file as the one checked.  (If you don't understand what I am talking about, you would be best served by not installing it!) 

Edited by Frank1940
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3 minutes ago, bwnautilus said:

I don't understand all this effort to get the preclear plugin working with 6.4.x.  According to @johnnie.black unRAID 6.2 and higher will kick off a preclear in the background while keeping the array online.  Am I missing something?

Some people use the plugin as a tool for stress testing drives before shucking/installation.

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45 minutes ago, bwnautilus said:

 unRAID 6.2 and higher will kick off a preclear in the background while keeping the array online.  Am I missing something?

It is worth pointing out that this technically a ‘Clear’ and not a ‘preclear’.   The ‘clear only happens at the time you add the disk to the array and thus the‘ Clear’ is part of the adding process.    Preclear is something you do before you attempt to add the drive to the array.  Also ‘Clear’ merely writes zeroes to the drive whereas the ‘preclear’ adds read phases before and after the write zeroes phase which does a more thorough test of the drive.

Edited by itimpi
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23 minutes ago, itimpi said:

It is worth pointing out that this technically a ‘Clear’ and not a ‘preclear’.   The ‘clear only happens at the time you add the disk to the array and thus the‘ Clear’ is part of the adding process.    Preclear is something you do before you attempt to add the drive to the array.  Also ‘Clear’ merely writes zeroes to the drive whereas the ‘preclear’ adds read phases before and after the write zeroes phase which does a more thorough test of the drive.

 

Thanks for this explanation.  A followup n00b question:

If you preclear a drive and then add it to the array will the addition kick off a clear or does unRAID recognize that you've already ran preclear on the drive?

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Maybe it's just voodoo now, but I've pre-cleared all my drives and haven't had any premature failures, on drives some of which are now more than 8 years old.  The drives that failed pre-clear I've returned.  Although my sample size is only around 20 drives, I'm a believer in stress testing a drive before putting it in to use.

 

If I understand correctly, the plug in functioned properly under 6.3.5.  Is that the consensus here?  I'm tempted to just set up a system with my unused license (I knew I'd have a use for that extra license someday!) running 6.3.5 just to preclear disks, as I've got the hardware around anyway.

 

For those of you who also believe in doing a pre-deployment stress test, what alternative do other suggest for stress testing a disk instead of preclear?  I'm certainly open to suggestions.

 

Thanks.

 

Kevin

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