April 12, 201016 yr Hi All, I've had my old Unraid system for quite some time and over the years, I've started replacing my PATA drives with SATA drives using PATA/SATA adapters. A few months ago, something wonky went wrong and I had trouble getting it running again smoothly again. I've had it shut down since then and now I'm building a new pure SATA server to be the replacement. What I want to do is move my SATA drives over, leaving my data untouched. Then I want to mount my PATA drives on another PC(Windows) and start copying the data from them to the new server. The newer server will have larger drives so I don't need as many in the system. Would the procedure below work? 1)Move the 4 SATA drives from the original to the new server along with 2 new drives that need formatting. 2)Start the parity and get everything in Sync 3)Mount each PATA drive to my windows PC and copy my files over to the new blank drives? My only concern with this method is, can I keep my existing data while still formating the 2 new drives... Or should I just move the data drives over and then add each blank drive 1 by 1 letting unraid detect each one and add it to the configuration... Or should I just move the data drives over, get parity running, then add all the new blank drives at once? Also, which Windows utility would be best for recognizing the Unraid formated PATA drives so I can copy my data over once the new server is set up? Thanks for any tips and advice!
April 12, 201016 yr There are many ways to accomplish this. I'd (personally) do something like the following ... 1. Install just the new disks into the new server 2. Run memtest on new server 3. Run preclear on the new disks (as a burn in test for new drives and new server) 4. Review syslog / SMART reports to ensure all working well 5. Add new disks to array - and format them (LEAVE parity empty) 6. Power down, transfer existing SATA disks from existing server (make sure all are recognized on bootup) 7. Add existing disks to array (LEAVE parity empty) 8. Ensure that you can read from all of your existing drives - check syslog for any problems - run SMART reports on existing drives - report anything unusual here. 9. Stop array, assign parity, start array (system will build parity) 10. Once complete, run a complete parity check - should be no sync errors 11. Review syslog and smart reports (Biggest danger is accidentally assigning a disk to the parity slot before step 9. Take extra caution.) As far as transferring data from your PATA drives, my first thought would be to boot up your old server and transfer them from there. Mounting in Windows box also an option - see here.
April 14, 201016 yr Author Thanks for the info... I have successfully moved over to a new MB and SATA setup. It recognized my old drives and new blank drives with no problems. I'm currently moving data off my old PATA drives to the new SATA ones. Thanks again for the advice!
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