Hello I'm new to using UnRaid and I'm sure this question is posted on here every week, but can someone point me to a thread regarding a step by step instruction on how to add an additional drive to my UnRaid array.  A common thing I have seen when using UnRaid is that you can easily press the wrong thing and erase all of your data.

 

UnRaid System: UnRaid Basic(Free)

 

Parity: WD1.5TB

Data1: WD1.5TB

 

Future upgrades - Want to add an additional WD1.5TD that was in my windows machine and is currently formatted under NTFS for Data2.

Hello I'm new to using UnRaid and I'm sure this question is posted on here every week, but can someone point me to a thread regarding a step by step instruction on how to add an additional drive to my UnRaid array.  A common thing I have seen when using UnRaid is that you can easily press the wrong thing and erase all of your data.

 

UnRaid System: UnRaid Basic(Free)

 

Parity: WD1.5TB

Data1: WD1.5TB

 

Future upgrades - Want to add an additional WD1.5TD that was in my windows machine and is currently formatted under NTFS for Data2.

Do you need any of the data that is on the disk you will be adding as disk2?  Part of the process will be the complete clearing (zeroing) of it.    It cannot keep its existing NTFS file-system once in the unRAID server.

 

Joe L.

No not at all, the only data i care about is on Disk1, but i need more space so I wanted to add another drive.

http://lime-technology.com/wiki/index.php?title=Add_One_or_More_New_Data_Drives

 

It really is easy. Note that it will take about 5-6 hours to preclear the disk before it is added to the array.

No not at all, the only data i care about is on Disk1, but i need more space so I wanted to add another drive.

OK,

 

It is pretty simple...  You have two choices.  Either you can pre-clear the disk, before you add it to the array, or, you can add it as it is and let the unRAID management page clear it for you.  

 

If you do let it clear the disk for you the array will be off-line during this process.  For a 1.5TB disk, expect the array to be off-line and performing the clearing step for many hours.  The best disks/motherboards seem to write to the fastest disks at between 75 and 100MB/s.  The speed will vary.  If you guess at a conservative clearing speed of 50MB/s you'll see that it will clear the disk at roughly  20 seconds per Gigabyte..  So... 1500Gigabytes (1.5TB) will take 30,000 seconds, or 8.3 hours.  If your hardware can write to the disk at 100MB/s it will be just over 4 hours.   Expect the array to be unavailable during this phase and don't do it when you planned to watch a movie from the server.

 

The other way to clear a disk is before you add it to the array.  You can do that with a script I wrote for exactly that purpose.  It is attached and described in this post: http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=2817.0

 

It performs its job before you assign the disk to your array, and , in fact, it will not clear a disk already assigned to the array (to prevent you from clearing precious data)

 

By default, it also exercises a disk by pre-reading it, and post-reading it to detect bad sectors and allow the disk to re-allocate bad sectors.  These will add to the time, but since this is all done with the array on-line, you don't have to be concerned if you want to watch a movie, or get to files on the array.     When you finally assign the pre-cleared disk to the array it will only be off-line for a few seconds. (The time it takes you to stop the array, assign the newly clear drive, and then press "Start" to start the array.)

 

To add the disk to the array you must stop the array (press the "Stop" button) then go to the "Devices" page and assign the new drive to a slot in the array, then go back to the main page and "Start" the array.

 

Once you "Start" the array (by pressing "Start") it will show the new drive as "Unformatted"  This is expected.

 

There is a bug in the most recent version of unRAID that will for some people show other disks as un-formatted if they took too long to come online.  If you see your prior existing data disk as un-formatted, do not panic, and DO NOT PRESS THE FORMAT BUTTON.  Instead, just press the "Stop" button and then the "Start" button and the array should get into sync properly.  

 

Once you ONLY see one disk showing as "un-formatted" and it is the one you are just adding, you can press the "Format" button.   The formatting will take about a minute or so.   Once that is complete you'll be on-line with the new disk added to the array.

 

For 99.9% of all unRAID array operations you will start it by pressing the "Start" button.  This includes replacing a failed drive or upgrading a drive.   Some times, if the configuration is changing, you'll need to check the "I'm sure" check-box under it to enable it.  

 

The button labeled as "restore" is actually a "Delete Disk Configuration and Parity" button.  Many of us think it is very poorly labeled.  It is not what you should press when you have a failed drive.    Pressing "restore" with a failed drive will likely lose the data on the failed drive, as you'll be asking the array to forget it existed.  Pressing it when all the drives are working properly will cause an immediate invalidation of parity and cause a full re-calculation when you then start the array.  For that reason, you'll probably never need to press it.  There is an exception to this rule, but it only applies if a disk goes off-line because of a loose cable.  It requires special commands to be entered between the pressing of "restore" and "start" to force it to not re-calculate parity.  If you suspect that a disk is off-line because of a bad or loose cable, create a thread in this forum asking for guidance on how to get it back online.

 

That's it.  It took me longer to type this than it will take you to get a new disk assigned to the array.

 

Joe L.

 

http://lime-technology.com/wiki/index.php?title=Add_One_or_More_New_Data_Drives

 

It really is easy. Note that it will take about 5-6 hours to preclear the disk before it is added to the array.

I suspect this estimate is a bit on the low side.  I'd allocate almost three times that time if also pre-reading and post-reading the drive.

 

Joe L.

I'll echo the recommendation to preclear the disk. I'd also highly recommend that you install unmenu at the same time as you are figuring out how to do all this stuff.

 

http://lime-technology.com/wiki/index.php?title=UnRAID_Add_Ons#UnMENU

 

I've been an unRAID user since the beginning, but I have the attitude that if it isn't broken, why fix it. I only started using add ons about a year ago. UnMENU and Preclear will help protect your data by catching problems early, and making it easy to monitor your system health.

 

I recently pulled my "Recorded TV" 1T. drive from my media center PC to upgrade to a 2T. drive. I ran preclear on the 1T. disk before adding it into my UnRAID array. The smart report at the end did not look pretty with hundreds of reallocated sectors. Without Preclear I wouldn't have found out until after it was in my array, requiring me to replace the drive. Windows didn't lift a finger to warn me about the impending demise of my disk. I also ran two preclear cycles on the 2T. drive I put into my windows box, I wanted a little assurance that the drive wouldn't suffer from infant mortality.

I should have said:

 

It really is easy. Note that it will take about 5-6 hours to clear the disk by UnRAID management console  before it is added to the array.  Joe's preclear script almost triples that time.

I should have said:

 

It really is easy. Note that it will take about 5-6 hours to clear the disk by UnRAID management console  before it is added to the array.  Joe's preclear script almost triples that time.

That make it more clear...  and during those 5 or 6 hours the array will be off-line.    Many people do it exactly that way, they just use the unRAID management web-interface and perform the operation when they do not need access to their data otherwise.

 

The reason my preclear_disk.sh process takes three times longer is it first reads the entire disk, then writes the entire disk, then reads it again.  The pre and post read phases represent the other two thirds of the time.  They however allow the disk's firmware to identify and re-allocate any bad sectors.... before you start using them for your data.   

 

Probably one out of a hundred drives shows a problem.  but do you want to be that one?

 

Regardless of which method you use to add a disk you should (as a matter of good operating practice)  do a full parity check before making any changes to the array.  It will allow you to know that all is working properly and know that the initial parity you wrote to the parity disk is readable.

 

Joe L.

There is a bug in the most recent version of unRAID that will for some people show other disks as un-formatted if they took too long to come online.  If you see your prior existing data disk as un-formatted, do not panic, and DO NOT PRESS THE FORMAT BUTTON.  Instead, just press the "Stop" button and then the "Start" button and the array should get into sync properly. 

 

Whoa good thing you mentioned that because I have the latest and it just did that after clearing and I thought that i had done something wrong and cleared both drives. They really need to fix that!