I've had a 15 disk unRAID array running successfully for over 10 years now, but every once in a while one of my WD Red drives (and some remaining Green drives from the early days) fail, or begin to fail, with errors that unRAID will alert me about...I've been able to (often with the help of the amazing unRAID community) to recover from all of those incidents, so far.

I've just had the first drive since the advent of XFS throw write errors...it is Disk 11 in my array (an old 2TB WD Green drive), which I want to replace with a new 4TB Red drive that I purchased a few days ago. While still in the array, I have moved all the data off the old Disk 11 onto Disk 12 and swapped out the new 4TB drive for it. I let it rebuild from parity as a ReiserFS, just like the old Disk 11, but now empty.

Since the new 4TB disk is as big as the biggest drive in my array (there is only one other 4TB drive that I somehow managed to add as a new XFS drive at the time with a very lengthy pre-clear process, I want to take the opportunity to format this now empty Disk 11 to XFS as well and start the lengthy migration process from ReiserFS to XFS on all of my drives.

I started to follow the instructions pinned by bjp999 (https://wiki.lime-technology.com/File_System_Conversion), set the new drives FS to XFS after excluding it from the User Share, restarted the array, but even though it does show as unmountable, as predicted, there is no Format button present (see attached screenshot).

What could I have done incorrectly to cause this? Do I need to remove that disk from the array's configuration first? I didn't see that as a necessary step in the instructions. What could it be?

The format button is under the Array Operation tab.

since the instructions and my situation differ in that the instructions *add* a Swap drive to the array, while I set an already existing array member to XFS before restarting the array, am I correct in thinking that I first have to remove Drive 11 from the array? would I then have to create a new confirguration?

phew, the instructions to this process with all the various if's and then's and different scenarios have got my head spinning a bit with confusion, to be honest.

jeeze, of course, boniel, thanks for reminding me!

I've been working too much and loosing my chops regarding unRAID...where would I be without this community?

If you want to force a format operation on a disk, then change its file system. You may need to change the file system first to something else if your desired files system is already set.

 

After each file system change you need to start the array to make unRAID aware of the change.

 

And... formatting a disk will erase any data on it!

 

points well taken...I'll try to get that into my blood.

now that it shows "Started, formatting...", can I leave the page? will it continue formatting in the background, even if I leave the page or close the browser?

5 minutes ago, tillkrueger said:

now that it shows "Started, formatting...", can I leave the page? will it continue formatting in the background, even if I leave the page or close the browser?

 

yes, formatting happens in the background independent of the GUI.

 

Ps. shouldn't take more than a couple of minutes.

Edited August 30, 20178 yr by bonienl

and apparently the page doesn't auto-refresh to show the format completion...when I clicked the Refresh button it showed as formatted...but it's reassuring to know that it happens independent of the GUI.

now on into a telnet session and to the rsync part...

is an initiated rsync operation also continuing in the background, even if I close the telnet session? (I'd like to shut my machine down over night...I'm in Germany, and it's getting late)

Just now, tillkrueger said:

is an initiated rsync operation also continuing in the background, even if I close the telnet session? (I'd like to shut my machine down over night...I'm in Germany, and it's getting late)

If you start any command running in the foreground of a telnet session, it will get terminated if the session closes for whatever reason, unless you use screen (available via the NerdPack plugin)

that does ring a bell, Squid...i'll just have to fall asleep to the sound of my Computers and figure out how to use screen again in the morning. Re-awaken cell memory, so to say.

Danke and a good night from Berlin, everyone!

1 hour ago, tillkrueger said:

that does ring a bell, Squid...i'll just have to fall asleep to the sound of my Computers and figure out how to use screen again in the morning. Re-awaken cell memory, so to say.

Danke and a good night from Berlin, everyone!

I'm too lazy to figure out screen, and just do stuff like that on the local monitor / keyboard.

haha, and I would too, Squid, if I could, but my unRAID system is housed at a friend's web-agency with a symmetrical gigabit connection to the internet...so, save for visits there to swap a failed drive every great once in a while, I have to figure out how to do everything else remotely.

Ideally, I'd like to upgrade the hardware for the first time in 10 years and make it a system that can be a virtual machine host and easier to administer for a terminal shy guy like me.

It's a bit of an art to decide when to replace a disk, but certainly as drives cross the 4 or certainly 5 year boundaries, it is good to start thinking about replacements. In a steadily growing array with a fixed number of slots, replacements can be forced by the need for more space, leading to removing the older drives sooner. But if growth is slower, you could wind up with a bunch of geriatric disks that see very little action and expose yourself to risks of simultaneous failures.

 

I'd give the server disks a hard look and consider moving to 8T parity and replacing the older disks. I do this type of pruning every few years. The older disks are not discarded, but used for backups.

Yes, it's an art alright, and one that I've also been honing for many years as well. While i agree with you wholeheartedly and have been doing the same thing, there are times when it's financially less convenient to "go big" than others. I was stretching already, getting this 4TB WD Red drive to replace my failed 2TB WD Green drive, and when I discovered this morning that the "refurbished" drive (bought at a more than a $50 discount) had failed not even one day into its operation, it was mostly the time I had wasted that got me riled up...going to the location where the server is hosted, swapping the drive, figuring out all the XFS formatting stuff and beginning to migrate data to it from the old drive and another 2TB drive, copying all night long and then see it fail the next day...I mean, this can happen with new drives as well, but it does suck, let's be honest.

Anyway, I took your advice to heart, sent in a return request for the 4TB and ordered a brand new 8TB WD Red, to be delivered tomorrow...I just went through a very similar dance last year and ended up moving my parity onto a 6TB drive, so now I'll have 8TB of parity and can move 3 of the old 2TB Green drives on the former parity drive...I'll continue doing drive size upgrades until I have it down to 8 drives, including parity, from my current 15 drive setup...I will be saving up to upgrade my server hardware (which is still on an 8-10 year old dual-core CPU and mobo) to a more modern 8-bay system that can do full virtualization and the full monty...something I've been hoping to do for years, but hadn't found the time (and money) to do...now is the time, me thinks, and thanks for the nudge!

You'll surely be seeing me asking LOTS of questions here in that process!

G'nite from Berlin

While buying used CPUs, HBAs, and even motherboards I would consider, I would never buy a used drive unless I knew and had a lot of confidence in the seller. Also I'd want to see the smart reports. 

 

I've had horrendous luck with refurbs and never buy anything refurbed.

 

I understand the financials issues. Buying a couple drives here and couple drives there as good deals are to be had is what I suggest. That way you have a variety of drive ages and capacities and aren't suddenly confronted with very expensive wholesale replacements. The 8T REDS and Seagates, harvested from external enclosures, have been exceptional bargains lately.

The 4TB drive I ended up with was such a drive, harvested from an external NAS enclosure, and bore the according generic label, without the red...it was 60% the price of a new one, so I pushed my luck...and lost.

The 8TB replacement drive which I ordered after you recommended it was delivered to my apartment building in Berlin, where I had waited - bated breath - all afternoon, in hope of it arriving before my friend's agency where my unRAID server is hosted closed for the weekend, and it was delivered, but without ringing the door bell or leaving a note, to a neighbor whose name (which I found in the Amazon tracking notes) that does not exist. So after all that I ended up missing my weekend deadline to install it (I had really looked forward to being able to spend the weekend migrating/copying and parity-building)...maybe you can imagine my disappointment and frustration with Amazon, who - at least in the USA - I have always had great luck and service with...here in Germany, so far, not so much.

Be that as it may, these things happen sometimes, sometimes for a reason, so I re-evaluated my situation and am now leaning toward picking up a 6TB drive locally on Monday (businesses here are closed on Sundays) and doing what you suggested, but based on my already existing 6TB parity drive...I can still pare it down to 8 drives, incl. parity, and would end up with about 42TB of space, of which only about 20TB are in use atm...I should be fine for at least a couple more years and then move to larger drives, which will most likely be vastly cheaper by then (at least the 8 and 10TB versions)...maybe I'll be more fluid, financially, then as well.

Thanks again for the advice!

btw, do you consider the Seagates good drives? I do see them for less than the WD Red drives, quite frequently, and - frankly - I've had Red's fail on me almost one every year (some of that maybe have been enclosure issues due to a couple of intercontinental moves, though)...would there be any issue with mixing my all-WD Red (with a few Green drives from many years ago) with Seagate drives?