I am currently running 4.5.4 with 10 drives in total (including parity and cache). Two of the data drives are PATA and I need to “get rid of them” out of the setup and leave just the SATA drives. What is the best way to move files off of them to the array. I have enough space on the remaining drives. I can do it from a networked PC but would rather not as it seems I have to do it one folder at a time or else I encounter errors. If possible, please keep the advice in as plain language as possible as I am not very versed in Linux. 

 

Thank you,

 

Lev

 

Before you do anything, run a parity check.  If you have a bad drive or some other problem, you want to find out before doing any of the below.

 

The easiest way is to replace them, one at a time, with new SATA drives.  The procedure would be the same if they failed.  Instructions are here.

 

To move the data, I personally would just do a drag-n-drop from the disk shares you are getting rid of to the disk shares that you are keeping.  This will make the transfer take a lot longer, since the data will in effect be moving to your client computer (desktop/laptop) and back to the server, but it is by far the simplest method.  No linux commands needed.  You do have to keep the client computer on the whole time, however.  If you have more than 500 GBs of data to move, I would break it into roughly 500 GB chunks and initiate one transfer per night until they are all complete.

 

If you want to reduce your drive total from 10 to 8 and not add any new SATA drives, then you will need to used the Initconfig command (formally the 'restore' button).  Note that this command immediately invalidates parity.  You will not be protected from a single drive failure until the new parity sync finishes.  The procedure is:

 

• Move all the data off the PATA drives
  
• Run a parity check.  Do not proceed if there are any errors, instead seek help on these forums.
  
• Power down the server and physically remove the two PATA drives
  
• Power up the server.  On the web management main page you will see errors about missing disks.
  
• Via either the system console or a telnet session, type in initconfig.  The command runs instantly, so you can close the telnet session or log off the system console immediately afterward.
  
• Refresh the web management main page and it will say 'Initial Configuration'.  Click Start to initiate a parity sync.
  
• Once the parity sync finishes, start another parity check.  If there are errors, seek help
  

 

If all that completes without errors, then you are done.

I tried moving the data through a networked PC, but as you said, it was dreadfully slow. I am going to be moving my setup to a larger case, and will not be using PATA drives in it. I decided to just replace the PATA with a larger SATA drive (WD 2GB) and do it as a replace/restore technique.

 

I realized that the other PATA drive was my cache disk, so I can just remove it later and replace with another SATA without having to restore.

 

I seem to remember reading somewhere on this forum about a technique where I can telnet into the system and issue a command where the data will be pushed over to other drives without having the need for a networked PC to remain on. I just do not remember where I saw it. It's like everything else, when you need it you can't find it. Otherwise, you stumble on it by chance. 

I tried moving the data through a networked PC, but as you said, it was dreadfully slow. I am going to be moving my setup to a larger case, and will not be using PATA drives in it. I decided to just replace the PATA with a larger SATA drive (WD 2GB) and do it as a replace/restore technique.

 

I realized that the other PATA drive was my cache disk, so I can just remove it later and replace with another SATA without having to restore.

 

I seem to remember reading somewhere on this forum about a technique where I can telnet into the system and issue a command where the data will be pushed over to other drives without having the need for a networked PC to remain on. I just do not remember where I saw it. It's like everything else, when you need it you can't find it. Otherwise, you stumble on it by chance. 

The easiest by far if you are not familiar with the linux command line commands is to type

mc

and invoke midnight commander.  From in it you can copy your files to their new homes.

If you use

''putty" as the telnet client, the mouse and function keys will work.  Otherwise Escape-1 through Escape-0 are equivalent to F1 through F10.

 

/mnt/disk1

through

/mnt/disk19

 

are the top level folders for each of the physical disks.

 

Joe L.

there is also the rsync command.

 

Here is a way to move the files with rsync.

 

rsync -avP --remove-sent-files /mnt/disk1/Videos /mnt/disk14/

 

This moves the directory /mnt/disk1/Videos to /mnt/disk14 as a directory Videos.