I have a software raid setup in server 2008 at moment.

It has 600 gb of my movies etc on.

 

If i break my mirror on 2008, then take one of those disks and put into unraid.  will there be a problem? 

 

Or once array is started will i be able to access the movies

 

Will it need to format or anythink?

I have a software raid setup in server 2008 at moment.

It has 600 gb of my movies etc on.

 

If i break my mirror on 2008, then take one of those disks and put into unraid.  will there be a problem?  

 

Or once array is started will i be able to access the movies

If the disk is formatted as NTFS it will be possible to mount it read-only OUTSIDE of the array and get access to the files on it.  It will NOT be protected by parity.  Basic instructions are here: http://lime-technology.com/wiki/index.php?title=Copy_files_from_a_NTFS_drive to do it on the command line.

 

If you install the unMENU add-on, you can mount and share the ntfs drive via unMENU's Disk-Management web-interface page... Again, it is outside of the protected array.

 

Will it need to format or anythink?

Any disk assigned to unRAID's protected array (on the "Devices" page) will be completely cleared when you then start the array, and then re-formatted with a reiserfs file-system when you press the "Format" button.  

(One exception: Unless it is partitioned EXACTLY identical as unRAID would have partitioned it and formatted with a reiserfs AND you invoke the "initconfig" command to force the unRAID array to save a new initial configuration and then build a new set of parity calculations including the newly added drive.)

 

So, yes, you can get to the NTFS files to copy them to a drive in the protected array,

but no, you cannot just add the drive to the array and expect parity protection.

 

Joe L.

thanks for that, probably best thing for me to do is to install one of the disks, get it cleared and formatted.  then put 2nd disk in as you mentioned below and then copy from one to another.  Then once disk 1 has the data on, get disk 2 cleared etc.

 

Will unraid automatically try and clear the disks?

 

 

I have a software raid setup in server 2008 at moment.

It has 600 gb of my movies etc on.

 

If i break my mirror on 2008, then take one of those disks and put into unraid.  will there be a problem?  

 

Or once array is started will i be able to access the movies

If the disk is formatted as NTFS it will be possible to mount it read-only OUTSIDE of the array and get access to the files on it.  It will NOT be protected by parity.  Basic instructions are here: http://lime-technology.com/wiki/index.php?title=Copy_files_from_a_NTFS_drive to do it on the command line.

 

If you install the unMENU add-on, you can mount and share the ntfs drive via unMENU's Disk-Management web-interface page... Again, it is outside of the protected array.

 

Will it need to format or anythink?

Any disk assigned to unRAID's protected array (on the "Devices" page) will be completely cleared when you then start the array, and then re-formatted with a reiserfs file-system when you press the "Format" button.  

(One exception: Unless it is partitioned EXACTLY identical as unRAID would have partitioned it and formatted with a reiserfs AND you invoke the "initconfig" command to force the unRAID array to save a new initial configuration and then build a new set of parity calculations including the newly added drive.)

 

So, yes, you can get to the NTFS files to copy them to a drive in the protected array,

but no, you cannot just add the drive to the array and expect parity protection.

 

Joe L.

thanks for that, probably best thing for me to do is to install one of the disks, get it cleared and formatted.  then put 2nd disk in as you mentioned below and then copy from one to another.  Then once disk 1 has the data on, get disk 2 cleared etc.

 

Will unraid automatically try and clear the disks?

If you assign a "Data" disk to the array after a parity disk has been assigned, yes, it will clear it as soon as you start the array and the array will be off-line until that clearing step is completed.  (the clearing is necessary to maintain parity protection)

If you assign a "Data" disk, and start the array before you assign a parity disk, it will skip the clearing step since it is not needed to maintain parity.

 

In both cases, it will treat the newly assigned "Data" disk as unformatted and present you a "Format" button to create a reiserfs on it. This will effectively erase anything on it previously.  (The parity drive does not have a file-system, it just has parity calculations, therefore it is not formatted.  It when assigned will be completely overwritten with those parity calculations)

 

 

 

 

Agree 100% with everything Joe said. But this thread raised a question in my mind. If a person wanted an NTFS drive inside the protected array, could they add the existing drive, do an initconfig, and have parity computed to include the NTFS drive, and tben manually mount the drive?

 

I believe you could and unRaid would maintain parity. You would, of course, have to avoid the temptation to press the format button. You'd have to also manually configure Samba to share the disk. You'd also lose user share features. But for a disk share is there any reason this would not work?

Agree 100% with everything Joe said. But this thread raised a question in my mind. If a person wanted an NTFS drive inside the protected array, could they add the existing drive, do an initconfig, and have parity computed to include the NTFS drive, and tben manually mount the drive?

Interesting concept... you might get it to work if the NTFS partition is the first and only partition on the drive since the MD driver expects to hook to it at sector 63.

I believe you could and unRaid would maintain parity. You would, of course, have to avoid the temptation to press the format button.

Very True

You'd have to also manually configure Samba to share the disk.

Probably also true.

You'd also lose user share features. But for a disk share is there any reason this would not work?

One HUGE reason... the ntfs driver in unRAID is read-only.  Don't have a clue if the "md" driver will play nice with the "ntfs-3g" driver you would need to be able to handle writing to the disk.