Tom899 Posted July 7, 2018 Share Posted July 7, 2018 I built my UnRaid server in 2010 with all 2TB drives. I'm now upgrading to 8TB drives. So far I have done the Parity drive and two data drives. In 2010 Lime-Technology sent me two JD_Firefly 2GB flash drives. Back then the other one was a back-up. I'm thinking about updating at least one of my flash drives because of age. What should I get (size and manufacturer(looking for the best)), and how do I move the contents and license? Thanks! Link to comment
Squid Posted July 7, 2018 Share Posted July 7, 2018 I'm a fan of Kingston DS9's. Shoot for USB2 drives (more reliable than USB3, and speed is completely irrelevant). Easiest way is to run the Flash Drive Creator program from LT https://lime-technology.com/download/ After its done, copy all of the config folder (config only) from the old flash to the new one. When you boot up and hit the GUI, the system will walk you through transferring the key file to the new flash drive. Link to comment
Tom899 Posted July 7, 2018 Author Share Posted July 7, 2018 23 minutes ago, Squid said: I'm a fan of Kingston DS9's. Shoot for USB2 drives (more reliable than USB3, and speed is completely irrelevant). Easiest way is to run the Flash Drive Creator program from LT https://lime-technology.com/download/ After its done, copy all of the config folder (config only) from the old flash to the new one. When you boot up and hit the GUI, the system will walk you through transferring the key file to the new flash drive. Thanks! Appreciated! Link to comment
Tom899 Posted July 8, 2018 Author Share Posted July 8, 2018 Another question please. Do you think it's a good idea to replace the USB drive because it's 8 years old? Or should I just let it be? Link to comment
Frank1940 Posted July 8, 2018 Share Posted July 8, 2018 17 minutes ago, Tom899 said: Do you think it's a good idea to replace the USB drive because it's 8 years old? Or should I just let it be? It will fail eventually. If we were looking at a million flash drives, we could probably find some data to give an indication of the failure rate and predict what percentage of all 2010 flash drives that would still be working. But when your particular drive will fail, all bets are off. (It could even be the last one of that manufacturing lot...) Plus, we see a new thread every few days asking about how to replace the key file because of flash drive problems. And those are just the folks who don't know how to get a new key file automatically! So flash drives used for unRAID do fail. (Plus, why do you think LimeTech instituted the that program? I suspect because they were spending to much time servicing key file requests.) The questions you should ask yourself are, am I prepared for the day when it will fail? Do I have a backup of the my flash drive that is current? Will I keep it current? How long can my server be down without causing problems? How well do I deal with problem situations if the drive were to fail and I was not prepared for it (no backup, no new flash drive, a time constraint)? If you want to minimize the hassle, replace it now at your convenience. Otherwise, be prepared for its eventual demise. Remember, a new drive could fail within days after being put into service. (Not likely, but possible...) Link to comment
pwm Posted July 9, 2018 Share Posted July 9, 2018 On 7/8/2018 at 1:34 PM, Frank1940 said: It will fail eventually. But older flash drives can handle more writes/GB of surface than newer drives. When moving to smaller and smaller cells and moving to dual-bit or tripple-bit memory, the number of erase cycles keeps going down. So it really isn't easy to predict if a new flash drive will result in better longevity than keeping the old devices. I'd say the #1 priority isn't to replace drives speculatively, but to make sure to keep a backup copy of the contents after every reconfiguration. Link to comment
Tom899 Posted July 9, 2018 Author Share Posted July 9, 2018 40 minutes ago, pwm said: But older flash drives can handle more writes/GB of surface than newer drives. When moving to smaller and smaller cells and moving to dual-bit or tripple-bit memory, the number of erase cycles keeps going down. So it really isn't easy to predict if a new flash drive will result in better longevity than keeping the old devices. I'd say the #1 priority isn't to replace drives speculatively, but to make sure to keep a backup copy of the contents after every reconfiguration. Thanks! Is the best procedure to back-up the flash drive, to simply copy the contents to a folder on my windows machine? Link to comment
pwm Posted July 9, 2018 Share Posted July 9, 2018 3 minutes ago, Tom899 said: Thanks! Is the best procedure to back-up the flash drive, to simply copy the contents to a folder on my windows machine? Note that unRAID have support to make a backup of the flash. On the main page, under flash device settings, there is an option to make a backup of the flash. unRAID will create a zip file and then ask you to save it on your local machine. Link to comment
Frank1940 Posted July 9, 2018 Share Posted July 9, 2018 12 minutes ago, Tom899 said: Thanks! Is the best procedure to back-up the flash drive, to simply copy the contents to a folder on my windows machine? If you do this way, I would suggest that you stop the array first so that the flag (which prevents an automatic parity check) gets set. Link to comment
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