Unraid 5.0.6 crash, won't restart (getting "VFS: Insert root floppy and press enter" prompt)

[DocStearn]

Looking for advice - during a data transfer between two Unraid servers (both running 5.0.6), the source server (TOWER) crashed. 

 

Tried to restart, and I'm getting the same situation described in this post, down to getting the line “VFS: Insert root floppy and press enter”:

 

https://forums.unraid.net/topic/41610-solved-help-unraid-5-wont-reboot-vfs-insert-root-floppy-and-press-enter/

 

Same with that previous post, if I press enter at that point, then kernel panic.

 

I've restarted the machine twice, no change. I've been running Memtest86 for 80 minutes so far to see if anything comes up, but it hasn't reported any errors yet.

 

I plugged the USB key for TOWER into a Windows 10 workstation and can see the files on it. I ran a checkdisk on the USB key with no errors detected.

I've emailed tech support at Lime for advice but I thought I would ask for guidance here while I'm waiting to hear back.

 

I really don't know whether the problem is with the flash drive (as with the topic that I linked to) or something else on the hardware side and I don't how to approach isolating the cause.

 

Could I simply install v6 onto a new USB flash drive as a trial and resurrect my array and recover that way? And then get a replacement key from Lime for that new flash drive? Note that the crash this morning obviously wasn't a clean shutdown - but no data was being written to TOWER at the time, it was the source of the files being copied. If it's relevant, TOWER has 14 data drives plus 1 parity drive, and I have the drive assignment info stashed.

 

Hope that you are all having a happier New Year's Eve than I am right now. :)

[trurl]

Here is the Upgrading wiki:

 

https://wiki.unraid.net/Upgrading_to_UnRAID_v6

[DocStearn]

1 hour ago, trurl said:

Here is the Upgrading wiki:

 

https://wiki.unraid.net/Upgrading_to_UnRAID_v6

So, in theory, taking this approach - and assuming that problem is with the current flash drive and not anything else - would all of my data be okay? And it would be a matter then of simply assigning drives to slots?

[trurl]

Yes your data should be fine.

 

What can you tell us about your hardware? V6 has more requirements than V5.

[DocStearn]

First, the (optimistically) good news - I backed up the files from the current USB key and then refreshed it as is (reformatted the USB, copied over the files from the original 5.0.6 install zip, made it bootable, restored the config files) and flipped the switch. Everything came up, green balls against all of the drives, and a parity check underway that should finish sometime tomorrow. So, this is encouraging.

 

For hardware, I've got:

ASUS F1A75-V Pro Socket FM1 AMD

AMD A4-3400 2.7 GHz Socket FM1Seasonic X-660 Modular 80PLUS Gold PSU

Mushkin Silverline 4GB (2xGB) DDR3 1333 MHz

G.SKILL Ripjaws X Series 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 1333 MHz CL9 Dual Channel

Antec DF-85 Dark Fleet Tower Case + 5-in-3 cage

Supermicro AOC-SAS2LP SATA controller card (I think that this was the one)

13 internal drives (various brands and sizes) + Samsung SSD EVO 250GB

Kingston DataTraveler DT108 4GB uRDrive USB 2.0 Flash Drive

 

Would this be okay for V6?

 

[trurl]

Your RAM is a little unclear (2xGB), are you saying you have 8GB total? I think that controller SAS2LP isn't recommended anymore.

[DocStearn]

My mistake, it's just the pair of Mushkins, so 4GB.

[trurl]

I think 2GB RAM is the minimum spec, but I really consider 4GB to be more realistic. Should be OK if you don't try to run any VMs or many dockers. Could be that controller will be unreliable in V6 but maybe not. I seem to remember it is more of a problem if you enable IOMMU (VM passthrough) in the BIOS. Maybe someone else will have an opinion on that.

[DocStearn]

No real expectations at this point for having anything more than NAS capacity.

 

Re the Supermicro card, it was their AOC-SASLP-MV8 card that I added, not the one that I listed above. Don't know if it makes any difference; if IOMMU was disabled by default, that's how I would have left it.

 

Thanks for the advice, btw, much appreciated.

 

[trurl]

I always encourage upgrading, even for those who are just a few minor versions behind on V6. It is difficult for us to support older version.

[trurl]

And V6 has many new features that make it a better NAS even if you don't need dockers or VMs.