Question on preclear and using unraid basic

[mangledjustice]

Hey guy's......I currently have my trial box with unraid basic going for about a month or so, everything has been working great i only have two drives going a 360 GB for parity and a 160GB for data.

 

Iv'e decided to add some storage and bigger drives but still use the basic for now so i ordered (3)  2TB drives from newegg here is the link http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136514

 

I would like to play it safe and run preclear on them before i use them, however i'm not sure if this pose a problem since i am only using 2 disc and im limited to only have 3 disk with unraid basic. how do i run preclear.

 

I'm sure it might be something simple i'm over looking.

 

Any help is greatly appreciated

 

Regards

[Rajahal]

You can preclear up to 6 drives simultaneously on any unRAID license.  Preclear is an add-on script, so unRAID basically knows nothing about it.

 

However, I'm afraid you've already strayed from 'playing it safe' by purchasing three drives at once.  This increases your chances of a multiple drive failure since all 3 drives could be from the same defective batch.  If it isn't too late, I would recommend cancelling your order.  Instead, buy each drive from a different vendor (one from Newegg, one from Amazon, and one from TigerDirect for example).  Alternatively you can buy three different makes of drive (one WD, one Seagate, one Samsung for example).  Or you can mix these two strategies (for example, one WD and one Samsung from Newegg, then a second WD from Amazon).  Finally, you can just buy one drive at a time and space out your purchases.  Any of these purchasing strategies will reduce your chances of suffering a multiple drive failure.

 

If it is too late to cancel your order, then you'll just have to risk it.  Make sure each drive passes preclear (you may even want to run more than one pass) before you trust your data to it.

 

Also remember to install jumpers on pins 7-8 of all your WD EARS drives before preclearing them.

[rich.bingham]

As an example, I recently bought 2 WD20EARS at once, one from Amazon, one from Dell.  Manufacture dates were 26 June and 10 September and the price only differed by a few dollars.  Well worth it in my opinion to avoid multiple simultaneous disk failures.

[SSD]

Although I agree that it is generally smart to space out or buy from multiple vendors, the risk of doing so is pretty small, esp for just 3 disks. I routinely buy 2 at a time and never had a problem.

[mangledjustice]

You can preclear up to 6 drives simultaneously on any unRAID license.  Preclear is an add-on script, so unRAID basically knows nothing about it.

 

However, I'm afraid you've already strayed from 'playing it safe' by purchasing three drives at once.  This increases your chances of a multiple drive failure since all 3 drives could be from the same defective batch.  If it isn't too late, I would recommend cancelling your order.  Instead, buy each drive from a different vendor (one from Newegg, one from Amazon, and one from TigerDirect for example).  Alternatively you can buy three different makes of drive (one WD, one Seagate, one Samsung for example).  Or you can mix these two strategies (for example, one WD and one Samsung from Newegg, then a second WD from Amazon).  Finally, you can just buy one drive at a time and space out your purchases.  Any of these purchasing strategies will reduce your chances of suffering a multiple drive failure.

 

If it is too late to cancel your order, then you'll just have to risk it.  Make sure each drive passes preclear (you may even want to run more than one pass) before you trust your data to it.

 

Also remember to install jumpers on pins 7-8 of all your WD EARS drives before preclearing them.

 

 

 

Thanks for the input guys......however i do understand the premise of spacing out drive purchases. i have bought multiple drives prior with no issues. I mean how ramping is this issue, not major i would assume. i guess i will have to just chance it and hope for the best.

 

 

Another question i have is when i tried to download the preclear script i got this error message saying " i do not have permission to access this part of the forum" or something to that effect. Is there a reason for this.

[Joe L.]

You can preclear up to 6 drives simultaneously on any unRAID license.  Preclear is an add-on script, so unRAID basically knows nothing about it.

 

However, I'm afraid you've already strayed from 'playing it safe' by purchasing three drives at once.  This increases your chances of a multiple drive failure since all 3 drives could be from the same defective batch.  If it isn't too late, I would recommend cancelling your order.  Instead, buy each drive from a different vendor (one from Newegg, one from Amazon, and one from TigerDirect for example).  Alternatively you can buy three different makes of drive (one WD, one Seagate, one Samsung for example).  Or you can mix these two strategies (for example, one WD and one Samsung from Newegg, then a second WD from Amazon).  Finally, you can just buy one drive at a time and space out your purchases.  Any of these purchasing strategies will reduce your chances of suffering a multiple drive failure.

 

If it is too late to cancel your order, then you'll just have to risk it.  Make sure each drive passes preclear (you may even want to run more than one pass) before you trust your data to it.

 

Also remember to install jumpers on pins 7-8 of all your WD EARS drives before preclearing them.

 

 

 

Thanks for the input guys......however i do understand the premise of spacing out drive purchases. i have bought multiple drives prior with no issues. I mean how ramping is this issue, not major i would assume. i guess i will have to just chance it and hope for the best.

 

 

Another question i have is when i tried to download the preclear script i got this error message saying " i do not have permission to access this part of the forum" or something to that effect. Is there a reason for this.

Were you logged in?  Other than that, I know of no reason for the message you saw.

[mangledjustice]

I was logged in, i even log out then back in with same issue.

[Joe L.]

I was logged in, i even log out then back in with same issue.

I just tried the link.  It works...

 

Was this the link you tried: http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=2817.0;attach=1937

 

Joe L.

[mangledjustice]

I was logged in, i even log out then back in with same issue.

I just tried the link.  It works...

 

Was this the link you tried: http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?action=dlattach;topic=2817.0;attach=1937

 

Joe L.

 

 

Hey Joe L.

 

I did get it to work i logged out a couple times. but then i clear my browser history and bam! it works so i was able to download and install and run the preclear.

 

I know this might not be the the place but i figured i would just avoid starting a new thread or something.

 

I ran preclear on a couple of ide HDD that i had laying around and i was trying to decipher the results. As mentioned in multiple threads, that i'm reading its important not to over analyzed the results. But this 120G HDD the numbers seems kind or weired compare to another drive i did.

 

If you are anyone could give it a quick once over and give your feedback i would greatly appreciate it. attach is a copy of both syslog.

 

Regards.

 

syslog-2010-10-17_1.txt

syslog-2010-10-16.txt

[Joe L.]

What seems weird to you?  A new thread is not necessary.

There is already a thread for this purpose here : http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=4068.0

 

and how to interpret the output described here: http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=2817.msg53371#msg53371