Current best method to move data between disks?

[tech3475]

Earlier today I discovered a drive had "failed" on my system, so I pulled the system out, checked the connection and so far while running a SMART test it seems fine (I rebooted and forgot to dump the logs).

 

But still, rather than risk continuing to use it, I've decided not to replace it and instead just remove it from the array as I intend on upgrading down the line.

 

What is the best way to remove the data from the emulated drive and put it on different disks without messing up the folder structure, permissions, etc?

 

Is it as simple as moving the data across the different disk folders (e.g. MC, dolphin, etc)? In which case do I just copy the data across disks or move it? Or is there a better procedure now?

 

Thank you.

[JonathanM]

The unbalance plugin will do what you want, it's a graphical front end that utilizes rsync command line to do the work.

 

There also is a procedure that takes some of the risk out of moving data off of one array member, emulated or not, where you exclude the drive from the global shares configuration. That will allow you to enable disk shares and "safely" copy from that disk to the user share system, which will allocate the data according to your split level and disk allocation strategy. If you don't GLOBALLY exclude the disk from user shares, not just the regular exclude, it's going to corrupt the data if you try to copy from disk to user share.

 

Unbalance operates from disk to disk instead of user share, so it's not effected.

 

Also, I'd recommend copying instead of moving. It will be faster, and have the same end result. You will have to rebuild parity without that disk after you get the data safe.

 

In any case, I hope the rest of your drives are perfectly healthy, because you are relying on them to perform flawlessly for the entire duration of this procedure. You say you plan on upgrading, it would be safer to go ahead with the upgrade and rebuild on to a larger disk. You would be operating at risk for less time.

Edited May 21, 2019 by jonathanm
Emphasize need for global share exclusion.

[tech3475]

8 hours ago, jonathanm said:

The unbalance plugin will do what you want, it's a graphical front end that utilizes rsync command line to do the work.

 

There also is a procedure that takes some of the risk out of moving data off of one array member, emulated or not, where you exclude the drive from the global shares configuration. That will allow you to enable disk shares and "safely" copy from that disk to the user share system, which will allocate the data according to your split level and disk allocation strategy. If you don't GLOBALLY exclude the disk from user shares, not just the regular exclude, it's going to corrupt the data if you try to copy from disk to user share.

 

Unbalance operates from disk to disk instead of user share, so it's not effected.

 

Also, I'd recommend copying instead of moving. It will be faster, and have the same end result. You will have to rebuild parity without that disk after you get the data safe.

 

In any case, I hope the rest of your drives are perfectly healthy, because you are relying on them to perform flawlessly for the entire duration of this procedure. You say you plan on upgrading, it would be safer to go ahead with the upgrade and rebuild on to a larger disk. You would be operating at risk for less time.

 

Thanks, the planned upgrade involved removing this drive slot anyway so that's another reason why I'm doing it now and I'll just put some non-critical data onto it (is in data I can afford to lose).