Proper way to add another drive?


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You could do the parity swap procedure.  Myself, I've never done it, and just do this the old fashioned way.  Unassign the parity drive, and then assign the 10TB to the parity drive, let the parity sync, and then add the 8 tb as a new data drive.  (It will have to clear itself though, which will take hours)

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51 minutes ago, jonathanm said:

Or, do a new config, save all, change the parity slot to the 10TB, and assign the 8TB to a data slot. Parity has to be rebuilt anyway, why not save the clearing time and just calculate parity based on the desired layout of disks.

I guess I don't know what all happens when you do a new config. At first it sounds data destructive but I'm sure I'm just not understanding it correctly. 

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2 hours ago, grphx said:

I guess I don't know what all happens when you do a new config. At first it sounds data destructive but I'm sure I'm just not understanding it correctly. 

I am assuming that you are intending to end up with an additional data drive and not replace one of the existing ones?   If so the ‘Parity Swap’ procedure mentioned earlier is not appropriate.

 

The New Config is slightly destructive in that it invalidates the current parity (which is why it should never be used as part of recovering a failed drive).    It leaves all existing data drives with their data intact.

 

if you use this procedure then when you start the array Unraid will show all your existing data drives with their data intact and will start building parity on the new 10TB parity drive.   The old 8TB drive will be shown as ‘Unmountable’ since it currently has no file system on it (parity drives do not contain a file system), but there will be a check box to allow you to format unmountable drives and the 8TB will show as the one to be formatted.    It needs formatting before it can be used to store data and in theory this can be done while the new parity is being built, but I would suggest that you avoid doing this until the new parity is finished building as it leaves a fallback possibility in the event that one of the existing data drives fails while building the new parity drive contents.

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1 hour ago, itimpi said:

if you use this procedure then when you start the array Unraid will show all your existing data drives with their data intact and will start building parity on the new 10TB parity drive.   The old 8TB drive will be shown as ‘Unmountable’ since it currently has no file system on it (parity drives do not contain a file system), but there will be a check box to allow you to format unmountable drives and the 8TB will show as the one to be formatted.    It needs formatting before it can be used to store data and in theory this can be done while the new parity is being built, but I would suggest that you avoid doing this until the new parity is finished building as it leaves a fallback possibility in the event that one of the existing data drives fails while building the new parity drive contents.

So basically...

 

1.  Shut down the computer and connect the 10TB

2.  Turn on the computer and let Unraid load up.  Before starting the array there is an option to set the new 10TB as a parity drive.

3.  Start the array and Unraid will start rebuilding the parity to the new 10TB drive.

4.  Once parity has been rebuilt to the 10TB drive, go and format the old 8TB parity drive and add it to the array

 

Then, I have an additional 8TB of storage.

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Just now, grphx said:

So basically...

 

1.  Shut down the computer and connect the 10TB

2.  Turn on the computer and let Unraid load up.  Before starting the array there is an option to set the new 10TB as a parity drive.

3.  Start the array and Unraid will start rebuilding the parity to the new 10TB drive.

4.  Once parity has been rebuilt to the 10TB drive, go and format the old 8TB parity drive and add it to the array

 

Then, I have an additional 8TB of storage.

Not quite.    You have left out a part of step 2 where you use Tools->New Config to put the array into a state where you can assign the new 10TB drive as parity and the old 8TB as data before you start the array.

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