I have 3 disks and a share with all 3 (called Media). My file structure is this:

 

/Media/Movies/Movie1/file.mkv

/Media/Movies/Movie2/file.mkv

/Media/Shows/Show1/S01/file.mkv

/Media/Shows/Show2/S01/file.mkv

 

You get the idea. Now, after reading a bunch, I figured a split level of 3 with high water allocation would spread out my media over disk. But in reality, this is what's happening:

 

 

Again, here's my share settings:

 

 

I have tried to experiment with split level of 2 as well but nothing seems to work. What do I need to do? Why does this not work?

First high-water was 2TB remaining on each disk, disk1 chosen first. Next high-water is 1TB remaining on each disk, disk1 chosen first. When disk1 has 1TB remaining it will choose disk2, unless split level forces it to choose another.

https://wiki.unraid.net/Un-Official_UnRAID_Manual#High_Water

Right in this particular config, once disk1 hits 1TB free it will start allocating from disk2 until it has 1TB free, then disk3 until it has 1TB free.  It then goes back to disk1 until 500GB free, then disk2 until 500GB free then disk3 until 500GB free, .. , you get the idea.

 

If disk3 were the 4TB device situation would be slightly different but similar:

allocate from disk3 until 2TB free

then from disk1 until 1TB free

then from disk2 until 1TB free

then back to disk4 until 1TB

then disk1 until 500GB free

etc

 

In the grand scheme doesn't make much difference.

That makes a ton of sense - thanks for explaining!

Seems like it's still not working consistently:

 

 

Disk 1 is getting everything!

 

Here's my share settings again

 

 

When I `cp` something on to the share, it always goes to disk1. However when radarr copied completed downloads, it went to disk2. What the difference here? I'm using smb. Radarr runs in docker and mounts the same smb share that I cp files to.

 

EDIT: Nvm I think that's because the existing directories don't get moved, only new ones do. Still odd.

Edited September 20, 20196 yr by Howboys

Split level overrides allocation method.

12 minutes ago, Howboys said:

Nvm I think that's because the existing directories don't get moved, only new ones do.

Not entirely sure what you are thinking here, but nothing ever gets moved, except for cache-yes moving from cache to array or cache-prefer moving from array to cache.

 

And in general, user share settings only tell it where to write new files.

 

On 9/14/2019 at 4:15 PM, trurl said:

unless split level forces it to choose another

11 minutes ago, johnnie.black said:

Split level overrides allocation method.