I have crashed my unraid server, the server will not boot, and I did this before I got to the point of creating a backup of the usb stick, but after installing a license key and moving ~400 GB of data to the raid.

 

Things to do different on my next attempt:

1. Get the server up and running with a working array
2. Create a backup of the usb stick!
3. Install apps...

 

At the moment I am not to worried about loosing data, and I know what disks where placed where.

 

What did I do to prior to the crash:

 

I tried to install Makemkv, it did not work, app would not start in web gui as it could not connect to something.

I tried to stop the app, but the app/browser stop responding, I refreshed the browser and the app was stopped after a few long attempts.

I tried to remove the app, but unraid could not do this, it just hanged in the browser, tho I could go to other menu choices.

I was thinking it might help rebooting the server, to get rid of the app, witch most likely was my biggest mistake...

Now the boot stops, and 2 leds are flashing on the keyboard

 

103 MB movie of the boot

 

Before I start over by creating a fresh installed usb stick, I want to learn from my mistake.

 

1. Is it possible fix the boot so the server will start?
2. What should I had done, instead of rebooting the server?
3. Is this enough information her to give an idea of what went wrong?

 

 

Thanks

Edited November 24, 20196 yr by Teza
Solved

Looks like a problem with the flash drive or the OS files, make a backup of the current flash (or just the config folder), re-create the flash using the Unraid flash creator tool, restore the config folder from your backup overwriting the existing one, that should hopefully do it.

Ok, this is what happend.

 

I took a new usb drive, instead of formatting the existing one, created a new install and replaced the config folder.

The computer did not want to boot from the usb drive and just went into bios.

 

I recreated the usb one more time, without replacing the config folder, and the computer would still not boot.

I then compared the usb drives and found that the "EDI" folder was named "EDI-" on the new drive so tried to change that.

Computer did still not boot.

 

Then tried the new usb stick in another usb port, and computer booted.

Um, ok...    ...then tried the first usb key that crashed in the same usb port that would boot with the usb stick with a new install.

 

Computer booted, unraid started, I got access to my server, was able to remove the makemkv app and everything seems to work just fine.

 

So why did this happen?

I guess the usb3 ports is not bootable, might be fixed by a bios configuration.

The usb 2 ports seems to boot normally.

 

What a relief...

 

Next step is to create a backup of the usb stick!

What you have encountered is not that usual.  USB3 ports seem to give problems with some MB's when it comes to booting Unraid.  For this reason, whenever someone reports having booting issues, the first advice that is given to try a USB2 port. 

 

IF you want to see if a BIOS upgrade will fix the problem, go ahead. But don't be surprised if it doesn't.  (I can not recall hearing that it ever did...)

 

(My personal theory is that the USB3 ports are booting as USB2 ports while under BIOS control and they get switched to USB3 when the Linux OS boots.  The flash drive gets 'lost' during the switch...)

I also see that some recommend to use usb2 flash drives.
My flashdrive is a USB3, but I hope I do not need to replace it with a usb2 as well.

 

52 minutes ago, Teza said:

I also see that some recommend to use usb2 flash drives.
My flashdrive is a USB3, but I hope I do not need to replace it with a usb2 as well.

 

I wouldn’t go that far.  I think the prevailing opinion is boot using USB 2 port but doesn’t matter if the flash drive itself is capable of both.

I have not heard of any problems with using a USB3 flash drive.  They are generally more expensive but the gap is narrowing on that score.   There basically is little advantage from extra speed from USB3 as the flash drive is little used with Unraid. Once the OS unpacks (those bz* files) and a few configuration files read, the drive just sits there until the shutdown starts and a couple of files are updated at that time.  (Unraid itself runs entirely from memory.)

3 hours ago, Teza said:

At the moment I am not to worried about loosing data, and I know what disks where placed where.

 

That metric of disk placement is only marginally useful with unraid. You need to keep a list of drive serial numbers and the corresponding slot assignments, parity, diskX, cache. A screenshot of the main GUI tab is one way of doing that. The /dev/sXX designations can possibly change from boot to boot based on timing or a drive failing, and will change if you modify hardware. Unraid doesn't care about /dev/sXX at all so it can be migrated to different systems without data loss. All you need is your drives, what system they are plugged in to doesn't matter as long as unraid can match up the serial numbers reported by the controller.

 

This is one of the huge advantages of unraid over traditional RAID management systems.

49 minutes ago, danull said:

I wouldn’t go that far.  I think the prevailing opinion is boot using USB 2 port but doesn’t matter if the flash drive itself is capable of both.

I think that USB2 drives seem to boot more reliably if you HAVE to boot from a USB3 port (as well as being slightly cheaper). 

1 hour ago, jonathanm said:

That metric of disk placement is only marginally useful with unraid. You need to keep a list of drive serial numbers and the corresponding slot assignments, parity, diskX, cache. A screenshot of the main GUI tab is one way of doing that. The /dev/sXX designations can possibly change from boot to boot based on timing or a drive failing, and will change if you modify hardware. Unraid doesn't care about /dev/sXX at all so it can be migrated to different systems without data loss. All you need is your drives, what system they are plugged in to doesn't matter as long as unraid can match up the serial numbers reported by the controller.

 

This is one of the huge advantages of unraid over traditional RAID management systems.

Oh, thank you.

So with this information I can rebuild the raid on any computer:

2 hours ago, Teza said:

So with this information I can rebuild the raid on any computer:

Any computer with a standard disk controller that doesn't mangle serial numbers.