USB Died, Server still up, Outdated backup...help please

[1lyfe]

Hello Everyone,

 

My Boot USB just died 30 minutes ago... at least that is what it seems. 

I am getting a lot of docker/vm/other errors that all point to missing or cannot find a file in /boot/xxx 

I have a backup of my USB, but it is a 2 days old, and I have replaced 3/12 drives in the past 2 days and started shifting data around them. 

I checked the latest backup file, and I found /config/DISK_ASSIGNMENTS.txt which indeed shows outdated drive information inside. 

 

Is there any way I can pull the drive info from RAM and put it on the USB so I can restore and boot normally? 

My unraid server is still up and running and everything seems to be running fine.

Dockers and VMs are still running although it shows dockers and VMs are stopped and cannot be started because of missing config files. 

 

Thanks for your Help!

[itimpi]

Easiest thing is to make sure you have a screenshot of the Main tab as that has all your current drive assignments.   You can then recreate the array using that information if needed.

 

it is always possible that the USB drive has just dropped offline for some reason and that rebooting may get it back.    Alternatively plug it into a PC/Mac and see if you can make a copy of the config folder that holds your license key and all your Unraid settings.

[trurl]

You can probably use that backup, just delete config/super.dat and it will make you reassign your disks. 

[1lyfe]

6 minutes ago, itimpi said:

Easiest thing is to make sure you have a screenshot of the Main tab as that has all your current drive assignments.   You can then recreate the array using that information if needed.

 

it is always possible that the USB drive has just dropped offline for some reason and that rebooting may get it back.    Alternatively plug it into a PC/Mac and see if you can make a copy of the config folder that holds your license key and all your Unraid settings.

Don't know why I didnt try plugging in the drive elsewhere... I just tested and unfortunately its dead. 
Do I just restore the config to new USB, and assign the Replace the outdated drives with new drives? 
Wont that cause a data rebuild?

[1lyfe]

4 minutes ago, trurl said:

You can probably use that backup, just delete config/super.dat and it will make you reassign your disks. 

Will I lose any data this way? 
Nothing else in terms of dockers/VMs/Settings has changed so I am not worried about those. 

I'm just worried about my data. 

[itimpi]

As was mentioned by trurl just use your last backup but remove the super.dat file from the config folder.

 

When you boot Unraid you will then have no drives assigned, but you can use the screenshot I mentioned to assign  them exactly as before. Tick the “parity” is valid box and then when you start the array everything should come up as before as Unraid will recognise disks that have previously been used in Unraid and will leave their contents intact.   The one thing you must NOT do is assign a data disk as a parity drive as that would destroy its contents so check your assignments carefully.

[1lyfe]

13 minutes ago, itimpi said:

As was mentioned by trurl just use your last backup but remove the super.dat file from the config folder.

 

When you boot Unraid you will then have no drives assigned, but you can use the screenshot I mentioned to assign  them exactly as before. Tick the “parity” is valid box and then when you start the array everything should come up as before as Unraid will recognise disks that have previously been used in Unraid and will leave their contents intact.   The one thing you must NOT do is assign a data disk as a parity drive as that would destroy its contents so check your assignments carefully.

Thanks for your help! I will this a try once I grab a new USB from the store.

 

Last dumb question... I was using CA Backup/Restore for the USB backups and it just backed up the folder structure. Do I use the manual installation method for creating the new USB? 

As in: Copy the folder over, and run the make_bootable.bat.

Edited April 28, 2020 by 1lyfe

[itimpi]

40 minutes ago, 1lyfe said:

Thanks for your help! I will this a try once I grab a new USB from the store.

 

Last dumb question... I was using CA Backup/Restore for the USB backups and it just backed up the folder structure. Do I use the manual installation method for creating the new USB? 

As in: Copy the folder over, and run the make_bootable.bat.

That will work just fine    I cannot remember if CA backup includes the super.dat file, but if it does make sure you delete it from the USB drive before booting Unraid.

 

it is worth pointing out that you can always get a backup suitable for use with the USB Creator tool by clicking on the flash drive on the Main tab and using the backup option from there.

[sota]

... and if anyone else who's in or is seeing this thread, doesn't go and make an immediate backup of their config...

[squelch]

32 minutes ago, itimpi said:

That will work just fine    I cannot remember if CA backup includes the super.dat file, but if it does make sure you delete it from the USB drive before booting Unraid.

 

it is worth pointing out that you can always get a backup suitable for use with the USB Creator tool by clicking on the flash drive on the Main tab and using the backup option from there.

Jumping in here, not OP. I'm curious if you have the NVIDIA unraid installed will this work the same way? It apparently overwrites the default unraid installation. I make backups of my flash drive weekly and would love to know all of this before my flash drive kicks the bucket.

[trurl]

4 minutes ago, squelch said:

Jumping in here, not OP. I'm curious if you have the NVIDIA unraid installed will this work the same way? It apparently overwrites the default unraid installation. I make backups of my flash drive weekly and would love to know all of this before my flash drive kicks the bucket.

If you have a backup with the nvidia build then using that backup will result in the nvidia build. Or you can just use a normal build with only the config folder from the backup to get going again, then reinstall nvidia the same way you did before.

[squelch]

1 minute ago, trurl said:

If you have a backup with the nvidia build then using that backup will result in the nvidia build. Or you can just use a normal build with only the config folder from the backup to get going again, then reinstall nvidia the same way you did before.

Okay! This will be my last post as I'm sure this off topic for this thread. Just so I make sure I'm understanding properly. If I use the backup from the WebGUI can those files directly be placed onto a new flash without the unraid tool?

[trurl]

1 minute ago, squelch said:

If I use the backup from the WebGUI can those files directly be placed onto a new flash without the unraid tool?

They can but they won't be bootable until you make them bootable.

https://wiki.unraid.net/UnRAID_6/Getting_Started#Manual_Method_.28Legacy.29

 

[1lyfe]

1 hour ago, itimpi said:

That will work just fine    I cannot remember if CA backup includes the super.dat file, but if it does make sure you delete it from the USB drive before booting Unraid.

 

it is worth pointing out that you can always get a backup suitable for use with the USB Creator tool by clicking on the flash drive on the Main tab and using the backup option from there.

Thank you SOOO MUCH!!!

Server is back up and running smoothly. 

Beer on me if you are ever in Toronto!

[1lyfe]

43 minutes ago, squelch said:

Jumping in here, not OP. I'm curious if you have the NVIDIA unraid installed will this work the same way? It apparently overwrites the default unraid installation. I make backups of my flash drive weekly and would love to know all of this before my flash drive kicks the bucket.

I have Nvidia unraid installed on my server and it just restored fine. 

Tested it as well and I can transcode on my GPU without issues. 

[squelch]

2 minutes ago, 1lyfe said:

I have Nvidia unraid installed on my server and it just restored fine. 

Tested it as well and I can transcode on my GPU without issues. 

Thank you so much! I figured it wasn't too offtopic to tack on into this thread. As this was something I was very curious about too. Glad to hear that you got your server up and running again.

 

Cheers