Disk rebuild - missing files?


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Hello all.

So, probably a user error more than anything else, but wanted to reach out to you for some guidance.

 

I had one of my drives come up with an red X and I was not able to get any SMART info from it.

I did the following:

 

Stopped the array

Unassigned the drive

Started the array

unRaid was then unable to format the drive for rebuild, so I then...

 

Deleted the partition in the Unassigned section

Stopped the array

Assigned the drive

Started the array

Rebuild is now starting (in progress)

 

However, the drive was 95% full but it is only showing that 1% of it is being used!!

Although emulated, I am missing some files and worried that more could be missing.

It's a 14TB HDD (eeeeek).

 

Attached is my diagnostics.

Could you please advise if I have lost that data or if I have not configured something properly?

 

Also, apologies if this has been mentioned somewhere else.

Some posts are a bit overwhelming, hence me starting this one.

 

Appreciate your input and any possible suggestions.

 

Thanks

x

 

 

diagnostics-20201002-1748.zip

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31 minutes ago, Alessio Liscietti said:

unRaid was then unable to format the drive for rebuild

Unraid doesn't format the drive for rebuild, so I don't know what you mean here. The filesystem (format) is part of the bits of the rebuild. Suspect you have an incorrect understanding of the meaning of "format". Format means "write an empty filesytem (of some type) to this disk. That is what it has always meant in every operating system you have ever used.

 

When you format a disk assigned to the parity array, Unraid treats that write operation exactly as it does any other write operation, by updating parity. So after the format, parity agrees the disk has an empty filesystem. Rebuilding a formatted disk results in a formatted disk.

 

And your diagnostics confirms disk1 is empty.

 

 

 

 

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Just now, Alessio Liscietti said:

I take it there is no way to "recover" the data though other methods?

Some have used UFS Explorer

 

Wish you had asked for advice before doing anything. It was clear you were on the wrong path when you went here:

35 minutes ago, Alessio Liscietti said:

Deleted the partition in the Unassigned section

Never heard of anyone even taking that approach, and still don't know what you meant by this:

36 minutes ago, Alessio Liscietti said:

unRaid was then unable to format the drive for rebuild

Since Unraid would never have attempted that, what did you see that gave you the idea it wasn't working?

 

For future reference, here is the correct way to rebuild to the same disk:

  1. Stop array
  2. Unassign disk to be rebuilt
  3. Start array with disk unassigned
  4. Stop array
  5. Reassign disk
  6. Start array to begin rebuild

There is no formatting or wiping partition. As soon as anyone mentions formatting in the same post as rebuilding it almost always means they are about to make a mistake, or that they already have.

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2 minutes ago, trurl said:

Unraid doesn't format the drive for rebuild, so I don't know what you mean here. The filesystem (format) is part of the bits of the rebuild. Suspect you have an incorrect understanding of the meaning of "format". Format means "write an empty filesytem (of some type) to this disk. That is what it has always meant in every operating system you have ever used.

 

When you format a disk assigned to the parity array, Unraid treats that write operation exactly as it does any other write operation, by updating parity. So after the format, parity agrees the disk has an empty filesystem. Rebuilding a formatted disk results in a formatted disk.

 

And your diagnostics confirms disk1 is empty.

yes, syslog shows disk was formatted.  I suspect the emulated disk was showing as unmountable so they formatted it since it was a given option.  That format option really needs to be moved somewhere else, like maybe within the individual drive's options, at least that way you have to work to find it!

 

 

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8 minutes ago, Alessio Liscietti said:

I take it there is no way to "recover" the data though other methods?

Google may be your friend here but if you do want to try to recover anything then you need to take your array offline so nothing else will be written to it. writes to that disk will overwrite data that *may* be recovered.

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19 hours ago, Alessio Liscietti said:

Going to run the drive through UFS Explorer to see if any data is recoverable.

Wish me luck!

The good: Running over night and at 70% and UFCE has found shed loads of my missing files so far. :)

The bad: So many files to go through!!! :(

The ugly: Me having to re-add them again to Unraid! 🤓

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