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Forum Discussion
Compatibility of discs running in failed ReadyNas RN104 with new ReadyNas RN214
My current RN104, purchased in Feb 2014 and therefore out of warranty, will not boot up, instead giving a "Fail to boot from USB!" message even when trying to boot from USB. I have the most recent upgrade to OS 6.9.1, and it was running fine as two days ago. However, when removing the USB boot drive and starting the machine per normal, the same "Fail to boot from USB" error occurs. When I did create a USB from which to boot, and followed that protocol, it then boots from the USB and shuts down as it is supposed to. The boot menu cannot be accessed via the paper clip in the rear reset hole method. From review of related threads in the community, it appears I am out of luck with the existing RN104. I think a product like this should have lasted longer than 47 months, but that's for another day.
Since my data on the discs cannot be replaced, and the Netgear proprietary backup methodolody has me stuck with Netgear if I ever want to see that data again, my question is, if I purchase a new ReadyNAS RN214, can I simply remove the discs that were running in the RN104 and move them to the RN214 (placing them in the same left to right order)? The discs are (4) 4TB WD Red NAS Hard Drives.
Thanks for any feedback/replies.
6 Replies
brianschilton wrote:
Since my data on the discs cannot be replaced,
My first comment is that the only way to keep your data safe is to back it up on other device(s). All devices (from any manufacturer) can fail, and RAID is not enough to keep your data safe.
brianschilton wrote:
and the Netgear proprietary backup methodolody has me stuck with Netgear
XRAID is a wrapper built on standard linux tools - in particular linux mdadm software RAID and the BTRFS file system. There is nothing proprietary. The data can be extracted from a standard x86 linux system, and it can also be extracted from some data recovery tools - for instance ReclaiMe.
brianschilton wrote:
my question is, if I purchase a new ReadyNAS RN214, can I simply remove the discs that were running in the RN104 and move them to the RN214 (placing them in the same left to right order)? The discs are (4) 4TB WD Red NAS Hard Drives.
If the failure (whatever it was) didn't damage the filesystems on the disk, then you can directly migrate the disks to a new OS 6 ReadyNAS - including the RN214.
brianschilton wrote:
My current RN104, purchased in Feb 2014 and therefore out of warranty, will not boot up, instead giving a "Fail to boot from USB!" message even when trying to boot from USB. I have the most recent upgrade to OS 6.9.1, and it was running fine as two days ago. However, when removing the USB boot drive and starting the machine per normal, the same "Fail to boot from USB" error occurs.
Can you try removing all disks (including USB drives and any other USB connections), and power it up diskless. Then tell us what status you see on the front panel, and also the status reported by RAIDar ( https://kb.netgear.com/20684/ReadyNAS-Downloads#raidar ).
The first step is to confirm that the chassis really has failed. If you remove the drives (labeling them so they go back in the same order), does it display "No Disks" and RAIDar sees it with the same status? If yes, do you have a spare drive (not part of your array) you can put in it and see if it boots and installs the OS to it?
Thanks for the helpful reply.
Short version: it would not boot discless at all and behave the same way; it did boot once when I put in a single spare disc BUT only with the recovery USB flash inserted; once that flash is removed it reverts to the same behavior as with the four orginal discs or with no disc. Then, after that initial successful recovery USB aided bootup, the system reverted to the same behavior with the new disc as it had with the original four discs.
Longer version:
(A) Discless test results: I removed the discs and tried to start discless. It immediately goes to the "boot from USB" status with the power and backup lights alternately strobing, and never gets anywhere the normal booting screen, much less a screen that says "No discs." That occurs whether or not there is actually a USB in the drive; then, if there is the recovery USB in the drive it runs that sequence and shuts down, or if not, proceeds to the "boot from USB failed!" message. If I remove the USB from the shut down drive and try to restart as normal, it still goes immediately to the "boot from USB" screen/flashing. If I let it try to boot without the USB in, and get the "boot from USB failed!" message, then the only way to shut down the chassis is to unplug the power cord, as it is otherwise unresponsive to the power button. Then, once the power cord is plugged in again (even after waiting ten minutes) it goes immediately to the "boot from USB" status and results in the same as with the discs in, i.e. "Boot from USB failed!" if there is no USB drive inserted, or running the recovery sequence and shutting down if the recovery USB was inserted.
(B) New disc inserted results: when inserting the new disc it would not boot without the USB recovery also inserted, giving the "boot from USB failed!" message and freezing there. However, after shutting down by pulling the plug, inserting the recovery USB, and then restarting, it then saw the new disc (not previously RAID/OS6 formatted) and started up normally (though needing extra time to format the disc). RAIDar saw it with no special messages other than to note that I now had one, but not four, discs in the bays. I then shut down per normal, and everything seemed normal. I removed the USB recovery drive and restarted as normal. This time it reverted immediately back to the old behavior as described in (A) above, and again I cannot get it to boot up at all, and cannot connect to RAIDar.
Thanks again for your time. I've gone ahead and ordered a new RN214 since having my system down too long is worse than the $389 bill. My chief concern is thus being sure I can simply swap in the four discs from the RN104 into the new RN214 without having the new RN214 see them as something that needs to be newly formatted and thus wiped completely clean.
I do have an older NAS unit that is used as my failsafe backup (so in answer to Stephen, "yes, my backup is backed up, though it is a huge pain to transfer data from that older unit, lost time I would like to avoid"). It would still not be a terrible outcome if you think this RN104 chassis can be resurrected to be reliable, at which point I will let it become my triple failsafe. Any thoughts you have along those lines would be most welcome, and again, thanks for your time and courtesy.
Thanks for your time and reply. You and Sandshark posed similar questions/analysis, so please accept my response to him (#4 in this chain) to yours as well. Thanks again for your courtesy and time. And my backups are backed up, though not as easily accessed in the backed up form in terms of time necessary to get them onto my main network systems :)
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