My ReadyNAS Ultra 2 has died and now shows both hard drives as dead. It still boots up but but intermittently shows 1 hard drive working so I'm sure that it is a hardware issue and not that both working drives died at the same time. I have RAID setup and need to recover my data. Can I just transfer the drives to a new ReadyNAS or will they need to be reformatted?Will these drives only work in a ReadyNAS device or would a different NAS platform support them without reformatting?Help.

They would need to be in a pro or ultra to be immediately readable. It is also possible to mount the volume in an x86 linux system, though I don't know the command sequence to do so.Have you tested the drives with vendor tools in a PC?

I have tried to run the disk through my Mac disc utility but it says :This disk doesn’t contain an EFI system partition. If you want to start up your computer with this disk or include it in a RAID set, back up your data and partition this disk.

It uses ext as the file system, and I believe the utility is correct when it says there is no EFI partition.I'm not a mac owner, hopefully someone who is (and who has actually done this) can give you more specific guidance.

If you are sure that the box is dead and not the drives then you can put them in another 4.x based system. The system uses MD RAID / LVM and EXT4 so mounting directly on a PC or Mac is not possible outside of a linux environment. Is it still under warranty?

Unfortunately the HW warranty expired Nov. 30, 2013

My ReadyNAS died. How do I save my data???

13 Replies

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StephenB
Guru - Experienced User
Jan 02, 2014
They would need to be in a pro or ultra to be immediately readable. It is also possible to mount the volume in an x86 linux system, though I don't know the command sequence to do so.

Have you tested the drives with vendor tools in a PC?
Schinway
Aspirant
Jan 02, 2014
I have tried to run the disk through my Mac disc utility but it says :
This disk doesn’t contain an EFI system partition. If you want to start up your computer with this disk or include it in a RAID set, back up your data and partition this disk.
StephenB
Guru - Experienced User
Jan 02, 2014
It uses ext as the file system, and I believe the utility is correct when it says there is no EFI partition.

I'm not a mac owner, hopefully someone who is (and who has actually done this) can give you more specific guidance.
Mace_Windoo
Aspirant
Jan 02, 2014
If you are sure that the box is dead and not the drives then you can put them in another 4.x based system. The system uses MD RAID / LVM and EXT4 so mounting directly on a PC or Mac is not possible outside of a linux environment. Is it still under warranty?
Schinway
Aspirant
Jan 02, 2014
Unfortunately the HW warranty expired Nov. 30, 2013
Mace_Windoo
Aspirant
Jan 02, 2014
Do you have a spare drive lying around? I would take a spare drive and see if you can factory reset your system with a different drive. This will confirm if it is indeed the box.

Be very careful however, as it will wipe whatever is on that spare drive
Schinway
Aspirant
Jan 02, 2014
With a new empty drive in the unit I held down the reset button on the back and powered up, RAIDar now shows "Corrupt root" for the drive.
Mace_Windoo
Aspirant
Jan 02, 2014
You need to follow the factory reset steps explicitly in this situation. Holding in the reset button during boot should take you to the boot menu, from there you can select factory reset.

http://www.readynas.com/kb/faq/boot/how ... o_2_duo_v2

"corrupt root" usually implies there is something on the drives
brianb33
Aspirant
Mar 25, 2014
It could be way better to ask a specialist to recover your data although the service is expensive I got my data recovered for less than $300 by www.295datarecovery.com
tony359
Apprentice
Mar 25, 2014
As Mace Windoo said, you are not resetting the unit properly, the reset button needs to be hold while the unit boots up til the BOOT MENU appears.