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Netgear ReadyNas Pro 6 corrupt firmware
First Netgear NAS user. I bought a defect Netgear ReadyNAS Pro 6. The previous owner said something went wrong during a firmware update and the NAS had some sort of corrupt firmware. It was 40Euro and my plan was to see if it can be recovered with reasonable effort and if not to reuse the case and the power supply to build my own NAS using OpenMediaVault or Nas4Free.
When I press the power button the fans in the NAS start spinning and on the display appears "ReadyNAS". Then nothing happens. The NAS is not discoverable in the RaidAR 6.3, it does not request an IP address etc. The "ReadyNAS" stays on the NAS screen. The NAS came with a 1TB WD Black drive (I do not know if working of defect yet). The behavior is the same if the drive is inserted in slot 1 or no drive is inserted at all except that in the first minute or so after power on some clicking noises are heard from the drive.
I connected a 15-pin (2x8 with one pin blocked) VGA header to the NAS but nothing is shown on the screen. I plan to connect an RS232 cable as well but I see there are solder remains on those pins so someone tried that already before me.
The question is: Do I stand any chance to recover it ? I have some experience with JTAG and flashing third-party firmware to routers but 0 experience with ReadyNAS.
This post How-to-update-BIOS-w-OS6-x-installed tells how to update the BIOS from OS6. While that part isn't applicable to you, it includes information on extracting the BIOS from the OS4.2.x package Netgear has provided and points to that package.
13 Replies
Did he tell you if it was running OS 4.2 or OS 6? If not, perhaps reach out to him and ask.
If it's only the firmware, than you could try a USB recovery - the OS 4.2 tool is here. https://kb.netgear.com/30267/RAIDiator-4-2-USB-Recovery-Tool. If it's a corrupted eeprom, then you'd need courtesy help from Netgear to fix it.
If you do get it working, I suggest converting it to OS-6. There is information in the forums on that. But if it is OS 4.2 now, then get it working on OS 4.2 first.
Assuming you have the right VGA cable (and I think there is only one common configuration), not seeing anything on the monitor means a serious problem. The NAS will say "ReadyNAS" if 5V is good -- it takes nothing more.
First thing to do is to be sure the previous owner didn't do some troubleshooting and leave something disconnected.
A common issue as those NASes get older is the power supply. RAM could be another, but is less common; and it would likely get to some point in the BIOS boot process unless there is no RAM at all. If you have a spare ATX power supply (or can "borrow" one from a PC), it's fairly easy to hook one up externally and see if that's the problem. Compatible supplies are available.
As for re-using the case, best of luck finding a motheboard that fits. Every conversion of a ReadyNAS to an open source NAS I have seen has retained the motherboard.
Thanks a lot for the suggestions. I have some reasons to believe the previous owner was quite smart and did not left many rocks unturned in trying to repair it. When I picked up the nas I saw he had at least 4 or 5 other ReadyNas in operation at the site (altough it seemed to me 2 slot models, perhaps ARM, not Intel based). It is quite likely that the internal EEPROM (containing the motherboard bios) is corrupted so I either find a way to reprogram it "in circuit" using my JTAG rig or desolder and replace it with another pre-programmed in my standalone eeprom programmer. Anyone knows a location where this BIOS might be available ?
Of course the existing board have a connector on the under-side for the drives backplane and there will be no other board having that but if I do not use the drives backplane and connect the drives using individual SATA cables to a mini-ITX motherboard with 6 SATA ports (such as Supermicro X9SCV-Q) perhaps also desoldering some connectors (HDMI and VGA) and replacing other (LAN ports) with headers, it might fit since 17x17cm is about the same size as the existing motherboard). But I am not there yet.
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