Ready NAS 212 and Acronis Cyber Protect Home Office

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RacingTog wrote:

I don't know the specific drives on the NAS but they were proper NAS hard drives, red, from Western Digital.

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Unfortunately WD slipped some SMR drives into the Red line.  Those don't perform well in OS-6 ReadyNAS, and write performance can be very variable (and very slow) with these disks.  Please check, and see if you are using one of these models.

The SMR models are

• WD20EFAX
• WD30EFAX
• WD40EFAX
• WD60EFAX

Note the A doesn't mean SMR - it's just highlighted to distinguish these particular disks from the older EFRX - which are all CMR

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RacingTog wrote:

Hi Sandshark. No, that hasn't worked. Should I switch it back on?

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Totally up to you. 

https://www.linuxtopia.org/online_books/network_administration_guides/using_samba_book/ch08_06_16.html wrote:

 

This share-level option determines whether Samba honors all requests to perform a disk sync when requested to do so by a client. Many clients request a disk sync when they are really just trying to flush data to their own open files. As a result, this can substantially slow a Samba server down. 

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Leaving it off can greatly improve performance for some applications.  Ignoring the disk sync requested by the clients has little downside.  

Maybe leave it off for a while, and see if you run into any issues.

Other sources make it seem a little more important to have strict sync enabled.  I looked around when VeraCrypt was giving me issues which turning it off solved, but I don't have any sources handy.  I ended up creating a new share exclusively for the VeraCrypt volumes so nothing else was affected by having it off.

Thanks for getting back to me Stephen,

I have taken a photo of one of the twin drives installed on my NAS 212. Please see image attached of the label of one the twin drives.

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RacingTog wrote:

I have taken a photo of one of the twin drives installed on my NAS 212. 

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There are easier ways to check the model.  It is in the logs, and you can also see it on the volume tab of the admin web ui (just click on the drive in the center graphic). 

But as I noted above, the WD40EFRX is CMR, so SMR is not the problem.

Have you ever run the disk test?  It's an option on the volume settings wheel.  I'm pressing a bit because disk issues are one cause of poor performance (and of course eventually can lead to data loss).

Have you ever measured the transfer speed when you drag/drop files from the PC to the NAS?

Hi Stephen,

I am running the disk test now.

How do I measure the transfer speed in drag and drop?

Are we going off course here? I have no issues with this NAS doing backups any other way. It is only Acronis it won't work with. They seemed to think it was some sort of permissions issue.

Hi Stephen,

The disk test has run. I haven't had any reports from it.

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RacingTog wrote:

The disk test has run. I haven't had any reports from it.

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It must have passed then - you would have seen messages if it had failed.

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RacingTog wrote:

How do I measure the transfer speed in drag and drop?

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You can simply copy a folder, and monitor how long it takes.

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RacingTog wrote:

It is only Acronis it won't work with. They seemed to think it was some sort of permissions issue.

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If it were permissions, it simply wouldn't have copied files.  So I see how it could be permissions. 

Hi Stephen,

OK, so to update: I got fed up of waiting for Acronis to complete and I instead used GoodSynch to do the backup. This it did in less than 20 hours.

So far we have established:

1) Acronis software works absolutely fine with all backup jobs including backups to all my Netgear NAS units except this particular one.

2) Goodsynch works absolutely fine with this NAS.

We can concude that both Acronis and the Netgear NAS drives are working fine. The outstanding issue is:

"Why won't Acronis work on this particular NAS?" Acronis engineers worked for three weeks on this issue and said it was something to do with the NAS. They suggested it might be a permissions issue.

Where do we go from here please?

many thanks,

I am much obliged,

RacingTog (Matt)

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RacingTog wrote:

 

We can concude that both Acronis and the Netgear NAS drives are working fine. The outstanding issue is:

"Why won't Acronis work on this particular NAS?" Acronis engineers worked for three weeks on this issue and said it was something to do with the NAS. They suggested it might be a permissions issue.

 

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In your first post on this, you said "It takes over a week to do a backup to the Netgear NAS."  If the backup is running very slowly, then the problem cannot be permissions.  A permissions problem would result in the backup failing altogether (either skipping some files, or stopping with an error).  My take is that they simply have no idea on what the problem is.

One option is to try creating a new share on the NAS for the backup.  Rename the existing share, and create a fresh one that matches the original name.  Then run Acronis again, and see if it works normally.  If it does, then you can delete the original share when the backup completes.

Thank you for the reply Stephen,

I have set that backup up 6-8 times, usually with a complet re-set of the NAS to factory default before trying a new share and backup. The same thing happens everytime. The backup tells me it will take about 9-12 days. The backup runs for about 5-6 days, then it stops with some sort of error. useually that it couldn't find the destination drive (NAS). Then, I restart it and it runs again for a few days and stops again with the same error. When I check the NAS, there are substantioal backup files created on it. I have never had the patience to let it complete.

Just closing this issue now. There was not a solution found. Acronis works perfectly with my other Netgear NAS drives, inc one which is identical in every way, same model, same firmware. But it simply won't work properly with one particular NAS. I have given up and am now using GoodSync software with that NAS and it works fine.