ReadyNAS NV+ upgrade after PSU failure

Question

I've had a ReadyNAS NV+ (RND4000) since it was an Infrant product (est. purchase 2005?).&nbsp; Except for a PSU failure several years back, which I replaced, it's been rock solid.&nbsp; Given it's age, I've been considering an upgrade for a while, but now the PSU appears to have gone out again, or at least I'm hoping it's that simple.&nbsp; My question is whether I need to repair the PSU on a very old unit in order to migrate to another NAS device and, if not, can I simply swap the discs (3x 750Gb Seagate) into a new ReadyNAS device?&nbsp;What are my options for getting my data off the drives if I decide NOT to stay with Netgear/ReadyNAS?&nbsp; Thanks in advance.&nbsp;&nbsp;

EricBlantz · Answer

Sorry about the last subject/title.&nbsp; I have no idea how that was entered.&nbsp; My issue is related to NV+ upgrade and data migration options.&nbsp;

StephenB · Answer

I took the liberty of fixing the title on the first post.
&nbsp;
It is possible to replace the PSU.&nbsp; The pinout isn't standard, so if you use an off-the-shelf PSU you'll need to modify it.&nbsp; The wiring changes are described here:&nbsp;https://www.readynas.com/download/archive/pdf/ReadyNAS_PSU_pinout.pdf
&nbsp;
There are some folks out there who are selling turnkey PSUs (already modified), but they are quite expensive.&nbsp; There are also some used NV+ out there, so you could purchase one with a working PSU and swap that over.
&nbsp;
If you have an ATX supply, you can jury-rig something that will work temporarily - using extension cables to connect the PSU to the NAS.&nbsp; You can modify the pinout in the extension cable.&nbsp;&nbsp;
&nbsp;
If you buy a new ReadyNAS, you can use paid support to temporarily mount your disks in the new NAS.&nbsp; That would let you off-load the data.&nbsp; However, this can be pretty expensive.&nbsp;&nbsp;https://kb.netgear.com/29876/ReadyNAS-Migrating-disks-from-RAIDiator-4-1-or-RAIDiator-5-3-to-ReadyNAS-OS-6
&nbsp;
If you can connect the disks to a PC (either with SATA or USB) you can either

boot the system under linux, and manually mount the RAID array or
use RAID recovery software (R-Studio is reasonably priced).&nbsp;&nbsp;https://www.r-studio.com/

&nbsp;
&nbsp;

EricBlantz · Answer

Thanks for the reply and the fix, StephenB.&nbsp; Revealing my ignorance here but... re the new NAS option, wouldn't my disks old just mount, and then I could backup to another device before upgrading to next/larger disks?&nbsp; or is there something proprietary about the RAID used in the NV+?

StephenB · Answer

EricBlantz&nbsp;wrote:
re the new NAS option, wouldn't my disks old just mount, and then I could backup to another device before upgrading to next/larger disks?&nbsp;

No.&nbsp; It's not that your RAID is proprietary - it's because too much has changed since 2005.
&nbsp;
One barrier is that the new ReadyNAS use a completely different file system underneath - BTRFS instead of the older EXT.
&nbsp;
Another barrier is that your NAS uses a sparc processor, current NAS use either an ARM or Intel processor.&nbsp; All ReadyNAS systems boot from the disks, but since your system uses a different processor, the NV+ disks can't boot on a newer NAS.&nbsp;
&nbsp;
FWIW, the RAID is differently organized too.&nbsp; Your system has a dedicated parity disk.&nbsp; The newer NAS&nbsp; distribute the parity blocks across all the disks.&nbsp; Distributing the parity improves performance and evens out the disk I/O.
&nbsp;
In principle Netgear could have included a boot mode that would mount the disks (at least read-only), instead of requiring support to do it manually.&nbsp; Though there is a limited amount of space in the boot flash, so they do need to prioritize how it's used.

tominwi · Answer

Pardon my naivete, but the idea that the NV+ can never be migrated to a newer platform except by Netgear engineers sorta boggles my mind. Why couldn't some backup from NV+ to a new platform work, using e.g. Rsync or some such, and then once the data is all on the new platform "just organize it the way you want"!?
&nbsp;
I suppose that last part is non-trivial huh!?

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ReadyNAS NV+ upgrade after PSU failure

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