Shutdown two readynas from one UPS

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Dewdman42 wrote:
For my purposes the best thing to happen when the power goes down is to fairly immediately shutdown all the computers after maybe 10-20 seconds just to make sure it’s not a brown out. I don’t want the ups battery to drain out all the way, I want the machines to shutdown cleanly. 

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That is what happens.  You just don't have a lot of control over the level at which the shut-down occurs with NUT.

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Dewdman42 wrote:

When the power comes back I want them to start up again even though they were shutdown cleanly.

It doesn’t make sense for a readynas to autobpower back on to the state it was when it lost power. These machines should hopefully not ever lose power before shutting down cleanly that is what we are trying to avoid.

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You've said you both do and do not want the same thing.  If the NAS was on when the line power was disrupted (and then orderly shut-down occurred due to NUT, since you have an UPS that's monitored by the NAS), then it does come back on when that power is restored -- the state in which it was prior to the power interruption.  If the NAS was off, then it remains off when power is restored.  The latter is what did not happen on most legacy ReadyNAS.  They, too, powered on.

My ultra 2 plus comes back on, my 524x does not. If NUT shuts it down before battery is drained then I guess it thinks it does not want to be auto rebooted, which is not sensical. Sorry I disagree with you.

1. power goes out
2. readynas runs on battery
3. NUT shuts down readynas while on battery power from UPS
4. last known state of readynas = off
5. battery drains
6. power comes back
7. last known state of readynas = off, so it doesn't powerup.

The only time it would ever make sense to have the readynas power up automatically to the last known state would if the power cut out completely before it could do a clean shutdown, so that its last known state is ON.  But that is a situation we are specifically trying to avoid! 

The good news is that somehow my switch or something is able to make it wake on lan.

Then your 524x is not doing what I said it should or what I thought StephenB said it would.  Your Ultra2, like most legacy systems, would probably come back on whether it was off or on when the power interruption occurred.  For most, I think that probably is better than it not coming back on when it was previously on, but it's still not what I think it should do.

I agree.  Well a lot of PC BIOS have three settings, two of which bring power back on, one is to always boot up the machine if power is detected, the other is to bring it to the last known state. If you are not using a UPS, that last known state mode works fine.  If you are using a UPS, then it doesn't, you would need to either

A - always boot it up when it detects power, ignore previous state.

or 

B - have the UPS system (ie, NUT) flag something in the BIOS to know that the last known state should be considered ON, for when the power does come back.

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Dewdman42 wrote:

My ultra 2 plus comes back on, my 524x does not. If NUT shuts it down before battery is drained then I guess it thinks it does not want to be auto rebooted, which is not sensical. Sorry I disagree with you.

 

1. power goes out
2. readynas runs on battery
3. NUT shuts down readynas while on battery power from UPS
4. last known state of readynas = off
5. battery drains
6. power comes back
7. last known state of readynas = off, so it doesn't powerup.

 

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If the sequence you list above is for the RN524, then it is acting as I described.  As far as the NAS is concerned, the power failure happened at step 5.

StephenB  wrote:

• If the system was powered off at the time of the power failure, the system remains off when the power is restored.

I thought the Ultra/Pro worked that way also, but I was working from memory (and as I tried to explain, it isn't something I run into very often).  It sounds like I remembered it incorrectly.

Whether this is sensible behavior or not is another question. Personally I'd prefer to always power up the NAS myself whether the shutdown was clean or not.

I agree.  My windows server is also configured to always power back on no matter what.  It makes no sense to me at all for a server of any kind to not behave that way....and in particular when as UPS is involved, even more so.

It might make sense for desktop computers, which are turned on and off frequently, to follow the last known state to power back up.  Also, Desktop computers running Windows and OSX are generally much more resiliant to not being screwed up by a power outage.  Even lots of apps are automatically saving things under the covers now so that in many cases you won't even lose what you were working on....not always, but sometimes.  So having your desktop on a UPS is less of a priority...and certainly if my desktop was off before a power outage, I don't want it back on again.

But for servers...if I want a server Off then probably it will be completely unplugged on a shelf somewhere.  If its plugged in, then it wants to be on always as long as there is power.  That should be the behavior of the 524X IMHO.

Do you have any clue as to why the wake on lan might be working, not withstanding the fact that I don't have any other wake on lan client anywhere specifically targeting it?

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Dewdman42 wrote:

 

Do you have any clue as to why the wake on lan might be working, not withstanding the fact that I don't have any other wake on lan client anywhere specifically targeting it?

 

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That is curious.  Are you certain it is WoL that is turning it on?  Have you tried disabling WoL in the NAS and see if the behavior changes?

I'm not "certain" of anything, but it was OFF always before and the 524x woul not restart when the power came back.  when I checked the WoL box, now it does.  I can't find anything in my router docs that it is sending the WoL message either.  No idea. 

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Dewdman42 wrote:

 I can't find anything in my router docs that it is sending the WoL message either.  No idea. 

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What router?

TP-Link C3150

OK, I see where you are coming from.  If the NAS does not know why it was shuit down, then it doesn't know to come back on if it was due to a NUT shut-down.  But I don't remember that being the way things worked on my native OS6 machines when I was using the built-in NUT.  I'm using Eaton IPP now, so things are very different for me.

I do recall seeing some interplay between having WoL enabled and power on after UPS shut-down on the legacy rack mount systems, and that could be the key here, but I don't remember the details.  If WoL is enabled, the NAS is not really totally off.  It''s alive enough to listen for WoL  That alone may be how WoL is interracting with your NAS.  It's not getting a WoL magic packet, just the fact that it's enabled changes how things work.

As to why you would want a server/NAS to remain off it it was off, you would if it's a backup device on a power schedule.  Simply put, one size does not fit all, but Netgear only gives us one option (which differs depending on current and legacy machines).

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Sandshark wrote:

 

As to why you would want a server/NAS to remain off it it was off, you would if it's a backup device on a power schedule. 

Yes, and some of my NAS are used that way.  

BTW, my comment on my preference was poorly worded - I'd prefer my own NAS to remain off no matter what the power state was.  The rationale is that I usually want to delay powering my NAS up until I know that the power is stable. 

Power failures are rare for me, and almost never last long enough for the NAS to actually power down.  If the relatively few cases when I've experienced an extended power loss, the power has often been unstable in the beginning (coming on for a few seconds, then turning off again).  Though I haven't had to deal with intentional brownouts, that is another scenario where I'd want to keep the NAS off.

But I do understand why some would want them turned on no matter what (and also why many would be fine with the current policy).  It depends on what they are used for, and the environment they are used in.

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Sandshark wrote:

Simply put, one size does not fit all, but Netgear only gives us one option (which differs depending on current and legacy machines).

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Agreed, and this has been requested many times for many years. 

FWIW, if you have a terminal connected to the NAS (via the serial port on the Ultra, or the microusb port on the RN52x), it might be possible to access the bios during startup and change the power settings.  Not something I've tried though.

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Dewdman42 wrote:

TP-Link C3150

 

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Unfortunately TP-Link doesn't seem to have a manual for it on their website (only FAQs and some videos).

FWIW, I have RN102 that I don't actually use (other than occasional testing).  It's on my home network, and is normally powered down.  It has WoL enabled, and it does come on spontaneously sometimes - every month or two.  I've never figured out the cause.  I've seen some other posts here reporting similar behavior.  It is possible that the NAS sometimes falsely thinks it is seeing a WoL magic packet.

Well the other thing that is making me wonder is that if I have all my machines shut down cleanly before the power in the battery is drained, then the minute they are shutdowh, they should detect some power and try to start up again.  Right?  

Seems to me that the only truly proper way to handle this is that the UPS itself should be controlling when to shutdown and when to start up, and therefore it should use WoL to start them up.

But i digress.   I'm happy enough they are going to shut down cleanly...  

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Dewdman42 wrote:

 

Seems to me that the only truly proper way to handle this is that the UPS itself should be controlling when to shutdown and when to start up, and therefore it should use WoL to start them up.

 

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Your UPS isn't connected to the ethernet, so it can't do that. 

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Dewdman42 wrote:

Well the other thing that is making me wonder is that if I have all my machines shut down cleanly before the power in the battery is drained, then the minute they are shutdowh, they should detect some power and try to start up again.  Right?  

No, because the NAS hasn't seen a loss of power at that point.  The Ultra would try to restart

• if the battery completely drains
• and power is then restored.

But if the battery doesn't completely drain, then the Ultra won't try to start up on it's own. That's because the bios won't see a loss of power.  

If it worked as you are imagining, then it would be impossible to power down the Ultra unless you pulled the plug.

I believe your conceptual problem here is that you are thinking that the shutdown initiated by the UPS is somehow different from other shutdowns done via the power switch, admin web ui, or power schedule.  As far as the NAS BIOS is concerned, it's not any different.

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Dewdman42 wrote:

Well the other thing that is making me wonder is that if I have all my machines shut down cleanly before the power in the battery is drained, then the minute they are shutdowh, they should detect some power and try to start up again.  Right?  

 

No.  The NAS will not return to the start-up portion of the BIOS until power is interrupted and re-applied.  Think of the actual power removal "arming" the process.

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Seems to me that the only truly proper way to handle this is that the UPS itself should be controlling when to shutdown and when to start up, and therefore it should use WoL to start them up.

 

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Actually, mostt high-end UPS do have the capability to send a shut-down command (that NUT can monitor) based on user configuration.  But many only provide you the ability to set those parameters through their propritary software rather than a control panel.  Since most basic home UPS units don''t support this, Netgear has not given that level of insite into NUT via the GUI.   And any changes you make via SSH could be overwritten at any point (especially an OS update).

An UPS with an Ethernet connection could send a WoL.  I suppose one with USB could emulate a keyboard and use that if "power on from keyboard" is enabled, but I doubt a ReadyNAS has that option, since it won't normally have a keyboard.

I did install an Ethernet card in my Eaton UPS, but it does not have WoL (or any other "run script on power-on") capability.  Eaton relies on you using an (expensive) application designed for enterprise use to monitor multiple UPS and devices on them.  It can send a WoL when power is returned to a device.

I suppose one could develop a set of power-down and power-up scripts for a "master" device that sets a flag when power-down is due to the UPS and will power on other devices when the flag is set when that unit powers on (and for some devices, wake from Hibernate).  Then, you'd only have to have one device auto power-on and the remainder could be powered up sequentially, reducing the power-up surge on the UPS.  I'm not enough of an expert on NUT to know how to modify it's power-down script.

A simplification of that would be for one unit to always send a WoL on power-up, since sending a WoL to a unit that's already on won't hurt.