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beljim7419 wrote:
1. The device does not come with the hard drive caddy tray things. Does any one know where i can get some from. Google is doesn't seem to know what i'm talking about :P

Here is one source: http://store.netgear.com/store/netgear/ ... .124539100

beljim7419 wrote:
2. Coming from another Nas, the Etrayz like I mentioned. I am wondering if I can somehow keep all my files on my 2TB hard drive and just plug it into the NV+?

No. Likely the NAS will reformat the drive and lose your data if you try.

beljim7419 wrote:
I have a spare 1TB which failed its SMART check and was wondering if maybe I can use this to initially set the NV+ up then somehow just plug the 2TB in and it will work? Maybe as Raid 0

Most likely the NAS will give you a bad disk error (it runs a diagnostic when a new disk is installed). I wouldn't recommend it even if it passes.

If you still have contact with whomever you bought the NV+ from, see if they still have the trays. The trays are an important part of the device, and even if you only install a few drives, all four trays must be installed to ensure proper airflow. If they don't have the trays, I hope you didn't pay very much for the unit, for brand new with a 3 year warranty, they can be purchased on Newegg for $310. The four trays have a value of about $100.

Regardless, what is done is done, and the NV+, although a little slow compared to newer higher powered models is still a very reliable and functional NAS. To the best of my knowledge, every brand of NAS uses it's own proprietary modification of a Linux distro and will immediately reformat a drive when it is initially inserted.

If you still have the Etrayz and it is still functioning, then set the NV+ up with at least one new drive and transfer the files over the network. I would either keep the Etrayz functional for a while, or create a complete backup so that you always have the files on two different devices. Remember that RAID is designed to make replacing a failed drive easy without having to resort to restoring from backup, not as an alternative to backups.

Hi, thanks for the replys.

No the seller doesn't have the trays so i will have to get some when i can afford it. I will attempt to just balance them in some how for now. :D

It cost me $140 so I can't really grumble. I am just hoping sickbeard and sabnzbd will run a bit faster with the extra ram the nv+ has and transfers will be faster. The Etrayz only has 128mb and can hold 4TB capacity and apart from the GUI being a bit slow it has served me well for a couple of years. If the NV+ is no better i guess I will just sell it on and stick to the Etrayz as its smaller. I thought because the NV+ is about 4 times the price it would be vastly superior but am starting to wonder as it seems to be an old model. I will have to cross my fingers I think.

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I thought one of the points of a nas and xraid was for it to be a good backup device as if a Hard drive goes down you loose nothing?

beljim7419 wrote:
I thought one of the points of a nas and xraid was for it to be a good backup device as if a Hard drive goes down you lose nothing?

A NAS is a great backup device.

If you are using it for primary storage you still need to back up it up. RAID increases data availability, and makes it less likely that you will lose your data. but there are several failure modes that will kill the device altogether (for instance a NAS motherboard failure).

Also near-simultaneous multiple drive failures can and do occur. Note that all drives have the same load (and are often identical and installed together), Rebuilding the RAID array when you replace a bad drive stresses the remaining drives in the system, and can push marginal drives over the edge.

The NV+ (released in late 2006, early 2007) is a minor upgrade to the NV which was released in 2006. The major improvement was the addition of the front LCD panel. It has 256MB of memory (unless increased by a prior owner). It sounds as if the unit has been bounced around a bit if the prior owner didn't have any trays. I'm not sure it's a good idea to try to install the drives without the trays.

You might want to consider the Ultra 2 or Ultra 4 when you sell the NV+ chassis. The Ultra 2 is $280 at Newegg (right now, prices fluctuate). It does not have the LCD front panel, but has an Intel Atom D510 x-86 single core 64 bit processor and 1GB of internal memory. It is much faster than the NV+ and supports HD sizes above 2TB. The Ultra 4 is the 4 bay version of the Ultra 2 with the same OS, and features, but add in addition to the 2 more bays, the LCD front panel that will display messages. The current Newegg price is $490. Both include all the trays and screws, 90 free technical telephone support, and free on-line support for the life of the three year warranty.

While I am not familiar with sickbeard and sabnzbd, I assume you run the application on the PC and then use the NAS for storage.

Sickbeard and Sabnzbd are installed onto the actual NAS. The progs actually download my TV shows automatiacally and unzips them etc. and organises them for me all automatiacally on the nas. This means I can turn my PC off and the lower wattage NAS does the work. Like I say my Etrayz does all this with no probs other than on the rare occasion i need to go into the GUI it's a little slow but bareable. The NV+ has more ram and i will increase it with a spare 512mb module i have lying around so in theory the GUI should be snappier unless the CPU is inferior. I will have a see what chip is inside the Etrayz.

I will also look into some other addons for the NV+ like photo viewers and stuff as the Etayz doesn't do that very well probably due to small memory.

I'll have to post when I get the NV+ turns up and give my opinions over the Etrayz. With the extra cost like I said I would expect a major difference but e will see. Just nee to work out how to set it up with out losing all my data. I don't have the space or to copy the data elsewhere so I will have to figure something out.

What brand and model of drives are in the Etraz?

I'm not sure you can run Sickbeard and Sabnzbd on the NV+. There are add-ons that can be loaded. The NV+ uses a customed version of an older Debian distro. Some of the others on the forum can maybe give you some insight there.

There reason I asked about the make and model of the drives, most NAS units are somewhat finicky about the drives installed. I don't know about the Etraz, but most of the majors have a qualified drive list. In the case of the ReadyNAS units, it is called the Hardware Compatibility List (HCL).

I'm using Western Digital Caviar green 2TB at the moment so that will be fine.
I also have a Samsung HD103UJ has faild the SMART check but I'm thinking of trying to use it to back up some data from the 2TB drive because that may have to be reformated. I'm going to try raid0 and use the Samsung 1TB to install the initial firmware which I think I read has to be done on a virgin drive then put the second drive in and hope it just accepts as extra storage andf my file will stay intact till I can get another 2TB drive. Not sure if I can swap to xraid later without reformating though which will be a shame.

I have seen Sickbeard and Sabnzb in the addons section so that should all be fine. touch wood.

1. Using a drive that is already throwing errors is not a good idea.

2. When installing a drive, any drive that is not part of the array, it will be formatted and initialized. The only time this is not the case, is when a compatible array is moved from one chassis to another. For example moving from one Sparc based NAS to another (Duo/NV/NV+) or moving from one x-86 based NAS (NVX/Pro/Ultra) to another. You can move an array consisting of fewer drives into a chassis with more bays (2 to 4, 4 to 6) but obviously cannot move a 4 drive array into a 2 bay chassis.

3. While you can certainly use the HD103UJ to test it and make sure of the OS version, I absolutely would not use it for production. Adding the 2TB drive to the array already existing with 1TB will definitely format the drive and wipe it of all data. The only way to go from any version of Flex-Raid to X-Raid is through a factory default, which again will format the drives and wipe the data.

4. There are only two successful ways to move the data. a) Purchase an external drive large enough to hold the data and back up all the data from the Etrayz. Then move the drives to the NV+ and perform a factory default to establish the volume. Then restore the data from the backup. b) purchase new drives for the NV+ that are on the HCL, establish the new volume and then copy the data from the Etrayz to the NV+. It will be possible to use the Frontview backup job setup to do this if the Etrayz has a compatible file system. Worst case you would use Windows copy/paste of the files.

While you state that the current drives in the Etrayz are WD Caviar Green drives, you did not state that they are found on the HCL. If they are not on the HCL, you are taking a risk of data loss or other problems.

My WD Caviar Green drive is listed on the HCL so it is fine.

I will test the nas out on the Samsung 1TB and if it seems better I will transfer most stuff to that and the rest to my main pc and external 2.5"
I have about 1.4TB in use on the 2TB WD drive so i should just get away with it and hopefully won't lose anything or much in the process and start fresh with the WD 2TB drive.

I'll let you know how I got on when the NAS turns up :)