ReadyNAS Duo - Drive 1 dead no matter which drive

Do you have a backup?
Is your Duo a v1 or v2? See:
http://www.rnasguide.com/2012/01/09/how ... -or-nv-v2/

Don't continue to do what you have been doing until you have a backup of your data.
I'd suggest you wait for advice here, or, if the unit is under warranty, contact support.
Can you currently access your data?

What happened when you replaced disk one with the "backup" disk. Was this disk the same size as disk 2? Did the unit then resync the drives?

Yes, I can access the data. When I replaced disk 1 with the backup disk, it showed that it was syncing but drive 1 led kept blinking and frontview showed disk 1 in need of attention or dead. All three drives are the same (Seagate 1TB). Should I put drive 2 back in and purchase a new 1TB and then backup the duo? Hows the best/fast way to backup the Duo? Thanks.

Did the resync complete?
Backup the data to a USB drive using Frontview backup jobs.
I would also suggest testing all 3 disks using seatools.
Remember to add and remove disks with the the NAS off, unless you are adding a new disk. Any disk added whil,e the NAS is on will we wiped.

Back it up before you do any more playing with disk replacement. The fastest way to back up a duo is over a wired ethernet network to a PC.

Local USB backup works, but is slower. If you do use USB, make sure the drive is formatted so you can read the files on your PC. NTFS is probably the right format. Though that also hurts the backup speed, the backup is useless if you can't access the data.

It is a ver 1. I'll start a backup later today. Something unusual, I powered it down, moved the so called bad drive to slot 2 and powered back up. Nothing in slot 1 but FrontView says "Unknown 931 gb" in disk 1 (nothing there) with a status of "dead". The drive that I moved to slot 2 is showing "ok". Very strange. I think the Duo is having a problem with slot 1. Any ideas?

Finally completed the backup. As mentioned in earlier post, I can put the good drive in slot 1 and the Duo says it is dead or needs attention. Is the unit broke or is there anything I can do?

rev1 wrote:
Finally completed the backup. As mentioned in earlier post, I can put the good drive in slot 1 and the Duo says it is dead or needs attention. Is the unit broke or is there anything I can do?

It might be broken (a failed SATA interface or a damaged connector). But you could try a factory reset with only drive one inserted, and see if that works. If it does, try hot-inserting drive 2. Any data would be wiped, so you'd need to reinstall addons, reconfigure, and restore from backup.

The factory reset may have worked. I put a disk in slot 1 and performed the reset. When completed, the drive is now reported as good, no more consistently flashing resync light. Before I install the second drive, I wanted to reload the data from the backup performed last week. If all goes well, I'll slide the second drive in. Does that sound correct? Also, been thinking of upgrading to 2TB drive. Will the v1 support 2TB drives? Using ReadyNas raid, can I run the current 1TB drive and a new 2TB drive for a while (realize I only would have 1TB capacity) and then later replace the 1TB drive with another 2TB drive and maintain the data? Or do I have to buy both 2TB drives at one time and perform the reload from the backup?

The v1 supports 2 TB drives, assuming you have 4.1.7 firmware or later. (If you are running something older than that, then you should upgrade and do the reset again - that will give you 4K alignment (needed for best performance). 2 TB is the limit though.

Your process is fine, though you could also insert drive 2 now, and then reload the data - the order doesn't matter.

Also, you are correct on your upgrade paths - you can install a 2 TB drive now in slot 2, and it should expand when you replace the 1 TB drive later on.