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ReadyNAS Ultra 4 BIOS
The last post in this thread says that ReadyAS resolved their problem by changing an option in the BIOS. The ReadyNAS Ultra 4 (RNDU4000) does not have a VGA header on the motherboard. It does have 4 pins on the back that I'm assuming are for a serial connection. Does anyone know if the BIOS can be accessed that way (IE: watching the boot process via a terminal and using a keybaord plugged into one of the USB ports)?
ReadyAS, I couldn't necro the above thread but if you're still around, can you comment here as to how you accessed the BIOS? My goal is the same as yours; to prevent the device from starting automatically when plugged in or when power is restored from an outage.
Before anyone suggests a UPS... The UPS I have (unfortunately) does not play nice with NUT. NUT can shutdown everything (including this NAS and the UPS itself) but the UPS restarts itself automatically a few seconds after turning off the load... So the power is cut to the RNDU4000, but then comes back even though the UPS is still running on battery... Which then means it will crash hard when those batteries are drained a minute or two later since everything else was already shutdown including the switch between it and the NUT Master server itself...
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BfloEagle wrote:
The last post in this thread says that ReadyAS resolved their problem by changing an option in the BIOS. The ReadyNAS Ultra 4 (RNDU4000) does not have a VGA header on the motherboard. It does have 4 pins on the back that I'm assuming are for a serial connection. Does anyone know if the BIOS can be accessed that way (IE: watching the boot process via a terminal and using a keybaord plugged into one of the USB ports)?
This isn't something I've tried, but there is a blog post here that might help you with that: https://gist.github.com/davewongillies/6481138
Once you get the port functional, you can see the boot process, and use a usb keyboard.
Going to give that a shot and will post how it goes. Was hoping that there was something easier or simple that I was missing but if not, in the end, a $10 cable is much cheaper than a new UPS.
BfloEagle wrote:Before anyone suggests a UPS... The UPS I have (unfortunately) does not play nice with NUT. NUT can shutdown everything (including this NAS and the UPS itself) but the UPS restarts itself automatically a few seconds after turning off the load... So the power is cut to the RNDU4000, but then comes back even though the UPS is still running on battery... Which then means it will crash hard when those batteries are drained a minute or two later since everything else was already shutdown including the switch between it and the NUT Master server itself...
NUT does not control how or why the UPS shuts down or turns back on. It simply monitors the UPS (or another machine that's monitoring the UPS) to determine when to shut down the NAS. If your UPS is behaving in this manner, it's either broken or some internal setting is wrong. Turning off the NAS would change the time it would take for the battery to drain, but it should not result in an UPS restart, and that's what it sounds like is happening. An unmonitored UPS is just barely better than no UPS at all -- it will get you through quick power events but you are at risk with longer ones.
On the other hand, are you sure the UPS is what's re-starting, and not the NAS? Maybe there is something mis-configured or broken in the NAS where the NAS is doing a restart, not a power-down. You could test this by connecting the NAS to mains power and unplugging the UPS till it signals the NAS to shut down. If the NAS just power cycles, not powers down, the problem is with the NAS.
As for using the serial port, I have to assume that's what the other user did. The Pro4, Ultra4Plus, and Ultra4 all have the same motherboard, and it has no VGA header. If there is a tool for setting options on your NAS, you may also be able to set it up so it does not come back on.
When a critical battery level is reached, a NUT Master server can (and does in my case) send a signal via the USB connection/driver to the UPS which kills the load and cuts power to the protected outlets. I can confirm this is happening as I've got my switch attached to it as well. The switch loses power once the NUT master server sends the "load.off" command as the outlet it is connected is no longer powered. But unfortunately for me, the UPS restarts itself (something the NUT developers confirmed can happen here, quote below), power is restored to my switch, and the NAS as well.
ondelay... "Some UPS’es will restart no matter what, even if the power is (still) out at the moment this timer elapses."
The suggestion they make to get around this does not work for me either. Go figure... And it's a "cheaper" Tripp Lite UPS (ECO350UPS) so who knows if things are implemented to standards (you mentioned an internal setting being wrong which is entirely possible since the value retrieved by NUT for ups.timer.reboot and ups.timer.shutdown from the UPS are 65535 whereas I'm seeing other "better" UPS's have a value of -1 here while the power is on, plus it only supports a generic driver). There's also reports of CyberPower UPS's having similar behavior where no matter what value NUT sends as the ondelay value, the ups sets it to 10 and restarts after 10 seconds. FWIW, I've also set this value extremely high so that if the my UPS will restart no matter what, why not make it wait a few tens of hours? I figured that would kill the battery but my UPS still restarts itself after a few seconds.
Back on topic... So the voltage present on the plug the NAS is connected to (from the battery) is lost. Then a few seconds later, the UPS powers up, power returns to the protected outlets, and the NAS starts itself thinking power has been restored.
As for the test you suggested... The NAS unit does shut down and does not automatically restart. BUT... As described in the other post as well, this happens because voltage remains live on the outlet. If I unplug the NAS, and then plug it back in, the unit power up right away which is essentially the same thing that happens when my UPS powers down (and subsequently powers back up) during an outage.
It seems that Netgear chose this functionality by design as most people probably would want to restart automatically after a power outage. I, and apparently ReadyAS, are not most people and do not want this though. Why Netgear chose to not make that an option in the UI is beyond me. My second NAS (a QNAP) is configured this way to not start after power is restored due to my annoying UPS sitution... QNAP even lets you chose to restore the last state so if you shut it down gracefully and then power is restored it _won't_ come online, or if it was on when power was lost it will turn itself back on, which means it's doing something to make that decision in the absence of a physical on/off switch. I've seen the arguement that Netgear had to hide this setting because of the scheduled power on options but that doesn't sit right with me. If one vendor can do it (use trickle power to determine if it should come online or not when that trickle power is restored), the other vendors should be able to as well.
And I fully acknowledge that it's very easy for me to say that on the outside. Maybe there is a technical reason and Netgear could not expose this. Maybe not... There hasn't been much said by them over the years of posts I've found on this topic though.
The new cable will be here tomorrow. I hope to have an answer shortly after that.
BfloEagle wrote:
There's also reports of CyberPower UPS's having similar behavior where no matter what value NUT sends as the ondelay value, the ups sets it to 10 and restarts after 10 seconds.
I haven't seen this behavior with my various CyberPower UPS. Once the UPS battery drains, the UPS remains off until power is restored.
BfloEagle wrote:
It seems that Netgear chose this functionality by design as most people probably would want to restart automatically after a power outage. I, and apparently @ReadyAS, are not most people and do not want this though.Why Netgear chose to not make that an option in the UI is beyond me.
Me too.
Though I don't think the trickle power bit is strictly needed, it'd be sufficient to just document what happens if automatic restart is disabled with a power schedule is set.
Somehow, BfloEagle 's latest post disappeared. I typed in a reply to that, and trying to post it resulted in "Message not found". Nowq IO posted this, and his is there again,
The situation appears to be a bit different than you described, though the result is the same. The UPS does not "power back on", it has not yet shut down and turns back on the switch to the NAS. Can you simply configure it such that it never turns it off, even if that means plugging it into a different UPS outlet?
If the UPS is basically a combination UPS and PDU, also make sure you have no ping-based reset that may be the culprit.
I'll give it a shot. Not sure if a NUT Master itself can ignore a low battyery signal (override.battery.charge.low = -1 maybe??). It's a raspberryPi so if it does not shut down gracefully, I'm not that worried... Everything else on the UPS will either be shutdown by that point or are not impacted by hard power cuts (switches).
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