NETGEAR is aware of a growing number of phone and online scams. To learn how to stay safe click here.
Forum Discussion
Solved
Readynas104 blinking screen and won't boot with drives installed
A few days ago I noticed that the front display panel was black, with random short blinks with no text or number. The NAS was not accessable through LAN. I unplugged power to restart. Same problem....
The LED on the power brick should be steady. Does it behave the same when the NAS is powered and unpowered? If it's only blinking when the NAS is powered, I'd say that's yet another sign it's a power issue. Still could be internal to the NAS if it's trying to draw more current that the brick can provide, but replacing the brick sounds like a reasonable next step.
Thanks for replying.
For me it seems to be the other way around:
Windows found new disk in disk manager. But it didnt show in "my computer" as a partition. I had the option to make one... Im not very familiar with Windows 11. But in earlier versions I could "mount" the partitions for them to show in "my computer". But I guess this would have been an option if I made a partition...
But there seems to be very many odd things going on.
I opened RAIDar as you suggested, and it shows the NAS as "healty". Not much more info going on in raidar.
When I press "offline setup (LAN)" I get prompted to input password. I tried the ones most likely to be my own admin password, set years ago. But it does not enter. I thought it was because of wrong password. But: I tried default "admin" and "password", and suddenly I get in.
This makes me believe that the NAS has done a complete reset. But please note that ALL of this is WITHOUT any disks connected.
Are my original "NAS settings" (users, passwords, apps, etc.) stored on a partition on one of the 4 harddrives?
Because it seems to be a complete "new NAS" when I enter the NAS IP page. And as I also stated in the original post: I had to configure the NAS as new. This is even more likely when I got to enter the setup with "Admin / password" login info.
When I entered via RAIDar it prompts me the setup wizard.
Even though I recently did this both before and after writing the original post... So for me it seems like something is resetting, or that the information is not stored. Maybe due to it beeing in "safe mode"?
Sorry for sounding like an complete idiot, but seems that I actually am one in regards to this :) :)
I can cook this down to two main questions:
1. Is there any way to get my NAS to boot with the 4 drives inserted into the bays? When I insert them, the display starts to blink and the NAS seems dead.
2. Is there any way for me to save the harddrive data?
Vega32 wrote:
Windows found new disk in disk manager. But it didnt show in "my computer" as a partition.
You might be a bit confused on this. Windows Disk Manager is the place where you can see the disk partitions. Though it calls them "volumes".
"My Computer" can only show file systems that Windows supports - and it doesn't support the file systems used by the NAS. If you had initialized the disk (or formatted it) there, you would certainly have lost the data.
Vega32 wrote:
I opened RAIDar as you suggested, and it shows the NAS as "healty". Not much more info going on in raidar.
When I press "offline setup (LAN)" I get prompted to input password. I tried the ones most likely to be my own admin password, set years ago. But it does not enter. I thought it was because of wrong password. But: I tried default "admin" and "password", and suddenly I get in.
This makes me believe that the NAS has done a complete reset. But please note that ALL of this is WITHOUT any disks connected.
That is because you are in safe mode, which uses the default passwords. Normally the NAS boots from the disks - and the configuration (including account credentials) are all stored on the disks.
Vega32 wrote:
I can cook this down to two main questions:
1. Is there any way to get my NAS to boot with the 4 drives inserted into the bays? When I insert them, the display starts to blink and the NAS seems dead.
2. Is there any way for me to save the harddrive data?
Power down, and reinsert the disks in their correct slots. Then use RAIDar, and tell us what status it shows for your NAS.
It's not 100% clear to me whether you have a bad LCD panel, or whether the NAS is completely failing to boot when disks are inserted. Do you see the normal LCD screen now that you are in safe mode?
As far as offloading data goes, there are a couple of options (including installing the beta versions of mdadm and btrfs for windows I mentioned above). But let's see if we can get more info on what's happening first.
StephenB wrote:
Vega32 wrote:
Windows found new disk in disk manager. But it didnt show in "my computer" as a partition.You might be a bit confused on this. Windows Disk Manager is the place where you can see the disk partitions. Though it calls them "volumes".
"My Computer" can only show file systems that Windows supports - and it doesn't support the file systems used by the NAS. If you had initialized the disk (or formatted it) there, you would certainly have lost the data.
Vega32 wrote:
I opened RAIDar as you suggested, and it shows the NAS as "healty". Not much more info going on in raidar.
When I press "offline setup (LAN)" I get prompted to input password. I tried the ones most likely to be my own admin password, set years ago. But it does not enter. I thought it was because of wrong password. But: I tried default "admin" and "password", and suddenly I get in.
This makes me believe that the NAS has done a complete reset. But please note that ALL of this is WITHOUT any disks connected.That is because you are in safe mode, which uses the default passwords. Normally the NAS boots from the disks - and the configuration (including account credentials) are all stored on the disks.
That makes 100% sense now:)
Vega32 wrote:
I can cook this down to two main questions:
1. Is there any way to get my NAS to boot with the 4 drives inserted into the bays? When I insert them, the display starts to blink and the NAS seems dead.
2. Is there any way for me to save the harddrive data?Power down, and reinsert the disks in their correct slots. Then use RAIDar, and tell us what status it shows for your NAS.
Trying that now. The blinking then continues. The LCD panel is working normally when no drives are connected (Safe mode). RAIDar can't find the NAS.
It's not 100% clear to me whether you have a bad LCD panel, or whether the NAS is completely failing to boot when disks are inserted. Do you see the normal LCD screen now that you are in safe mode?
As far as offloading data goes, there are a couple of options (including installing the beta versions of mdadm and btrfs for windows I mentioned above). But let's see if we can get more info on what's happening first.
Regarding faulty power. That may very well be the solution I think.
I noticed that the green light on the power supply is also blinking slowly. (bright green light, and then dimming to a weaker light, every 1-2 seconds perhaps)... Is that a symptom for something wrong with PSU? I just tried disconnecting the drives, and the PSU light continues to blink - but the LCD is working normally and NAS is booting into safe mode.
I will find a old harddrive to test.
Had to edit because I don't know how quote works apparently:)The LED on the power brick should be steady. Does it behave the same when the NAS is powered and unpowered? If it's only blinking when the NAS is powered, I'd say that's yet another sign it's a power issue. Still could be internal to the NAS if it's trying to draw more current that the brick can provide, but replacing the brick sounds like a reasonable next step.
Found an old, empty disk. Put it into bay 1, powered on - and it is behaving the same: LCD is blinking, and NAS is not booting properly. RAIDar cant find it.
I could also see that the green light on PSU it not blinking until I press the power button and the NAS powers up with blinking LCD screen.
So, faulty PSU or something faulty inside the NAS?
NETGEAR Academy
Boost your skills with the Netgear Academy - Get trained, certified and stay ahead with the latest Netgear technology!
Join Us!
