Forum Discussion

Aspirant

Sep 13, 2017

Solved

RN204 changing from 2-4TB to 4-3TB drives

Hello, I currently have two 4TB drives in my RN204 (firm 6.8.0 & X-RAID) and I want to change them out for four 3TB drives. There is currently 2.64TB of data on the RN. Two of the 3TB drives are new ...

Adding Disks

StephenB
Sep 14, 2017
You can switch to flexraid, and then add two 3TB disks as a second RAID-1 volume. then you can use the built-in backup to copy the data to the new array. If you use the home folders, you will need to back them up to a temporary share.

Then destroy the existing volume, and switch back to XRAID.

Finally insert the two remaining 3 TB drives, and restore the home folders.

There is a risk here, it is possible that the NAS won't migrate the time machine data when you destroy the original volume. It will migrate .apps, but I'm not sure about Time Machine (and it's not something I use).

StephenB

Guru - Experienced User

Sep 14, 2017

You can switch to flexraid, and then add two 3TB disks as a second RAID-1 volume. then you can use the built-in backup to copy the data to the new array. If you use the home folders, you will need to back them up to a temporary share.

Then destroy the existing volume, and switch back to XRAID.

Finally insert the two remaining 3 TB drives, and restore the home folders.

There is a risk here, it is possible that the NAS won't migrate the time machine data when you destroy the original volume. It will migrate .apps, but I'm not sure about Time Machine (and it's not something I use).

billl4

Aspirant

Sep 14, 2017

Thanks Stephen. I will look up how to change from xraid to flex raid as well as backing up to the new array. I'm not sure if I am using the Home folders, but it looks like my home folder just has 2 user folders in it:

If you are referring to the Documents, Pictures, Music, Video folders, I don't have anything in them, so I guess I am ok there.

By destroying the existing volume, can I just remove the 2 existing drives? Or do I need to do something in the Admin > System > Volumes tab?

Thanks again for your help!

StephenB
Guru - Experienced User
Sep 14, 2017
billl4 wrote:

By destroying the existing volume, can I just remove the 2 existing drives? Or do I need to do something in the Admin > System > Volumes tab?

You need to destroy it via the settings wheel on the volume tab. Then you can remove the drives.

billl4 wrote:

Thanks Stephen. I will look up how to change from xraid to flex raid as well as backing up to the new array. I'm not sure if I am using the Home folders, but it looks like my home folder just has 2 user folders in it:

What's in MP_timemachine?

Overall, the risk here is that you'll lose your existing timemachine backups - that isn't something I'd personally worry about (assuming the OSX systems are healthy), but of course you might feel differently.
- billl4
  Aspirant
  Sep 14, 2017
  I see the destroy setting now, thanks. MP_timemachine and the other user folder don't have anything in them. I guess they were created by the RN. I think I have a grasp on things now. I'll probably do this over the weekend unless I get some downtime before that. I appreciate all of your guidance!