I've been running a ReadyNAS Ultra 2 Plus for about four months now without any problems. A few days ago I upgraded it to the new 4.2.20 firmware, during which I think the system rebooted successfully as part of the firmware installation process. Last night it failed to restart after a scheduled reboot and I've been unable to get it back in service after several hours of working on it today. When I press the power button to turn it on, the fan starts running at high speed, the blue LED in the power button illuminates, and the little green activity LED illuminates. After about ten seconds the activity LED goes off but the blue power button LED stays on and the fan keeps running at high speed. I can hear the HDDs spin up normally, but the network interface hardware link/activity LEDs do not illuminate. It seems like the ReadyNAS is barely starting the boot process when it hangs, pressing the reset button has no effect, and RAIDar cannot find it on the network. I've swapped the HDDs with known good drives, but the ReadyNAS still won't boot.I've seen a few other customers discussing similar issues online, so I'm starting to suspect that this is somehow related to the v4.2.20 firmware upgrade. Does anyone have any suggestions on ways to fix this problem or other things that I should try?

If you boot it with no drives, and it doesn't show up in RAIDar saying 'no disks detected', there is something wrong with the chassis itself. You already have a support case, they will probably do an RMA.

I don't think that booting without disks was any different (not visible in RAIDar), but I'll be sure to try that tomorrow morning just to be certain. It's really odd, four months of trouble free service then wham, it won't even boot up.Thanks for your quick reply -- I'll update this thread as the problem is resolved; hopefully with enough details to make it an informative read...

With electronics problems can emerge at any time. One reason why backups are recommended.If an RMA is needed, I'd suggest putting a spare disk (must not be from your array) in the replacement unit, ensuring the firmware is up to date, then powering down and following the migration procedure: http://www.readynas.com/kb/faq/boot/how_do_i_migrate_disks_over_from_an_existing_readynas_to_another

OK, I double checked it and even when turned on in diskless mode my ReadyNAS is not visible in RAIDar, so it looks like I'll be waiting to hear from Netgear regarding my support ticket.I also noticed that after the activity LED turns off (about ten seconds after power-up), there's a small green LED inside the left, front side of the chassis that flashes rapidly for about three seconds, then it's off for about six seconds, then the cycle repeats. It's not visible on the front panel, only if I peer in through the air vent openings on the left side or when the chassis is in diskless mode it is also visible through the front grill. I haven't been able to find any documentation on it, though, and I'm reluctant to disassemble the chassis to investigate further since it's likely to be going back to the manufacturer for a warranty exchange.

I just bought the same unit at Frys Sunday and it was working fine Sunday night with just 1 2TB disk. I too upgraded from 4.2.17 to 4.2.20. It rebooted fine, and I ran some tests copying about 80GB of Acronis images to it (on Gige was about 40% slower than my existing QNAP 219+). I then shut it down (via the GUI) to install drive #2, and it has never booted since then. The manual boot sequence works up to the point where you must press reset again to select the choice but it never does anything. I have tried cold starts (unplugged for 30 minutes) no-disk boots, new disk boot (pull first one), etc. to no avail. It will go back to Frys tomorrow. I just returned the Duo v2 (purchased last Monday) for almost exactly the same problem (no firmware update, but after maybe 5 reboots it was history - submitted support ticket, told to return it) to get this one. I guess I will have to order my second QNAP 219+ instead. If ReadyNAS units are this troublesome, I can't use them in my home office. I wanted to like it, but I've run out of patience.

Ultra 2 Plus won't boot - support case #18604734

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awbenway
Aspirant
May 23, 2012
Ah! I didn't know you could log into the ReadyNAS OS and run things. Hadn't really thought about. But if it's really a Unix box underneath, I should have expected that some expert Unix guys could figure that out (I'm not).

Support didn't answer my last response that I already related how the boot menu didn't work (could select a mode, but it wouldn't execute when you pressed reset again) and RAIDar and Frontview could not see it (because it never booted). I suspect that either the flash went bad, or the 4.2.20 update didn't install cleanly (but the Ultra did reboot cleanly and let me create a share and write a bunch of test files to it). It was the next shutdown cycle where it died.

I already have one QNAP 219P+ here, but it has a 1.5TB disk size limit (still does as far as I can tell). I may try the Synology 212+ which is also highly reviewed on SmallNetBuilder. But their name is too hard to remember most of the time... ;<)
mdgm-ntgr
NETGEAR Employee Retired
May 24, 2012
Does sound like it could be a flash problem. USB Boot Recovery of 4.2.20 could be worth a try: http://home.bott.ca/webserver/?p=166

Basically you download the zip file referred to in the link above but use the firmware image of 4.2.20 (http://www.readynas.com/RAIDiator_x86_4_2_20_Notes) not the older one in the zip file.

However there is a possible negative side effect of USB Boot Recovery which would require NetGear tech support to remotely login to the unit to fix.

Normally however if you're getting this problem with a new unit you'd want to simply return it as DOA to the reseller and get a replacement.
ReadySECURE
Apprentice
May 24, 2012
I agree. give mdgms method a go.
awbenway
Aspirant
May 24, 2012
Thanks for the tips! My schedule is heavily overloaded with work, short selling my CA house, and moving to Oregon (trip #2 with U-Haul trailer tomorrow) - no time for experiments. I took the Ultra back to Frys this morning to return it within their 15 day window. I won't be back in CA until 6/2. So I have set all this aside for now. Netgear suport responded to my response to their response of yesterday today (see, I can emulate those marketing guys I -an engineer - have to deal with at work) and said to return it. Basic hardware failure on the board. Hmm, maybe there are some sort of "negative waves" at Frys that causes Netgear failures...... Two years or so ago they had a major run of bad power supply returns on all the Ready NAS units they sold - they pulled all ReadyNAS off the shelves for maybe a year.
mike1615
Aspirant
May 25, 2012
A quick update - After a few Q&A emails with Netgear tech support, I'm exchanging my Ultra 2 Plus for a new unit via an RMA since it was still under warranty. The replacement unit should arrive in a few days and I'll see how well the data on my HDDs survived the whole experience.

Thanks for all the advice and stay tuned, I'll let you know how it works out...
krakonos
Aspirant
Jun 03, 2012
That is strange. The same thing happened to my Ultra 2 Plus. Now I am waiting on a new unit via RMA too.

Have you upgraded firmware in your new unit to version 20? I just wonder if I should wait with upgrading till next available version.
llemoine
Aspirant
Jun 04, 2012
Same problem, after poweroff, Ultra 2 plus don't boot anymore (ticket 18703182) with firmware 4.2.20
no led activity, no ping, no frontview
when booting, the "Act LED" come blue and after some seconds return off forever ...
Hope support will find how to solve
balaams_ass
Aspirant
Jun 05, 2012
Same here. Received and built yesterday afternoon. Copied over about some initial data to verify I could DLNA to my Logitech Revue (<--awesome BTW), worked so I started the full data set copy then gone like a freight train. Same symptoms. Sucks. Not happy. Thinking about returning it and building a Ubuntu NAS.
pcourtney1
Aspirant
Jun 19, 2012
same here, it is definitely something related to upgrading to ver 4.2.20

Same problem, after poweroff, Ultra 2 plus don't boot anymore with firmware 4.2.20, no led activity, no ping,
no raidar ( rescan) no frontview , total rubbish, I must buy Qnap or Synology next time, why don't I learn not
to buy Netgear stuff.
mike1615
Aspirant
Jul 07, 2012
Final (I hope) update to this ReadyNAS problem for me - I received the replacement unit via NetGear's RMA process and followed mdgm's suggestion to ensure the firmware was up to date, then migrated the HDDs from the failed unit to the new chassis via the migration procedure at:
http://www.readynas.com/kb/faq/boot/how_do_i_migrate_disks_over_from_an_existing_readynas_to_another

It's working so far, but I notice that they just published firmware v4.2.21 so we'll see how that goes...

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Ultra 2 Plus won't boot - support case #18604734

21 Replies

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