Running out of Space at the moment. So I want to start replacing the 3TB drives.
Now I know I will have to do one at a time, But is it as simple as just pulling out one drive 3TB drive and putting the new 6/8/10TB in and let it rebuild before putting the next in. Or do I need to do something special first?
Secondly which drive is best? The top one (ie the first one I put in when I first got it) or the bottom one?
Thirdly if I get a second NAS just a RN422 say to use as a seperate Time Machine Drive, will I need to reformat the 3TB drive/s before I put them in?
But is it as simple as just pulling out one drive 3TB drive and putting the new 6/8/10TB in and let it rebuild before putting the next in.
Yes. The first upgrade won't change the available space, but the second one will. You likely will need to reboot after the second one. That should trigger the expansion. Let that finish before you add the third.
However, if you are upgrading a lot of drives it would be faster to do a factory reset with all drives in place, and then restore the data from a backup. That builds the array once, instead of rebuilding it for every drive upgrade.
Note we do recommend having a backup of your data (always), but particularly when you are manipulating drives.
Secondly which drive is best? The top one (ie the first one I put in when I first got it) or the bottom one?
It doesn't much matter. Though if all drives are healthy, you might want to upgrade the oldest one first, under the theory that it might fail before the others.
If a drive isn't 100% healthy, then replace that one first. You can look at the SMART stats by downloading the log zip file from the web ui, and look in disk_info.log
Thirdly if I get a second NAS just a RN422 say to use as a seperate Time Machine Drive, will I need to reformat the 3TB drive/s before I put them in?
Just do a factory install from the boot menu. Later on if you replace one with an old RN316 drive you will need to reformat the drive from the volume tab. Alternatively you can zero the drives using vendor tools (WD's lifeguard or Seagate's Seatools).
Thanks however I don’t have a backup so don’t want the factory format option. I will be going to 2 NASs to move my time machine backups off my main NAS. Eventually I will replace my RN316 with the equivalent 6/8 bay model at the time. Then move all the data to the new model keep the 316 for the backups. Can I ESATA directly between the 2 NASs as it will be faster if Mount one NAS directly into the seconds one and copy the data that way rather than go via a computer right?
NAS backup jobs will transfer data directly between the two NAS over your network. If you are skilled with linux you can also do this manually using ssh. But the NAS are not designed to act as eSATA (or USB) clients. They can access external disks using eSATA/USB but they cannot be accessed that way.
What I think you don't understand is that when you complete the switch-over, your old drives will not contain a valid volume. As you replace each one, the old one will become out of sync with the rest. So, they don't provide you a backup. And seeing you don't already have one, getting one should be a priority.
If you want to make the old NAS a backup, you need to get the new NAS up and running with new drives and then copy the data from the old.
So, they don't provide you a backup. And seeing you don't already have one, getting one should be a priority.
Yes. You are risking losing your data if you have no backup. RAID isn't enough. It would be wise to put some backup plan in place before expanding your storage. A USB drive could work (or perhaps use a dock with internal drives that you could use later in a new NAS).
If you want to make the old NAS a backup, you need to get the new NAS up and running with new drives and then copy the data from the old.
Upgrading the disks one at a time on the RN316 will preserve the data (unless something goes wrong - which could happen).
As far as repurposing the RN316, there are a couple ways you can do this. One is to get the new ReadyNAS running with new drives, and then using backup jobs to copy the data to the the new NAS. Once done, you can reverse source and destination on the backup jobs so that they back up the new ReadyNAS onto the RN316. That is what @Sandshark is suggesting.
When you get a new ReadyNAS you can also switch to it by directly migrating whatever disks are running in your RN316 when you want to make the switch. Then do a fresh install in the RN316, and back up the data on the new ReadyNAS back to the RN316.
But as @Sandshark says, you won't be able to mount the 3 TB drives as a RAID array after you upgrade your storage. You'll need to reformat them, and create a fresh (empty) volume.
What I think you don't understand is that when you complete the switch-over, your old drives will not contain a valid volume. As you replace each one, the old one will become out of sync with the rest. So, they don't provide you a backup. And seeing you don't already have one, getting one should be a priority.
If you want to make the old NAS a backup, you need to get the new NAS up and running with new drives and then copy the data from the old.
Yes I know the old 3TB won't contain the data once I take it out.
But will it be best to reformat it clean it all up before putting it in a second NAS?
And I know that I will need to move all the data off the RN316 (if I get a new one) before I use it as a backup
@AKLGUY wrote: Yes I know the old 3TB won't contain the data once I take it out. But will it be best to reformat it clean it all up before putting it in a second NAS?
You can zero the disks using LifeGuard (or SeaTools) prior to installation. Or you can do a factory default via the boot menu when you put them in another NAS.
If it will be a while, then I'd zero each after the new drive resyncs. Although the RAID array can't be mounted using regular tools, RAID recovery software might be able to recover it. So zeroing them early ensures that can't be done (providing some privacy protection in case you sell them or something).
