So a few weeks ago I posted about my RN314, and how it died after a firmware update. Unfortunately, nothing I've tried has brought it back and it's long out of warranty/support. At this point, I'm looking at how I might be able to preserve the data, since the disks were completely fine.
Question 1: Not sure I can swing the expense given Covid and all, but if I purchase a diskless 6-bay ReadyNAS of a newer model, will I be able to plug the old disks in and effectively mount the raid volume? How involved is that procedure if it can be done?
Question 2: If I can't manage to get a new ReadyNAS, is there a good way to recover the data, either by generating a disk image and then mounting them within an OS somehow, or by getting a less expensive RAID controller that I could plug them into (though I'm not sure I could find a cheap 6 port raid controller)?
Thanks all!
Model: RN31400|ReadyNAS 300 Series 4- Bay (Diskless)
The fix for mount_block_root errors is USB Boot Recovery.
In your previous thread you said you had a 6-bay unit not a 4-bay unit. The process to boot off USB on a RN316 with an older BIOS is tricky.
About 5 seconds after power on the touch leds go off after full brightness. You then need to press and hold the O.K. button. Press it too soon or too late and it won't boot off USB. It can take multiple attempts to do this correctly.
Systems with newer BIOS automatically boot off NTGR USB Boot Recovery keys.
Not all USB keys are compatible.
Assuming the problem is just on the flash migrating the disks to a new unit should work fine, however your old unit may be fixable.
If you cananot fix the 316, or choose to upgrade anyway, there is no special procedure needed for mounting the volume on the new NAS, assuming the problem is in the 316 flash or other hardware, not on the volumes in the drive, which I believe is the case. It's as simple as installing the drives from the 316 into the new NAS and powering on. It should come up and look just like it was on the 316. No recovery or othjer jumping through hoops necessary.
As a precaution, it is a good idea to install just a scratch drive in the new NAS first and insure the OS version is the same as you were running on the old one. It's supposed to update whichever (between the drives and the flash) is older to the newer, but another user has reported a potential issue with that that we have not yet diagnosed.
