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I'm having some pretty bad luck with a couple aging Readynas Pro Pioneer. One is very likely dead. The other is in a bad way. I haven't totally given up on it yet and will try my best with the help from this forum to get it up and stable.
Here's my question: can I pull the six disks out of the NAS and put them in another NAS and expect to carry on? Obviously not just any old NAS but a Netgear one, and if so, which one(s)? The RN I have now is running OS6.
Secondly, if the above is possible, would it accept a degraded volume? One disk is failing and I tried to replace it and bad things are happening with resync. Putting the old one back it also initiates a resync and the NAS hangs. Assuming a new NAS could use this volume, can I assume it would do so degraded but would resync it?
Just a quick note to close the loop on this thread.
The "stone dead" RN lives on... It was bad memory on this box as well. Hard to believe but of the four memory modules in two boxes, three were bad or chose the moment I replaced the PS to go bad. I've seen bad memory prevent booting but never seen it prevent even triggering the PS on. In any case, fresh memory immediately allowed it to start.
Both RNs are now running, are fully synched, have several terabytes of data and have not been the least bit unstable.
Oddly, one of them constantly reports that its UPS has been disconnected then immediately reports it being plugged in and it's a "new" UPS. Like 50 time per day. Swapping cables, swapping UPS's, using different USB ports etc makes no difference at all. But that's another thread perhaps.
Thanks to you both for your patience, assistance and valuable input.
New ReadyNAS are very hard to find, and often overpriced. Many here suspect Netgear is exiting the NAS business - no new platforms in 5 years, no new software features in some time, and the lack of inventory tend to support that theory. Though Netgear hasn't said.
If your NAS are running 4.2.x firmware, than an x86 OS-6 ReadyNAS (RN300 series or higher) will mount your data volumes as read-only, in order to let you offload data. But it needs to reformat the disks after that, since the OS 6 ReadyNAS use a completely different file system.
If your NAS are converted to run OS-6, then you could directly migrate to any OS-6 ReadyNAS with enough bays.
If you can connect the disks to a Linux PC (perhaps with a multi-bay enclosure), then you could mount the data volume, since the NAS uses standard software RAID tools. A Windows or Mac PC could also access the data using RAID recovery software (which might be required anyway, given the issues you are seeing). R-Studio is one option there. https://www.r-studio.com/
So what are the symptoms of the two NAS? The usual culprit is the power supply. They're good, but still only designed for a PC, which few keep around as long as the Pro Pioneer has been out. If you have a standard ATX12V supply rated at least 350W, you can connect it externally and see if that fixes it. If it does, a standard SFX supply with a couple cable adapters works great as a replacement. Some even have a temperature-controlled fan, so run more quiet.
A Pro Pioneer, especially with an upgraded CPU, memory, and OS6, is still quite a viable home use NAS even without a lot of Netgear support, in large part because of this forum.
Ok, bear with me here and I'll try to keep this as short as I can while still providing the background and events that led to where I'm at.
I have a primary RN and a backup RN. A couple months back I noted the backup RN was unresponsive and reboots didn't help. With help from the forum and Stephen's in particular later, I was able to get the firmware refreshed and diagnose three disks with rising errors. It would run but eventually hang so I couldn't use it or copy anything off of it and I didn't have the money to purchase three new disks. I also replaced the PS on this NAS because it seemed like an easy thing to refresh and cross off the trouble list. I eventually just yanked the three disks and rebuilt it fresh but hadn't yet backed up anything from the primary. The other day a friend gave me three drives matching the size of those in this backup RN and I added them but had not yet started a backup. Famous stupid decision...
Because in the meantime for several months I had noted alerts on the primary RN that one of the disks has 51 errors. Again, lack of money for a replacement 8tb drive had me biting my nails. Finally I was able to purchase a replacement drive and thought I would also refresh the PS. After replacing the PS that system won't power on at all, not even with another known-working PS on the bench. No lights, no nothing just totally unresponsive. This needs more investigation but its not looking good.
So, I pulled the drives out of the backup RN and put the primary drives in it. It booted and seemed ok so I swapped the bad disk with the new one and in started to resync. The next day I noted it was hung at 75% or so. Sometimes it would boot sometimes it wouldn't. Sometimes with the new disk, sometimes not. I tried putting the old errored disk in and it started resyncing that, then failed a 5%, hung. Realizing the firmware on the disks is older than the firmware on the backup RN, I eventually was able to get to the boot menu and reinstall the OS. It failed a couple times and hung a couple times and often I couldn't get to the boot menu, it just stuck on the display showing Readynas. But eventually it did it all like it should and came up seemingly ok. But it still hangs when resyncing. And in fact if I try to pull data from it via backup software on PC on the network, it hangs within 5-15 minutes. I'm doing this with neither the bad disk or replacement in place, so it's flashing degraded all the time.
Sorry this was long winded, but worthwhile I think for you to know the sad saga.
I've done a bit of a google for replacement Netgear boxes and agree they are rare and unreasonably priced. The idea of finding a chassis to take the disks and use Linux to mount them if only to be able to backup is a great one but I would need some serious assistance with that. I have a Linux Mint workstation but would an external multi disk chassis work, even a USB one? I'm not sure what to look for. That software mentioned is also affordable but not sure if that suggestion is part of the Linux idea or an alternate.
Sorry to ramble. I'm stressed. Any assistance is greatly appreciated.
@WildPhydeaux wrote: One question I have is what systems does OS6 use, is it ZFS? Would ZFS recognize the members of the RN volume and make it accessible?
The file system is btrfs, which runs on top of software RAID (mdadm).
I haven't used Linux Mint, but if you can install mdadm and btrfs on it, then you should be able to mount the array.
I'm actually on the road for work until early next week so just gathering information from folks and thinking about an approach. At the end of the day if I can access the data and offload it onto a number of loose drives then I'll feel a whole lot better. And with this approach I can then start with a fresh factory reset which I'm guessing would be ideal.
To that end, I do have a spare Linux desktop PC to donate to the task. It has how swap 3.5" bay and I have enough loose disks to place the data on. And a buddy has an 8-bay drive chassis for sata drives with the option of connection to the PC via esata (also has an esata card) or via two sata cables.
I know nothing about this and would need some assistance. But is it "simply" a matter of installing support for BTRFS and then installing MDADM? Then obviously some commands to mount and "reassemble" the drive member into a volume? From there I can then copy data onto one loose drive at a time?
I've probably used the wrong terminology here and showed my naivety, but that's where I'm at.
Comments, suggestions, alternative options? All welsome.
The files and directory structure span all the drives of a RAID, so you cannot get anything from a single drive. Assuming 6 drives in RAID5, you'll need concurrent access to at least 5 to do anything, be it in a NAS or Linux machine. They don't have to all be in the same enclosure. Five USB to SATA adapters would also do it. Using the one working NAS and the volume form the other is going to be the easiest, but your buddy's multi-drive eSATA chassis and compatible card is another option that won't tie up that NAS, assuming there is a Linux driver for the card.
Yep, totally understand that the data is spanned across the drives and they all need to be online and addressable as a single volume in order to copy data from them. In this case one drive has no usable data (having failed partway through resync), so I only have the minimum number of 5 to try to pull from.
My comment about single loose drives would be the targets for backing up the data to, so that later the 6 drives from the RN could then be destroyed and start over on the RN with a fresh install.
I realize they don't all need to be in one chassis, but this 8 bay unit is just sitting idle and available. I'm not concerned about speed for this, but sata would be a little quicker than USB connected ones for pulling off 30+Tb.
It certainly would be more convenient to use the working RN and the volume from the other to feed these loose drives, but I've tried multiple times and that RN hangs within 2-5 minutes after I start pulling data from it. I was connecting to it over the network on the spare Linux PC and either doing a simple file copy or running FreeFileSync.
So I don't know what's causing this hang every time - errors in the volume or issues with the RN itself. I guess if the former, then maybe I'll end up with the same problem however I access it?
So I don't know what's causing this hang every time - errors in the volume or issues with the RN itself. I guess if the former, then maybe I'll end up with the same problem however I access it?
That is possible. It might be useful to see if this happens in tech supprt mode.
Actually, eSATA with a port multiplier will be significantly slower than USB3 connections, and probably USB2. But as you say, speed is not a priority. That 8-bay unit definitely uses port multiplication because it requires only two eSATA connections, so each is multiplied X4.
You can certainly back up the data to as many independent drives as you need. Just keep good track of that goes back where.
Tech Support Mode? I mean I know it exists, I've seen the boot menu option. And I understand that I'm not able to get Netgear tech support since the RN is running OS6. Are you saying I should select that option and retry copying files? Is that mode more permissive in some way? Happy to try it, just curious.
Yes the 8 bay uses port multiplication so I don't expect performance out of it, but if it saves my bacon I can take a month to copy the data for all I care! Lol
The spare Linux PC available does not have USB3, only USB2. It's an older box and is no high performance wonder but it's always been stable and as I say I'm not fussed about speed, just the end result.
@WildPhydeaux wrote: Tech Support Mode? I mean I know it exists, I've seen the boot menu option. And I understand that I'm not able to get Netgear tech support since the RN is running OS6. Are you saying I should select that option and retry copying files? Is that mode more permissive in some way? Happy to try it, just curious.
With tech support mode, the NAS application isn't running - instead you need to manually start raid and mount the volume.
I'm wondering if the NAS will stay up longer in that mode.
Anyway, instructions are to connect with telnet (I suggest the putty client if you use windows - https://www.putty.org/). You log in as root, and the password is infr8ntdebug.
From there you can start RAID and also chroot by entering
rnutil chroot
At this point it might be good to check how full the OS partition is:
btrfs fi df /
FWIW, I see this when I run this command on my own NAS:
From there you can assemble and mount the data volume using
btrfs device scan
btrfs fi show
mount /dev/md127 /data
File sharing protocols aren't enabled. You could manually back up over the network at this point by running rsync from the command line. Or mount a USB drive and copy data that way. You can also start samba (smb) using
Thanks very much, that's helpful and a good reference. I returned home early from work travel a little earlier than expected so I'm looking at the situation again today and have two updates:
1) For the RN that won't power up, I've removed the motherboard and looked it over closely, dusted the back etc as I had not had it out previously. Everything looks perfect. No sign of any debris in a edge connector or anything. Did continuity test on all ribbon cables, all good. Reassembled and still no power up. I tried both the new PS and and known-good ATX. It simply won't start up at all, no sign of power. So I jumped pin 4/5 of the PS while connected and it fires to life, kind of. Fans start, display shows ReadyNAS. But thats all, it doesn't actually boot. Interestingly after a minute or two the fan speed lowers, then later raises again. Anyway as soon as the jumper is removed it powers off. I'm not sure what this tells me to be honest.
2) For the RN that has my data, I left the dead disk and it's replacement out of the chassis and booted with just the 5 disks. It came up as it has before as expected, as degraded but accessible. However unlike every other time, it now seems to be feeding a back up. I connected to it from a PC and started copying data from the RN to a disk in the PC and its been running for a couple hours. Previously attempts at the same thing ended in a hang after only a couple minutes.
If I can get the data off in the next several days the plan will be to do a factory reset and start from scratch. But without the other RN working I don't have a reasonable back solution, short of loose disks.
I think the next thing to do if you want to try and troubleshoot the non-functional NAS is to install a VGA cable on the VGA header and take a look at what's going on when it powers on with the jumper in place, especially whether it even starts the BIOS and any errors shown then.
The inability to start without the power supply jumpered most likely indicates either a problem with the +5VSB (+5 volt standby) power or the power-on circuit. Since +5VSB also powers the NIC, you will normally still see a LAN LED lit with the unit off if it's something other than the +5VSB itself. And since you've not noted that being the case, I am beginning to suspect that the +5VSB has too much load (maybe a shorted capacitor) on it. Perhaps the new supply was "the last straw" for a failing capacitor, though it's not a typical situation. Without a schematic (which Netgear has not made available), finding the specific issue with any internal circuitry is quite a task.
Anyone have a pinout for the IDC15 VGA header on the motherboard they care to share or link to? I'm just going to cobble together a Frankenstein adaptor since it's unlikely to be useful beyond 10 minutes use...
Perfect, thank you. I had a heck of a time finding the motherboard side pinout, so that link is the ticket. I had considered just pinning 1 to 1, 2 to 2 etc but one never knows... In the end, it shows nothing. Motherboard doesn't appear to even begin posting. I'm done with that chassis, I had a feeling it was going to be fruitless but had to try to the extent of my ability. Thank you both for your patience and assistance.
But there is good news too. On the other box the last of the data has been extracted to loose drives. I'm fortunate that I had most of it and was only missing 7TB or so. So my data is safe for short term. I mean I'll only have the one copy of it all when I factory reset the RN and get it all back in place but at least things are looking brighter.
Now... Do I trust the Readynas? Maybe it was a combination of bad things - old firmware, a PS possibly at the edge of deaths door and one disk with 52 errors that I ignored too long and when that MB died, moving the disks to this box didn't help with a different firmware etc. But eventually it DID stay up with the volume in a degraded state long enough to copy a lot of data.
Put the replacement disk in and do a factory reset?
If you are going to do a factory default and continue using the NAS, then I strongly recommend an upgrade to OS6. Before you do that, a RAM upgrade to at least 2GB is recommended. If you still have the original processor in them, then an upgrade of that will make it a lot snappier. Note that before you do a processor upgrade, you need to be on the latest BIOS, and updating that is a lot easier under OS4.2.x than OS6.
I have several ProBE and Pro6 models that have worked fine, except most of the oldest have needed a replacement supply (I bought a couple already needing one). I did upgrade the OS and memory, and the processor on the ProBE's (the Pro6 has a much faster CPU from the factory). I retired them only because I decided to go rack-mount, not because I lost faith in them.
I'm keen to forgive and forget. I jammed the new disk in and did a factory reset, just waiting for disks to sync.
I made the move to OS6 several years ago and upgraded the CPU to the limit of the board as well as installing new RAM, though I don't recall how much. It would have been at the recommendation of this forum or possibly the most the board supports.
Thanks to all who contributed to this thread, your input is truly appreciated and it reminds me how helpful this community has been for me over the years.
I won't close this now only because, although the working RN has been stable, it's only been a few days of hoovering data from it. It has taken only one client, and I've yet to copy anything to it. It's likely fine now, but knock on wood...
I any case, I WILL return to close the loop on this in a week or so to mark the thread as solved.
Well folks I'm back and increasingly frustrated. The very unit that ran seemingly stable in a degraded state and allowed me to offload all my data onto loose disks is back to causing me grief.
To recap, 5 of these disks where in another RN chassis along with a disk that was apparently bad. I tried to replace the PS and intended to swap a new replacement disk in but that chassis seemingly failed (now is written off). So I put the 5 working and a new one in this other chassis and had nothing but issues, it failed resync with the new disk after many hours. I hung I should say and wouldn't reboot sometimes and other times it would but trying to copy data from it or when resyncing it would just hang. Even updating the firmware was problematic but it did seem to eventually work. Finally it started working with the new disk removed and I was able to get the data off over several days of copying.
So now I put the new disk back in and did a factory reset. All seemed well and resync started. Today it was hung at 88.xx %. Would not reboot, just stuck at ReadyNAS on the display. So tried with the reset pin and could only get the menu once in 5 or 6 reboots. But anything I selected there just did nothing, essentially hung. I eventually got it to react when I took that new disk out. After literally 2 hours of trying every combination of operations and battling with not booting its finally back up with just the 5 disks and I did a factory reset. It's now resyncing and tells me it needa 50 hours.
I'm very frustrated. The old disks are 8TB WD Red NAS drives. The single new disk is an 8TB Seagate IronWolf NAS drive. Can you not mix? The WD are 5400 and the Seagate is 7200. Is that a problem, but if so why does it all sync for 30+ hours before it hangs? Is it possible that the firmware install is corrupt or something? Can the same version of FW be downloaded and installed "over top" or will it not do it because it's the same version? I don't think I'm doing anything wrong here but it's really stressing me out. I also note that at one point all 5 of the old drives showed no Ata errors when I hover the mouse over them. But now 3 show 1 Ata error each. Should I be concerned about that?
I'm just sick over this and every step takes hours/days.
Well that didn't last long, I went back to the RN and noted it displayed Readynas and the small vertical bars progressing from left to right below, quickly again and again and the fan on high speed. Had to restart it. I did note when it did the volume check it got tp 99% and the hash marks across the screen just before it carried on briefly showed:
#####0p at the end. I've never seen that before. It's came up and returned to resyncing, now it says 24 hours to resync.
I'm very frustrated. The old disks are 8TB WD Red NAS drives. The single new disk is an 8TB Seagate IronWolf NAS drive. Can you not mix? The WD are 5400 and the Seagate is 7200. Is that a problem, but if so why does it all sync for 30+ hours before it hangs?
The hang is of course concerning, and suggests there might be a problem with another one of the drives. Using smartctl -x with ssh might give you some more information.
