ReadyNAS NV+ v2 No volume or files -possible RAID rebuild advice
Model: ReadyNAS NV+ v2
Firmware: RAIDiator 5.3.13
Raid Type: X-RAID2
A friend has asked me to troubleshoot why he can no longer access any of the files stored on his NAS drive. All drives are showing with a status of OK but there is no volume listed and, by looking through the logs (attached), it would seem that one of the drives may have been failing. Not being too familar with this particular range & so as not to get it wrong, I wonder if someone would be kind enough to take a quick look through this log & advise as to best course of action to recover the data?
Model: ReadyNAS RND4000v2|ReadyNAS NV+ v2 Chassis only
Re: ReadyNAS NV+ v2 No volume or files -possible RAID rebuild advice
The system has detected 17 disk failures over its life (if I counted it correctly). The last failure in the log is from 21 January, and the replacement disk started throwing ATA errors on 10 February. Now the volume scans are failing on boot-up.
What disk models is your friend using? Were they newly purchased or old disks? 17 disk failures over 6 years is an extremely high failure rate, and suggests that either he has been making poor choices on his disks (most likely), or that that something intermittent is wrong with the chassis (much less likely).
Given the history, you should begin testing the disks in a PC using the vendor tools (Seatools for Seagate, Lifeguard for Western Digital). Do label the disks by slot. Knowing how many disks are healthy would give you some indication on whether data recovery is likely to succeed or not.
Even if the disks look healthy, you likely are facing a data recovery issue - which will be expensive. Some users have had success with ReclaiMe software (which runs on a Windows PC, and requires that the RAID array be connected to that PC with USB or SATA). Netgear offers data recovery service, the terms of service are here: https://kb.netgear.com/69/ReadyNAS-Data-Recovery-Diagnostics-Scope-of-Service. Seagate offers a service too (and they will recover from any vendor's disks). But I haven't seen any posts here from someone who used Seagate's service to recover a ReadyNAS RAID array.
Re: ReadyNAS NV+ v2 No volume or files -possible RAID rebuild advice
Hi StephenB & thanks for the response.
Not sure as to the history of disk replacements (if any) but the current drives are Seagate ST31000524AS (931GB) in both bay 1 & 2, Seagate ST2000DL003-9VT166 (1836 GB) in bay 3 & Western digital WD10EARX-00N0YB0 (931GB) in bay 4.
I could certainly test each drive & even try recovering from them, either via ReclaiMe or Linux, but having read several other posts on here that advise not to do this as it could make it harder if professional help is required, would I not just be better of contacting support to see if they can rebuild the volume? Should this be the best option, please can you advise as to how best to do this as I did try to contact them prior to trying on here (using https://www.netgear.com/support/contact.aspx) but was not sure as to the exact option to report it under and not knowing the purchase date could not proceed further anyway. Is this the correct procedure?
Re: ReadyNAS NV+ v2 No volume or files -possible RAID rebuild advice
It is safe to test the drives using Seatools and Lifeguard, that is non-destructive. Just make sure the NAS is powered down while you are testing the drives, and return them to the same slot.
Knowing the drive health will give you some idea on whether data recovery is possible or not.
Re: ReadyNAS NV+ v2 No volume or files -possible RAID rebuild advice
Have been unable to check the drives as neither of the tools seems to find the drives in the scan for some reason. However, have managed to use Macrium Reflect to make disk images of disks 2,3 & 4 but disk 1 failed with multiple bad sectors.
As far as number of disk failure messages on the NAS, it would appear to be as I thought! User was not aware of NAS control panel & email notifications had not been setup so he was unaware of any problems. The only drive replacement listed in January was not actually a replacement but just him taking a drive out to try & copy info off, before returning to same slot again! No drives were replaced during any of the previous alerts.
Would I be right in guessing that with drive 2 appearing to fail & drive 1 exhibiting bad sectors, this may be main reason for complete NAS failure? How does this bode with regards to possible recovery?
Now that I have images of 3 of the disks, I am considering plugging all drives into a PC with 4 sata ports & trying ReclaiMe. Any advice for/against?
Would I be right in guessing that with drive 2 appearing to fail & drive 1 exhibiting bad sectors, this may be main reason for complete NAS failure? How does this bode with regards to possible recovery?
If two drives fail (or if one drive fails during a resync operation) then the RAID volume fails . Recovery depends in part on how much data was correctly transferred to the clones. The RAID array might also be out-of-sync, which would also get in the way. I suspect there will be some file system corruption, so you might not be able to get back everything.
Re: ReadyNAS NV+ v2 No volume or files -possible RAID rebuild advice
Apologies for delay in updating this topic, been busy!
Would just like to give a positive review with regards to ReclaiMe. Purchased this for client & managed to recover the majority of his files, losing just one or two spreadsheets which must have been stored in the worst of the bad sectors.
One last question though as client has asked me whether I can rebuild ReadyNAS (with new drives!) but not in RAID configuration. Can it be configured just as four separate backup disks? Not sure as to validity of this request but can understand that client has lost faith in RAID & thinks (simply) that four separate backups would be better! Advice?
Not sure as to validity of this request but can understand that client has lost faith in RAID & thinks (simply) that four separate backups would be better! Advice?
The main takeaway for the customer is that there needs to be a backup plan in place. RAID isn't enough to keep the data safe. The backups should be to a different device - not a different internal disk in the same NAS. Some options are
USB drives
Cloud Storage
a second backup NAS
With proper backup, RAID isn't needed (though it is nice to have). RAID does provide an extra level of data protection, but the primary benefits are
availability - the data remains available during routine disk replacements
expansion - the volume size can be increased with offloading/restoring all the files.
