RN314 scheduled snapshots not working on some shares

[david_spittle]

Hi

I have had smart snapshots enabled for years on my 314. Recently the scheduled snapshots on my main Projects share stopped working. It seems that all of the old snapshots are gone (no harm done) and I can only create manual snapshots.

Snapshots on other shares seem to be still working as expected with “years” of protection.

Any ideas how to get this working again? Thanks.

[StephenB]

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@david_spittle wrote:
Hi

I have had smart snapshots enabled for years on my 314. Recently the scheduled snapshots on my main Projects share stopped working. It seems that all of the old snapshots are gone (no harm done) and I can only create manual snapshots.

Snapshots on other shares seem to be still working as expected with “years” of protection.

Any ideas how to get this working again? Thanks.

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How full is the data volume?

[david_spittle]

Hi

I have 6.7TB data, 4.3TB snapshots, 5.19TB free. Raid 5.

[StephenB]

You could try disabling/re-enabling snapshots on the share, and see if that helps.  There might also be some useful clues in the log zip file, so you could look there around the time(s) the snapshots are created.

Another possible path is to move the data into a new share that has snapshots enabled, and then delete the old one (renaming the new one to match the original name).

[david_spittle]

There doesn’t appear to be anything in the log when the hourly snapshot is meant to occur. It simply does nothing.

I’m running a VPN with security permissions on folders. Do you think there would be a way to dig deeper without having to break this?

Disabling and re-enabling didn’t do anything.

[StephenB]

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@david_spittle wrote:
There doesn’t appear to be anything in the log when the hourly snapshot is meant to occur. It simply does nothing.

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Are you running "smart" snapshots or "custom"?

[david_spittle]

Hi

Using Smart snapshots.

[StephenB]

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@david_spittle wrote:
Using Smart snapshots.

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I'm wondering if switching to "custom" might work??? FWIW, I stopped using the smart snapshots long ago.  The monthly ones are never deleted, so eventually they fill the volume. So I switched to custom, where I can specify retention, and only take snapshots when the share changes.

I think that if you created a second share, then doing an rsync backup job to copy it (setting the destination network address to 127.0.0.1) should preserve the folder permissions.  Or use ssh, and specify --reflink in the CP command. 

[david_spittle]

Hi

I've created a new share as the other approaches didn't fix the snapshots.

Would you mind helping me with what I need to type to do this and retain timestamps? I tried running a backup job but the timestamps are set to today's date. This will make aws backup everything again, and I have versioning enabled in the cloud.

I also tried to set up remote rsync over SSH using the backup panel in the admin interface but it promted for a public SSH key.

I also tried copying the settings from an old rsync backup but that was going to a USB port on the back. I hit all buttons that seemed logical but no cigar.

I'm assuming I need to ssh into the nas?

Something like this? I wasn't keen on just trying it as this is my most important data.

ssh root@192.168.1.40 then type the admin password

rsync -a --reflink ~/PROJECTS_NAS/ root@192.168.1.40:~/PROJECTS_NAS_2/

Thanks

[StephenB]

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@david_spittle wrote:
ssh root@192.168.1.40 then type the admin password
rsync -a --reflink ~/PROJECTS_NAS/ root@192.168.1.40:~/PROJECTS_NAS_2/

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rsync doesn't have a --reflink option. Use

cp --reflink -rp /data/PROJECTS_NAS/* /data/PROJECTS_NAS_2/

That will preserve ownership, permissions, and timestamps. 

If you want to see progress as it copies, then use

cp --reflink -rpv /data/PROJECTS_NAS/* /data/PROJECTS_NAS_2/

You can then rename the shares from the admin web ui, and delete the original share after you've confirmed that everything is ok.

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@david_spittle wrote:

I wasn't keen on just trying it as this is my most important data.

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Hopefully you have a backup plan in place for the NAS.

[david_spittle]

Hi, that appears to be working and is copying now with original timestamps.

RE Backups:

1) RAID 5

2) Snapshots will be twice daily (hopefully this will be fixed with this new share)

3) Daily backup via Windows to external HDD plugged into my main PC (using FreeFileSync as you suggested. I went for this approach as USB drives plugged into the NAS were flaky and occasionally disconnected mid backup, filling up up the OS partition and bricking it) This isn't ideal as I have to leave my main PC on now - but FFS has a lot more options in the GUI than the NAS.

4) Daily backups to AWS, with versioning for 90days.

I think that is quite thorough - I was swapping out my local disk but I tended to leave it for months. But I may revisit that and swap after a big project milestone.

Anyways, thanks for being here Stephen, you often help me and I appreciate it.

Dave

[david_spittle]

After some further investigation it appears that none of the scheduled snapshots, for any shares are working on my NAS.

Sorry for the misinformation.

It appears that all of my scheduled snapshots are no longer visible, and the only snapshots that have been retained that are available to Windows previous versions are those that I have manually created over the years.

I'm unsure as to how long this has been like this. I can confirm that creating a new share doesn't solve this problem, there are no new snapshots, and I have tried creating new text files so that there are some changes...

[StephenB]

One drawback of setting "allow snapshot access" is that Netgear decided to make the contents of the snapshots writable when you enable that setting.  Since the reason I want snapshots is to be able to roll back to older versions of the files, I really don't want them to be writable.  So I personally make sure that setting is always set to off.  Windows Previous version doesn't have that issue.

Are you only looking at Windows Previous Versions to see the times the snapshots are taken?  If so, I suggest confirming that by right-clicking on the share settings wheel and choosing "recover".  That will show you the all the times the snapshots were taken.

[david_spittle]

Hi

I only enabled the "Allow snapshot Access" option, as part of the troubleshooting.

And to determine what snapshots are there, I have tried:

1) right-click in windows > previous versions

2) In the admin page on the shares tab, I've clicked previous versions.

3) I just tried Recover and can still see just the manual snapshots.

[StephenB]

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@david_spittle wrote:

3) I just tried Recover and can still see just the manual snapshots.

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And this is also the case for the new share you just created?

The current settings include "only make snapshots with changes" - did you make a change in the share, and confirm that the snapshot isn't made at the next scheduled snapshot time?  For instance, renaming a file. 

[david_spittle]

Hi

Yes I created two text files, one just after I enabled snapshots on the new share and second one after the first hour hadn’t worked.

[StephenB]

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@david_spittle wrote:
Yes I created two text files, one just after I enabled snapshots on the new share and second one after the first hour hadn’t worked.

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Maybe now also test renaming one.

If you want, you could get a full log zip, and send that to me via PM (private message).  Don't post it publicly, as there is some potential for privacy leakage.  You can upload the zip to cloud storage (google drive, etc), and include a download link in the PM.  (You won't be able to attach a zip file).

[david_spittle]

Snapshots are now working.

I can't precisely pinpoint what the problem was but I think that the snapshots weren't being generated because the pruning threshold was set to 66% and the combination of data and snapshots was at that threshold? Weird as that's exactly how it's supposed to work 'smartly'.

One thing that provided a clue was increasing the prune threshold. Immediately afterwards I could see some of the missing snapshots. Shortly after becoming visible they vanished again which initially confused me but I could see in the log that they had been pruned. I raised the prune threshold higher and the same thing happened.

The solution (I think) was to ditch the 'smart' snapshots on all drives. I set it to custom and to retain for 3 months. And it then pruned all of the old snapshots (we're talking TB or so), and the snapshots began working again on all drives.