Another QNAP NAS conumdrum

[GlenMH]

StescoG66 said:

Have contacted QNAP support. Not home until Wednesday now though so nothing doing until then.

What do you mean by SSH?

What I meant was restore the QNAP to its original state with the original drives, back up to the new drive I bought then reformat the QNAP and restore from the backup

Yes - going back to the original set up is good.
Back up to a new, different USB drive and then put that away somewhere safe once you have checked all the data is there.
Replace failing disk in QNAP with new HDD and allow machine to rebuild the mirror.
If that fails, then reformat and reinitialise the machine with the new disk in it and copy your data back on from the backup USB drive.

The key thing is getting that USB drive sorted and all your data copied.

[TonyRPH]

ash73 said:

It's been discussed before I can't be bothered doing it again. If you want to waste your time and money on a RAID setup go right ahead.

My Netgear ReadyNAS runs RAID and I've b een able to simply swap out disks with no issue.

Likewise with a Synology NAS - just swapped the bad disk out...

I also run software RAID on a couple of Linux boxes, and again, I've been able to swap disk out without issue (admittedly Linux can be a bit fiddly identifying the bad disk, but it works).

So I'm struggling to see what your issue is...

Of course hardware RAID in enterprise servers make it's a lot easier.

[Tonsko]

I've just done a quick search, and could find it mentioned twice. Ash makes a good point, but 'explaining it so many times I can't be bothered' is a bit dramatic. Perhaps many more times not on this site.

Anyway, the upshot is:

ash73 said:

To clarify, consider the alternative of having two cheap single-bay NAS systems (or a backup to a PC), rather than an expensive multi-bay NAS with RAID.

Install the primary NAS at your home, and the secondary NAS off-site e.g. at your parents, or hidden away somewhere on-site. Then set set the primary to sync to the secondary, so nothing is deleted on the secondary.

Two single-bay NAS (or single NAS with backup to PC):
- protect against accidental deletion - YES
- protect against theft/fire - YES
- protect against disk failure - YES

Single NAS with RAID:
- protect against accidental deletion - NO
- protect against theft/fire - NO
- protect against disk failure - YES
- provides hot-swap which is completely unnecessary in home systems

Either way, you also need a USB drive (or cloud storage) for your third copy of data.

[TonyRPH]

Tonsko said:

I've just done a quick search, and could find it mentioned twice. Ash makes a good point, but 'explaining it so many times I can't be bothered' is a bit dramatic. Perhaps many more times not on this site.

Anyway, the upshot is:

ash73 said:

To clarify, consider the alternative of having two cheap single-bay NAS systems (or a backup to a PC), rather than an expensive multi-bay NAS with RAID.

Install the primary NAS at your home, and the secondary NAS off-site e.g. at your parents, or hidden away somewhere on-site. Then set set the primary to sync to the secondary, so nothing is deleted on the secondary.

Two single-bay NAS (or single NAS with backup to PC):
- protect against accidental deletion - YES
- protect against theft/fire - YES
- protect against disk failure - YES

Single NAS with RAID:
- protect against accidental deletion - NO
- protect against theft/fire - NO
- protect against disk failure - YES
- provides hot-swap which is completely unnecessary in home systems

Either way, you also need a USB drive (or cloud storage) for your third copy of data.

Thanks Tonsko.

However that still doesn't mean RAID is a waste of time.

RAID *WITHOUT* some form of backup could indeed be regarded as a waste of time though, I will agree.

If I did have a disk failure, I would rather have RAID with a backup* - at least you don't have to hassle restoring backups when installing a new disk (like you would in a non RAID system).

Perhaps ash73 could have been a bit clearer in his post in this thread - it would have only taken an additonal sentence...

• to clarify - by backup I mean a seperate disk, preferably offsite. Not using the RAID as a backup.

[Tonsko]

ash73 said:

Sorry chaps it had been a long day...

[StescoG66]

GlenMH said:

StescoG66 said:

Have contacted QNAP support. Not home until Wednesday now though so nothing doing until then.

What do you mean by SSH?

What I meant was restore the QNAP to its original state with the original drives, back up to the new drive I bought then reformat the QNAP and restore from the backup

Yes - going back to the original set up is good.
Back up to a new, different USB drive and then put that away somewhere safe once you have checked all the data is there.
Replace failing disk in QNAP with new HDD and allow machine to rebuild the mirror.
If that fails, then reformat and reinitialise the machine with the new disk in it and copy your data back on from the backup USB drive.

The key thing is getting that USB drive sorted and all your data copied.

Gone back to the original set up, and looks as though I have royally f***ed it!! Will book it into a local tech wizard and try to get teh data pulled off the disc as much as possible. I am an arse!!

[Blim_bug]

I still suggest you go through Qnap, as opposed to getting a local firm to look at it.

Qnap have an extensive experience in their product and will know all the relevant CLI in order to try and get your data back.

It's likely that all your data is still there, but you've damaged the configuration (swapping the drives around) and now it can't mount the filesystems.

I'd recommend you power off the NAS system now and purchase a couple of new hard disk drives (2 TB Western Digital Red drives is what I've got).

Open a support call and wait for some assistance.

if it gives you any comfort, I was in exactly the same situation as you and they managed to get me out of a pickle (though I did have several older backups of my photos etc).

[mattyn1]

I would definitely get QNAP to log into your NAS and attempt to fix it. My TS210 had a single disk failure - something to do with the filesystem file being corrupted after a power cut.
I never had RAID - simply as a huge disk - but the bloke who responded to the help desk email was able to login to my NAS via some software, and talk me through his fixing. He ran numerous checks etc, and got all my data back. A proper top bloke.

[GlenMH]

Yup - agree with the posters above - get QNAP involved, even if you have to pay for it....

[Kenny6868]

ash73 said:

RAID is pointless on a home setup anyhow, as you are discovering.

Completely disagree.

My PC boots to a 250GB SSD. This holds Windows 10, Office 2016 and Serviio and everything else is stored on my RAID box.
I have one of these...
http://www.startech.com/uk/HDD/Enclosures/2-Bay-Ex...

I connect it to my PC via USB3.0 and set Windows to look for everything there. Downloads, My Documents, Libraries, the works.

The box is set to RAID 1 so that I have a backup if one drive dies. If a drive fails I buy another, hot swap and it'll rebuild automatically. If the RAID box dies, I buy another, configure to RAID 1 and insert the drives. If my PC dies, I buy another, reinstall Windows and connect the RAID box.

No further backups required.

RAID is not the issue in this case. It is the method used to rebuild a failed drive that is the issue.

[Tonsko]

The point that Ash is making is that if you delete a file by accident, then the raid will sync that and the file is gone.

[alock]

Kenny6868 said:

No further backups required.

RAID has its place. Being your 'backup' is not the right place for it. Last time I lost a hard disk was because of a power surge that knocked out the power supply taking both hard disks with it.

• A backup should not be in real-time unless it implements its own versioning. This covers an accidental deletion.

• At least one backup should be off-line. This covers a virus that encrypts every document it can access.

• At least one backup should be off-site. This covers fire and theft.

You might not care about these things and only want to cover a simple disk failure but to call it a backup is stretching the definition. It's better described as redundancy. The clue is in the name, Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks.

[GuyW]

You're putting all your faith in a cheap NAS box, brave...

Startech are reasonable for cables, little else.

[StescoG66]

Hello again computer related gurus. Well I got most of my photos recovered which is a relief, but appear to have lost all my music and videos which is a ripsnorting pain in the arse, However silver lining is I shall re-rip all my CD's properly in FLAC using Media Monkey this time.

However - before I can do that the problems persist.

I have replaced the 2 HDD in the TS210, it acknowledges their presence in the Qfinder dashboard plus the HDD lights are illuminated on the front of the unit. However when I log in to control panel/storage manager the HDDs are not present. Obviously I need to rebuild the RAID but if they are not detected I can't do that. Any ideas anybody?? Really getting pissed off with this now, but once this is done I have a USB drive that I will run a backup to.

Edited by StescoG66 on Saturday 30th January 16:19

[Digger]

Get in touch with QNAP Support.

I do believe it's been suggested already.

They easily sorted out mine several years ago.

[StescoG66]

Digger said:

Get in touch with QNAP Support.

I do believe it's been suggested already.

They easily sorted out mine several years ago.

I have done. Just now am getting impatient....

[StescoG66]

Well I think it's dead. Corrupted firmware. Even the QNAP guy couldn't get it going. Funny as the PC can see it, just it can't be initialised.....
QNAP support were brilliant it must be said

[Blim_bug]

It might be a silly question, but are you sure you are using the correct power cable to the NAS box?

Reason I ask is that I went through pretty much the same experience, it turns out that I used the power lead for my external USB drive caddy, instead of the NAS power supply (so whilst it had sufficient juice to power up the NAS, it didn't have enough power to spin up the drives as well).