The Problem with a NAS (ft. 14TB Brick from Synology)
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- čas přidán 8. 07. 2018
- This video features what was nearly a 14TB brick -- our Synology DS1515+ NAS that won't turn on or boot. Pressing the power button doesn't do anything.
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Our Synology DS1515+ NAS died. It won't turn on, the power button doesn't seem to do anything, and the power supply still checks as OK with a PSU tester. Apparently, these units had a very common failure from dying power supplies, motherboards, or other lower level issues. Major concerns include saving the RAID and all the data (which will primarily save time, as we do have a lot of it backed up), but also moving to a more reliable box going forward. We found out that the Synology NAS power supply uses the same ATX 24-pin power cable as a computer power supply, and so used that troubleshooting option to replace the DS1515+ PSU with something else.
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Also did it for Deadmau5.
You do know that this PSU exists as a spare part, right?
Check your tone. The system doesn't boot with or without that PSU, but it does boot with an external one, so the point is irrelevant. All that matters is that we revived the thing for long enough to migrate cleanly.
I dont get it if you have a temporary fix and have it running to be able to migrate the data from it why would you buy a new synology NAS if you intend to shortly switch to a custom built server style NAS, you could either:
1. Just build the new server style NAS asap, you could probably do that before the new synology NAS even got there and migrate the files directly. As you say you have all the parts you would need less maybe the drives themselves which I'm sure you could pickup from local PC store today.
OR
2. Just throw some extra drives in an existing render or work machine temporarily, migrate what files you need now and probably the files you don't have backed up just in case running it with external PSU becomes a problem then you have more time to build the new server style NAS.
Then yeah if something happens and it dies running like that you have the files you need for now and re-download the rest from offsite backup, but if it keeps working fine just yeah do same as in 1. and just directly migrate everything.
I dont understand why you "HAD" to buy it straight away, unless it was more of a panic order it right now so we can get back to work asap just in case without thinking to much about it kinda thing, without even trying to diagnose first, which i kinda understand but don't at the same time since the fix you found should have only taken 30min to an hour max, and an extra 1 hour lead time doesnt seem worth panic ordering a $1200 NAS.
BTW im not trying to hate to say your dumb or anything just curious what your reasoning was.
I couldnt find a way to message you. But I had the same problem with my Synology NAS and I safely managed to get the whole data back and migrate it using a rather easy piece of software.
It was kind of funny a even the Synology support staff didnt know about it.
Its non destructive and auto recognises the Synology format as well as some others. You simply hook up the drives into any standard windows PC and selected the drives from the software (dont even need the right order), and it scans the drives and figure the rest out itself and then mounts it for read access.
PM me and I will point you in their direction.
A couple things:
Your data is easily accessible without a Synology chassis. Take the drives out, connect them to another machine (order doesn't even matter), and boot Ubuntu from a USB stick. You can then mount the array and copy all your data off. Synology has a knowledge base article on their website with all the details. (Under the hood, the array is just standard Linux stuff... mdraid and LVM2.)
Those models, because of the atom CPU bug, all had their warranties extended. Call them and open an RMA for it.
I realize it makes for more CZcams clicks to claim the sky is falling, but it's not. Yes, it stinks to have a system go down. But that's why you should have redundancy, especially for a business...
I'm fairly sure it will use MDADM, I'm really surprised this hasn't been mentioned more!
yeah. it just seems like pure hate for something stupid....
testify!
@chicken it does use mdadm and lvm
@@Chicken42069p a 2 sentence definition/explanation of mdadm & lvm would educate us noobs a bit. Yes, we can google it, but...
When you do build the your own NAS in a server chassis, please record it and show the install procedure, what parts,what RAID lvl you plan on using, most likely ZFS zraid2?
anders gjerløw I hope so too
I definitely want to see that
You should in all honesty not put all you disks in one vdev like one huge raidz not only are you screwed if you want to add more storage you also lose massive amounts of performance. What you should be doing it putting multiple vdevs into a single pool. If you do this ZFS will stripe the vdevs and you get much better performance. If you need more space you can just create another vdev and add it to the pool and your done. It has to be the same type of vdev 6 disk raidz2 or a mirror etc but still. I mean technically you can add a none matched vdev to a pool but this is a VERY VERY bad idea and honestly your on your own.
Now you may say AHH but stripes you have no redundancy. Well no you do, in ZFS a vdev is responsible for its own redundancy not the pool. So you can stripe as many vdevs as you like into a pool.
You also get cool things like lz4 compression to save space. Now you may think that the compression will slow down this pool right. But no, think about it, the slowest part of your NAS is the hard disks, and you have loads of ram and CPU cycles sitting there 99% of the time doing fuck all why not put them to use. So say for example you have a 100mb file and you want to write it to a disk that can do 200mb a second , you can in theory write that in 0.5s, now if you can get a 50% compression ratio on your data you only have to effectively put 50mb on the disk. So now your 200mbps disk can do 300mbps!
Please do this! Because I need NAS and would rather build something than just buy it.
Building it is surprisingly easy. You can get used servers off eBay pretty cheaply, then load them with drives. Install Linux and ZFS. Configure and put it in your basement. I have a 20TB ZFS setup downstairs - serious overkill but I had some of the parts lying around. Dual Xeon L5506 hex cores, 40GB ECC RAM and the chassis w/power supply was about $300 shipped. Then eight 4TB Hitachi drives (2 pools of 4 drives in RaidZ1) gives me 24 TB of raw storage and about 20TB of formatted storage.
Do a build video when you build your server! I love that sort of thing!
LowSpecActionSquad yes!
This would be awesome!
Yes please
Agreed ... I would love to see such a video.
"We're gonna need another Storage Server" Better Call Linus and 45 Drives!
Defiantly call Wendell! (not joking, seriously call Wendell)
who's wendell?
Wendell is Level1tech
ArhGee you don't have to be defiant, I'm sure Wendell would be happy to help
Booo Linus. Lame
Sorry dude, you are wrong about the Synology stuff being proprietary and need a lot of time to recover.
Synology uses mdadm, you just need an Ubuntu server and you can rebuild the RAID and recover your files. That is the biggest advantage for me of Synology over proprietary RAID like in the Drobo...
I'm a bit surprised that comment was even made by Steve. I mean, full credit to the guy for being a legend but not knowing that before making the video seems weird. Oh well.
I have used this process to recovery my system.. Interesting that he does not even mention it..
luckily my 1813+ is still good -- but anyone worth their salt has backups for important data. single copy of anything is never good. Yes you have raid, but its their own fault for not having a backup for the raid.. i may have 24tb of raid6 fun stuff but i realize its not safe without a real actual backup.
this video unfortunately is a repeating rambling rant ... noone should ever expect priority treatment just because they run their business off of a particular product. especially after a few years. Motherboards easily go obsolete within that time, and are hard to find off of even a custom setup.
That being said, since even my 1813+ is by this point nearly 4 years old i'm working on preparing its transition array .. yes its costly but when you cant afford to lose it you better have a backup... crying because you lost something irreplaceable in tech because you were too cheap to have a redundant system is pointless... raid only prevents against X# of drive failures, not X# of fires, or hurricanes or tornados or motherboard failures of said raid system.
/end ranters rant no sympathy for this here... normally i'm not such an ass, but everyone learns the hard way about data backup. its not entirely synology's fault.
Far as I was aware, Steve was referring to the hardware? The motherboard and drive power delivery is custom - hence why he said he couldn't really do much of anything around ~3 minutes in, unless he said it elsewhere referring to their software/firmware that I missed?
Just unplug the drives and connect them to another SATA controller. Boot from USB and mount the drives. The raid is autodetected by Ubuntu and the filesystem is Ext4 or BTRFS. Synology is just a wrapper on top of Linux. This video is just a lot of non-information. A quick google on this model shows what the issue is (dead CPU due to Intel manufacturing mistake). So instead of doing al this, contacting synology for a swap, getting a mobo and Ubuntu stick would have costed the same ammount of time and showed some insight.
GN petabyte project?
We don't have that kind of need or money! But also, to be fair, we'd need a zettabyte just to be better than Linus.
Gamers Nexus Just go to the shelf, and grab *all* the storage drives. Who needs extras on hand? (/s)
Just get Western Digital or Seagate to "donate" the drives like Linus does!
Do a Ceph cluster with initially three machines and slowly creep up to that golden zettabyte mark over time.
August Svensson - lol, Ceph and the XFS filesystem for small business storage. That is a next level hyperscale data-center solution... ZFS on steroids.
our DS1815+ just died last week - likely from the same issue as your unit. thankfully we were within warranty period and synology drop-shipped us a new one. (they actually extended the original warranties for a number of models commonly affected by a year)
Synology uses mdadm, boot up Ubuntu and rebuild the array.
Did not realize that! So the array could be dragged over to an Ubuntu system with mdadm installed, and disovered/ imported there? Awesome......
Actually that isn't that simple and if the data is encrypted than your lost in the wood's.
This is exactly the reason I went with Synology. Wanted an out of the box, no tinker NAS solution that's still built on linux in case the hardware craps out.
It should just be
mdadm --assemble --scan
vgscan --mknodes
vgchange -a y
This is excatly what I did when I upgraded from a DS1010+ with 5 disk RAID5 to a self made ubunto based NAS. Just move the disks to the new server and mdadm scan + assemble and voila, RAID was up and running with all of my data.
Just finished watching Ask GN 89. Went back to sub page. New GN video has appeared. It doesn't get much better than this 😁
Okay. I guess it could get better if your NAS hasn't just shit the bed and taken all of your projects with it.
Great ethical content maker, his review of the PC-O11D was the one that sold me.
Update : The issue you face can be solved by replacing the transistor in Q2 area of the motherboard (Q4 area for 1815+ models). This transistor, once burnt, prevent the power switch of the MB.
what is the name of the transistor I cannot read anything on the tiny head of the transistor so have no idea what to replace it with?
Please keeps on the loop over your NAS build as well as the why for your choices of os and file system.
Keep up the good work.
I love when you have an issue and just take us to a trirp through the diagnostics of the issue.
You could have easily taken the drives out and pulled that data off. Plenty of posts on how to get your data off a dead synology
How are you NOT doing backups every 24hrs?! o.O
This was a really interesting video guys. Legit those mod mats are actually really useful! I think you've got a good product on your hand there guys.
Great video. Definitely nailed the coffin on not getting a Prebuilt NAS. I had been leaning towards a diy file server for a while and now I’m committed. Look forward to seeing more vids about it.
not directed at anyone in particular but... obligatory "RAID IS NOT A BACKUP" comment.
Yes ... and you're totally right to remind everyone about that.
I'm going to be disappointed if your new Server isn't called, "The Nexus" or "The Gamer's Nexus". I was actually recently looking at one of these myself, kinda weary now.
Gamer's NASxus...
I'm all for stupid names. My NAS is called Nassie. So cute.
Qnap and synology NAS are good to have, this guy is just being an total pussy about this.
He just needs a new PSU FFS which is super easy to buy and get for these NAS boxes but he's making out like the world has just fucked out and hes going to be dead tomorrow, and he can't get an PSU when Qnap and Syology don't change these PSUs as they keep the parts the same across the range.
The Qnap boxes have an external PSU so you just replace the external PSU and it up and running again.
I can see this guy trying to swap to an FreeNAS OS and then can't get it setup right then try and keep it going then end up giving up and using this box.
Just to let you know Qnap and Synology use Lunix as well.
I have to thank you. My Synology DS1515+ shut off and would not turn on. Your suggestion of removing the drives and power worked. I am now trying to get it all backed up. I was stupid and didn't plan for failure.
Glad you didn't lose all that data! Looking forward to the server build.
Synology's raid is LVM at its heart, a standard linux install can read the entire RAID set.
Curious what your backup solution for that much data winds up being. I have about 40TB active on Synology NAS's, but haven't found a price-reasonable remote backup solution outside of just buying duplicate NAS's and drives.
We use Crashplan for business on some places with success. Quite inexpensive. Uploading 40Tb for the first time (or restoring) could take a long long time depending on your internet though. But you will have that problem with any cloud service. Their plans are per device with unlimited storage. So you just need to concentrate everything on a single machine and then send it all to the cloud. Their system do incremental backups, versioning and other good stuff.
That's the problem with services like that and BackBlaze; a NAS server doesn't count and I can't "concentrate everything on a single machine" lmao. I will look into it in case they allow NAS's, but I doubt it
I have it running on a few headless Debian servers, so it runs fine on Linux. I just open the CrashPlan Desktop app on my local machine through X11 redirection over an SSH connection (works fine even on Windows). You can always pay 2 subscriptions for 2 machines (or more) if you need it, concentrating in a single machine is not really a must, but many times it does make sense to have a big backup machine that can be replicated to the cloud. I am not sure what do you mean with "NAS server doesn't count" since it runs on any Linux. I guess you could even mount a shared storage to the machine and include the mount in the backup if you want > EDIT (which means that you can also run it on any Windows/Mac/Linux machine that has access to the shared storage)
try unRAID, it doesn't stripe your data across multiple drives and you can have two parity drives.
so you won't lose data if one or two drives fails, and even if more than 2 drives failed, you'll only lose the data on the failed drive, because your data is not striped across the drives.
Well with Backblaze, they specifically don't allow NAS's and thus don't allow network-mapped drive letters to keep that from being abused. I have Synology NAS's, much like what's shown here, so unless they have a specific Synology app I pretty much have to back up via other PCs.
Was gunna comment on GN pumping out the content aaaannnnd.....video about y'all nearly losing a crap ton of data you need to do so. Glad you got it working temporarily!
Really interested in seeing the next video on you guys making a new custom server for storage. I'll likely follow up on it myself
Looking forward to the NAS Server build!
Also maybe cover server security. Ie. Ensuring that only those authorized to have access, do. And securing the box so it can be internet facing (accessible via VPN from a remote location).
Just use FreeNAS and a custom build
Not particularly familiar with the different NAS/RAID solutions. What does everyone think of FreeNAS vs. the alternatives? Upvote the comment above so we can get some good suggestions, please!
Gamers Nexus FreeNAS should be your only choice for a home brew NAS. It uses a superior file system, ZFS, and has amazing support with constant updates. Having said that, I still prefer Synology because BTRFS is still a great file system, and DSM is very easy to use.
From what I have seen it is usually Freenas vs. Unraid vs Windows Server with some form of raid.
Linus answered the question in his forum and looks like he uses a few different solutions based on his needs.
"The high speed nvme storage server is using Windows Storage Spaces
So is its near realtime backup
The vault is running cluster over zfs on centos
My server is running unraid with a couple of VMs and a plex docker container.
Per the above comment I'm probably not doing it right, but it works for me"
linustechtips.com/main/topic/940503-what-system-does-linus-use-for-his-server/
freeNAS as the name implies, is free, and you should really look into it. ZFS is really robust and scales well for the future.
tbh its all based on the kind of redundancy u want, and freenas has only zfs which is poorly flexible, i went with windows 10 storage spaces which is more adaptable and the system is easy to use for a home server since its the classic one
Well done on the troubleshooting stuff, lesson learned on not following the 3-2-1 backup protocol. Great channel.
I was about to but one of these for my video production uses, glad I got to check this out before that.
The problematic x(x)15 models, my local dealer was quite open about it when I asked her about which Synology models are more prone to power failure and the a few models she mentioned were all from the 2015 series, perhaps none after that. Hope Synology learn from their mistake.
have a DS1813+ running for 9 years now. Always running. Replaced all hard drivers for bigger (from 4tb 5400 to 8tb 7200) ones a couple of months ago after one of then has failed.... No problem at all.
0:31 well there is the problem right there, it isnt connected to any power duh
Looks fishy indeed
Did he try reversing the polarity ? ;-P czcams.com/video/w-pm8uxw1MM/video.html
Wow, I'm glad I knew I could setup a home server back when I wanted a NAS and went with the DIY solution.
Can't wait for the server build upload!
Synology has a guide how to recover drives when plugged into a regular PC and using a Linux Live CD. It does work with those two bay NAS, not sure how easy it is to do this with their bigger units.
3:55 - NO. This is not a problem with a NAS. The potentially catastrophic loss of data is *entirely* because you had a deficient backup strategy. If you can't tolerate a piece of hardware dying, you need a backup. It's really as simple as that. All hardware fails eventually.
For a critical system design, a client actually had a whole spare server in a box in storage. If any one component or a whole server died, near zero wait time to replace any part or a whole server. Swap and go.
Expensive Solution ? No. Downtime ? Six figures per hour $$$$$$.
So it was worth it to have extra parts nice and new on site. Off site backup out of state, if some disaster took out the building ! :-O
If something took out both locations in both states, well - not their lucky day. :-/
I believe he says somewhere that he does have a backup.. just saying.
Wow, and I was thinking to get me one this. Thank you for this video.
As my luck would have it, just today my Synology 916+ died on me. Thank you for this video, gives me some guidelines and tips to recover my data.
I'd like to point out that synology uses linux LVM and mdadm for storage, so if you plug these drives, just as they are, into a linux server, they should be detected without problem. Just like in the case of ZFS, LVM uses unique IDs for the drives, so it should pair them up right even if you mix them up. Maybe send an email to Wendel from Level1. I'm sure he can help you out, also...maybe a nice video for the both of you.
Maybe it's time to buy another NAS the same size and sync all of your data across as another point of redundancy? Or you could always sync it first then keep it at home as an offsite backup :)
Fridgemusa at home is on site, in his case. With gigabit internet he has the possibility of off-site sync of large 4k video though.
Yep.
I moved off QNAP/Synology/Etc, a long time ago. I went to FreeNAS via IXSystems. I did buy their actual hardware, but all of it is non-proprietary. You can get all the parts from the manufacturers (don't have to rely on e-Bay). The devices are also user-serviceable, and IXSystems will send you the part, with a 14-day return time allotment. It can take time to RMA, as they do so back to the original manufacturers, but you can get that advanced replacement to keep you from being down. I decided to buy an extra board from them at about cost, so now I have a spare. It's almost like a DIY server, except you can buy it all as a package.
Another thing with using a NAS, is having a local backup that's up-to-date. While not affordable for everyone, I have a second NAS (slightly smaller in TB), which is synced every 6 hours with high compression. If the first NAS fails, my downtime is only the replication schedule time. Remote backup can then be used for the smoking hole/scenario, with a slightly larger sync window.
I have had this happen to me. Synology replaced the device quickly no problem. The older devices have power integrated, the newer have a separate power brick which is more easily replaceable.
Worst case buy or lend another (can be a newer device too) just to get the files off it. Just mark the drives like you said and install them in a new device.
Finally, backup backup backup! Any single point of failure will bite you, be it off the shelf or self built.
When I started the 14 min video, I thought "The Problem" would be much bigger. But basically the video just shows how to unplug and plug a power supply and lasts 14 min.
And if you mean the problem is that a product (like a NAS) can fail, wow didn't know that...
the problem was apparently unknown at the time until it powered on from the second psu
Yeah, but why needs it to be 14 min?
Everybody knows a CZcams rant shorter than 10 minutes is not a proper rant.
So basically "the cause of problem was unknown until I tried the most obvious thing"? Wouldn't he have done exactly the same thing if he had built the box himself? (Yes, I know there's a small difference between "checking if a PSU is defective" and "checking if another PSU powers the system", but come on! He sounds like Synology was the biggest crap this side of the Atlantic.)
you would be a terrible person if you took the needed parts out of the new one to fix the old one and then RMA'ed the new one, but only a terrible person would do such a thing to a obviously defective product
This all day, brought a synology cause i wanted the set it and forget it, but the limited space (50gb) and the gimped cpu is killing me. I need to move on to a custom solution.
Probably each of the parts have their own serial number to avoid thing like that, m/b could have it in bios, but if not, yes i would have done the same
mochi kun Wait, 50GB? When was this?
50Tb, lol, my bad
@Giorgos - While i would never encourage such a terrible, terrible deed lets be honest they are not nearly organized enough to have all the serial numbers for each product cross matched with the internal serial numbers of each component.
Nice temporary fix!
I've been running a Synology NAS without any problems for 4 years (which is already backed up to another unit) but this got me thinking that it could happen to me as well.
that's cool mat with the Power supply info... dig it!
While watching the intro. Me: "yeah, drop the NAS a bit more...." 😂
ZFS > RAID IMO. Having the filesystem handle the majority of the replication tasks (and not separate hardware), while being an open standard, makes things a lot more safe to handle.
If you don't care about performance, ZFS is great
I really like your mat you have there where you are working on this Synology NAS, where can I get one of these and what size is this mat?? Jim
Can't wait to see the server build. Any chance you'll do a setup log?
**CRT scope producing screen burn in the background.**
BTW, why not remove all the HDDs and mount them in Linux on another device to copy the data off it?
Am I missing something or what?
DIY servers
Interesting video. I will soon be in possession of a working old PC, would you recommend a NAS or a home server for home/family storage? Infrequently accessed, mostly for smart TV movies, potentially around 1 or 2 TB of data. A server would be nice for accessing the data even from our other property, but I dunno if the hassle and the danger of static IP is really worth it in this case.
Hi Steve. Great vid and great save! Why did you put the white jumper on the end of the ATX cable. Couldn't you have just left it unattached?
"These NAS tend to die randomly so we decided to put all on data on it without a complete backup solution"... oook
I have a Synology 1815+ that suffered the exact same failure. I got it to come to life using the double power supply trick then created (soldered up) an adapter for a SeaSonic SS-250SU power supply ($43 each). Mine has been happy for over a year now ;)
The power supply can be ordered directly from Synologys website. Delivery times are around 4 to 7 days to Europe.
Synology has procedure on how to pull that data using linux
Synology uses Linux, it's mdadm. Super standard Linux stuff.
I built a FreeNAS box (4+2 4TB), about 4 years ago.
About a year after that, I got paranoid, so I built another identical box, to rsync the whole thing onto.
So I have ZFS2 4+2 setup, *times two.*
Talk about an overkill. LOL
But seriously, what better way is there to back up a huge NAS box? I certainly couldn't think of one, other than ANOTHER NAS BOX.
not overkill at all, as long as they are geographically separated. Wouldn't regular backing up of one box to image files be better than rsync though? Giving you the option to restore from an earlier point instead of getting ev. AIDS synced to both boxes.
rsync is not a backup. If data gets corrupted somehow you could end up rsync'ing the bad data
There are projects on github that can get you backing up to Amazon S3 from a ZFS volume using ZFS send and ZFS receive, so that's an option.
Hmm interesting. I did use ECC memory on both builds, and ZFS does check-sum all data, so I'd think the data corruption is unlikely. But I see there are other ways to do things to be even more.... paranoid.
However, I'm not interested in cloud type storage. My data stays with me, physically. Meltdown and the likes should have given people second thoughts about the cloud.
it's rare but raid cards / controllers can die and cause corruption. Same for bad areas on a disk (again rare as there are protections against it). Reason I mention it is i have seen it happen and cause an outage before.
Synology has very good support in my experience. I had an issue and they quickly shipped a replacement. Its possible to have hardware failures with anything. If you want very generic commodity hardware, use freenas. Then if you have a failure, you can rebuild the whole system or just replace the component.
Just built an Unraid server myself and loving it so far.
Synology (and others) have many data recovery methods for various scenarios. If you bought another NAS (you said you did), you could have used that for the recovery (by following correct steps). Electronics fail, no matter what the make/model. Don’t blame the tools for you not having backed up critical data.
The funny thing is I was just looking into buying a NAS, but I am very much considering just buying a Threadripper CPU + 1180, and just making a hybrid nas/plex server/gaming PC and not spending hundreds on completely separate devices, when I can do all in one with overkill.
Honestly that's basically what I did. I'm actually doing all my gaming in a Windows 10 VM running on my Threadripper box with a dedicated GPU for the VM, but it's got Linux as the base system for everything else. It works pretty darn well.
This is what I did. I consolidated my computer and ZFS NAS together into one new beefy box running Proxmox. Proxmox handles all the ZFS storage for me, and for VMs I'm running Windows 10 (for gaming) and macOS High Sierra (for everything else) on it.
You could easily do that. I have a backup server running in a VM on my Ryzen 7 1700 system. I have an ICYDock 5 bay hotswap unit in the case (it's an older case that actually has 5 1/4 bays...). I run it under VirtualBox with a CentOS VM which has ZFS. The drives are attached via rawdiskaccess - and the VM runs in headless mode.
So it just sits in the background, using very little overhead, and provides ZFS based storage.
With a threadripper i would honestly run linux as a base OS and run a virtual windows and pass that 1180 to the windows VM so you get 99.5% of bare metal performance. Then you can pass your sata controller to a BSD VM and set up a ZFS storage array , all on one box.
Done this with an unRaid build. 1950x + 1060/Titan Xp.
Super flexible and does everything I need... and my needs are pretty diverse haha
Do you plan on making any videos of the server build?I'd love to see that process even if you only cover the basics.
Bummer. I ended up buying a 24tb NAS because of the size/cost convenience, but I trust it as far as I can throw it. This is a great example of RAID is not a backup (which you know and had good mitigation in place).
Time to call Wendell
Storinator to the rescue
i am curious what was synology response to fixing the nas? did they offer to look at it for free did they offer services for paid since it was out of warranty? you did not mention if they would fix it. which is with most coompanies cheaper then sourcing the parts and fixing it usually.
Any update on the custom server build? Really interested in what you put together.
Yes, you have to buy another sinology box, but if its a power supply/motherboard issue you should be able to take the drives out of the old synology and move the drives to a new synology box and migrate the RAID. Synology provides documentation to do this.
#LinusSaveGN let's give GN a badass server, they deserve!
I have been researching servers recently and have been wondering how you fix raid arrays. I have a raid 10 array in one computer from back in the day and has luckily been alright besides one weird issue that just required a reboot. Could you possibly go into detail in regards to building a home server with a linux distro and creating a storage server and potentially other cool stuff that can be added in the future if the person wants to do more with the server besides data storage and streaming? Also, and probably more importantly, how to fix it when something goes wrong, like a driver fails or a power outage causes damage to the motherboard or something?
Thanks,
RS
One of the beauties of ZFS or using an enterprise grade raid controller like an LSI, is that the Raid / Pool information is stored ON THE DISKS! So if you need to replace the controller / OS / Machine as a whole, a new Compatible ZFS install / Raid controller will pick up the array and allow you to import the array just fine.
No way in Hell I'd buy another one of those. Back it up and load to a new built system through your 3rd Party back up company. Seriously, their lack of any timely support for an emergency situation for an existing customer just screams "We don't want your continued business!"
That's really more of a price point issue than anything else. At the price one of these units go for you're not going to get emergency support or even especially competent regular support. No company selling units like these at the price they are would be able to afford to. There's a reason the top end of the storage market operates at several thousands of dollars per TB.
This is actually a reason I like using windows raid. If something goes wrong with my hardware, the drives are easy to pull out and put in any other PC. If your storage needs are under 12TB (current largest drives i think) just run 3 12TB drives in raid 1 for 12TB of redundant safe storage which are easily readable on any PC!
I am a novice, planning to build my first system mainly for genealogy ... archive family records going back to the 1700s. Are you referring to raid as available in Windows 10 (or whatever the current version is)? Offsite cloud backups are a given, but what hardware + software is reasonable for a raid 1 setup?
Raid on windows is utter trash. It does not have any modern features that something like ZFS has
Unless of course, you WIndows FakeRAID (TM) just loses it's mind, resulting in total loss, a standard feature of S2D! :)
I am referring to RAID in windows 10. It's software raid, running on your CPU, so you'll want to have a decent CPU in your system. But Windows RAID works well whether your aiming for redundancy (raid 1) or speed (raid 0). I have personally tested both these setups and speeds scaled just as well as hardware raid.
If you want a more modern file architecture with things like protection from bit rot you could always get a Windows Professional For Workstation's copy of windows 10 and use the ReFS file system which is very similar to ZFS in terms of data protection.
I run a 12TB RAID 5 DIY NAS server, and I was pretty baffled when I saw the title. I was happy to hear that your criticism was at those crappy prebuilt systems. I never liked those.
Several years back I had a Seagate Blackarmor NAS which stopped recognizing the RAID array even though the drives were fine. Pulled the drives, connected them to my desktop, and ran a RAID recovery program to get the data back. Much easier than trying to fix or replace the NAS itself.
If you loose data from having 1 nas go down you dont have your systems correct. Have back ups of backups and offsite storage.
What happens if there is a fire at your office? so even if you have two NAS you loose all your data. Thats why offsite is so important.
? That was already discussed in the video. Watch it.
Gamers Nexus lol
rewatched it, I think i had too many beers last night and missed it at the start.
What Software will you use to run your backups of new files? Hope you can do a video on it.
FreeNAS. :)
Did he try plugging back in the old 24pin cable? i've had stuff refuse to turn on after a couple years, but then be perfectly happy for years after unplugging/replugging the 24pin
ghosts -.-
this was an interesting video. please post your other NAS build. I am interested in both the hardware and the software setup. mini how to or summary of the software would be great.
I understand your frustration, especially since your small business depends on this system to operate. My experience in enterprise systems management has taught me about the concept of "lifetime spares". The idea is that if you have a critical system that you know will become unsupported by the manufacturer, you buy duplicate parts or complete spare systems to continue to operate for the lifetime of the project that these systems support (some of the systems I supported had been in operation more than 30 years). Depending on how standard those parts are, you may be able to hedge with an alternative supplier (as demonstrated) or wait until the products are EoL and stock up on used stuff (testing before you need it). A warranty is the first defense, a service contract is the second, and stocking your own spares is the third, the worst case is board level repair. All of these options have differing costs and applicability, you have to look at it form the perspective of an insurance underwriter, being critical of potential failure points and associated costs. You always have the option of transitioning to a different system, but in many cases the cost of engineering and implementing a new solution will far exceed proper maintenance and stocking spare parts. In your case, it may be as simple as replacing bad capacitors in the power supply, but your tester doesn't display ripple or noise like proper electronics test tools. Your tester probably doesn't supply enough load to simulate the connected system either.
If you get a somewhat beefy server, it's pretty easy to throw Xen on it and then FreeNAS as a VM with the disks passed-through.
That way you can have a bunch of VMs effectively directly attached to your storage server and free up your real network (if you have any use for VMs that is)
Wait, so was the issue with the PSU or with the motherboard? I'm having the same issue with a server build I'm working on (no response when I press the power button, even after resetting CMOS), and I'm wondering what the takeaway here is.
Where can I get one of those desk mats with all that connector info on them?
Does the mod mat also function as a placement in the market for a new one.
The Synology issue with the Atom processor came out a year ago. It is an Intel issue with the processor. Synology immediately fixed the issue on all new units and offered a 1 year warranty extension on all those units. Now the Atom issue does not affect all units, but only some. Having said that, I have used Synology boxes for years and they have been pretty rock solid for me and my customers. Now, if you have a good solid backup system, then this problem you are having would be a minimal thing. I have 1 NAS backup to a 2nd NAS twice daily and then have a 3rd one that I update monthly and keep in a safe. In addition, I use cloud backup. I can tell you from experience that the "end all solution" to your problem is not building out a server with a lot of drives. Been there, done that and sold the T-Shirts. You can get into the same issue there. Go a few years down the road and see if that motherboard is still being made or if you are going to use a separate controller, will it function with whatever operating systems are out then? This is the problem with using a PC/Server to do this. Now you add complication and more components and run a full blown operating system. These need to be kept up to date and patched too. That is the beauty of a NAS. It is a small box, no frills, no graphics and just does one thing. I have done both for many years, or I should say, decades and there is always a compromise or trade off. I can tell you of Servers failing and having the same issue you are having now. Your ultimate solution, whatever way you go, is to shore up your backup systems so that you don't have this problem the next time a NAS/Server/PC/SAN fails. AND..... If you are using anything but say a RAID 10 in your NAS or Server, you are asking for problems. RAID 5 is not longer recommended in the industry and RAID 6 will be there in 2020.
would you still recommend something like this for a home user? maybe if you was going to use 8TB max storage capacity for 2-4 users? would having an external hard drive plugged in to it be necessary?
Wow (I'm a noob in this area) - so if I had one of those and it died (but drives are good), I can't rip the drives out and put them into another NAS enclosure? If I had a DIY NAS running something like freeNAS would the data be easier to salvage?
Hey I have a DS218+ that had a failure on the backplane (Sata slots). Warranty expired on december 2019. Synology won't fix it, neither provide parts. Where Can I get parts to replace it my self? I saw the disassembly on ifixit, and it is pretty simple.
I so appreciate this. I had someone in IT suggest this to me because I wanted a file/email server of my own and I was thinking of it and just dropping the email or making it work. I won't be doing that now. Either building a cheap server or buying a used one.
Couldn't find the video, did you ever do the server build?
I love their DSM, but hate their boxes (bought a second hand one which worked for about two weeks...then like yours, totally stopped booting). My solution was to use XPEnology, which is amazing !! You could have done the same, and migrated your content easily).
I just built my own with my old i7 4790k, 16gb ram, and purchased a nice itx board with 6 sata ports, all into a sexy looking white node 304. Installed XPEnology, and voila !! Now I have a very easily serviceable DIY synology NAS. Very cheap to build... prebuilt proprietary would have been £1.5k, and it'd be less powerful...
Cool to see you troubleshoot it so quick.
all the best! great work!
And I am glad I watched this. Now I'll just build my own NAS. Thx.
Good job! I dumped Synology a while ago. Got a netgear a while back that has a few years on it.
I built myself a little Open Media Vault server and over the years frown tons of other features on it. For instance FTP, Plex server, Torrent client, Web server, Samba share, Mumble, TeamSpeak ,Omada Controller (EAP) for home wifi control, Octo print, Weather logger with time-lapse etc etc.. Services I might need to access outside of my home are routed through a simple webpage (easy to remember domain) directly to my machine. Yes, there is a long random pass for each individual service.
Can someone explain what the jumper he used is for?
I didn’t quite follow how that would help? Or what the purpose was.
Will you be making a video about making the server? I think that that would be nice to watch.
Now will you make two servers with one being a SATA or NVMe SSDs and the other being HDDs for long-term storage?
I'd love to see a video when you guys make the DIY server. The hardware build and the software choices.