exist2resist Posted July 17, 2017 Share Posted July 17, 2017 (edited) Normally I shut down my entire server when I swap out a bad drive. What is the procedure to do it live? Stop array, remove drive from array, spin down drive, remove drive, insert new drive, put in old drive slot, spin up array, and let OS rebuild array. Does the above work? Edited July 17, 2017 by exist2resist Quote Link to comment
ken-ji Posted July 17, 2017 Share Posted July 17, 2017 Yes and no. The steps outline is correct. (Actually you don't even need to spin down the drive, but rapidly removing a drive might cause the drive to jump out of your hands due to the inertia of the spindle) The remove drive step can really be done safely if you have hot swap drive bays. Though the SATA power and data connector is physically designed for hot swapping, the odds of disrupting something while the system is live might be more that you are willing to accept: cables falling into spinning fans, fingers touching hot heatsink - kinda thing. YMMV Quote Link to comment
Frank1940 Posted July 18, 2017 Share Posted July 18, 2017 As I understand it, unless the drive has already been detected during the boot process and is currently unassigned, you can not do what you propose. (The kernel in unRAID does not detect a drive when a new drive is hot-inserted into the mix.) Hot swapping may have been added into the kernel in one of the recent releases but I have not seen a formal announcement to indicate that it has been done. Quote Link to comment
lionelhutz Posted July 18, 2017 Share Posted July 18, 2017 3 minutes ago, Frank1940 said: As I understand it, unless the drive has already been detected during the boot process and is currently unassigned, you can not do what you propose. (The kernel in unRAID does not detect a drive when a new drive is hot-inserted into the mix.) Hot swapping may have been added into the kernel in one of the recent releases but I have not seen a formal announcement to indicate that it has been done. You can definitely hot-swap on most hardware that is around today. I've done it many times. Upgraded 3 drives one at a time without ever shutting down the server. Just stop the array long enough to re-assign the new disk in place of the old. Quote Link to comment
Frank1940 Posted July 18, 2017 Share Posted July 18, 2017 2 minutes ago, lionelhutz said: You can definitely hot-swap on most hardware that is around today. I've done it many times. Upgraded 3 drives one at a time without ever shutting down the server. Just stop the array long enough to re-assign the new disk in place of the old. I stand corrected. (Personally, I would never do it. I always imagine that Mr. Murphy will be there to slap me down.) Quote Link to comment
ken-ji Posted July 18, 2017 Share Posted July 18, 2017 15 minutes ago, Frank1940 said: As I understand it, unless the drive has already been detected during the boot process and is currently unassigned, you can not do what you propose. (The kernel in unRAID does not detect a drive when a new drive is hot-inserted into the mix.) Hot swapping may have been added into the kernel in one of the recent releases but I have not seen a formal announcement to indicate that it has been done. Actually it seems that while the array is stopped, unRAID continuously rescans the controllers for device changes. When the array is running, no new devices will be detected, unless the UD plugin (or is it the preclear plugin?) is installed and the UD tab is open in a browser - or you manually run the controller rescan from a shell. I have a hotswp external enclosure and I do the hotswap all the time I need it. Quote Link to comment
exist2resist Posted July 18, 2017 Author Share Posted July 18, 2017 Cool thanks for all the replies. I have external 24 hot swap bays so no going inside the case. I usually shut er down, but wanted to see if it is possible to do online. I will try online. Thanks again Quote Link to comment
exist2resist Posted July 18, 2017 Author Share Posted July 18, 2017 Sweet, my array is being rebuilt without having to reboot. I can confirm that when you stop the array, plug a new drive in, unraid will detect it. I was also pulling and checking several other drives to find the correct serial # of the faulty drive. Unraid reports the drive missing in the web interface but once you plug it back in it repopulates it. Quote Link to comment
CHBMB Posted July 18, 2017 Share Posted July 18, 2017 4 hours ago, Frank1940 said: I stand corrected. (Personally, I would never do it. I always imagine that Mr. Murphy will be there to slap me down.) What do you expect when you're avatar is a leprechaun. He's not going to be far away! lol Quote Link to comment
SSD Posted July 18, 2017 Share Posted July 18, 2017 6 hours ago, lionelhutz said: You can definitely hot-swap on most hardware that is around today. I've done it many times. Upgraded 3 drives one at a time without ever shutting down the server. Just stop the array long enough to re-assign the new disk in place of the old. I've always been reluctant. Always felt that the time saved was minor and the risk was sort of unknown. I am also not big on flasbing controller BIOS unless I have to, and uncertain if updates are needed to fully support hot swap. But maybe I'm just living in the past. May play around with it on my backup server at least. Quote Link to comment
JorgeB Posted July 18, 2017 Share Posted July 18, 2017 Most new controllers shroud support hot-swapping without issues as long as the disk is unmounted first, but I also prefer to shutdown first, though for most of my servers I have to anyway since they don't have hot-swap bays. Quote Link to comment
bonienl Posted July 18, 2017 Share Posted July 18, 2017 I use drive cages which allow drives to be replaced without using any tools. Simply stopping the array and swapping a drive is the way I have done upgrades lately. A refresh of the GUI afterwards allows to select the new drive instantly. Quote Link to comment
SSD Posted July 18, 2017 Share Posted July 18, 2017 3 minutes ago, johnnie.black said: Most new controllers shroud support hot-swapping without issues as long as the disk is unmounted first, but I also prefer to shutdown first, though for most of my servers I have to anyway since they don't have hot-swap bays. Define "new". Is there a way to check if a particular controller and its current firmware support hotswap? Quote Link to comment
JorgeB Posted July 18, 2017 Share Posted July 18, 2017 1 minute ago, bjp999 said: Define "new". Is there a way to check if a particular controller and its current firmware support hotswap? All AHCI controllers, all LSI SAS2008 or newer, those are the ones I know of. Quote Link to comment
exist2resist Posted July 18, 2017 Author Share Posted July 18, 2017 9 hours ago, bonienl said: I use drive cages which allow drives to be replaced without using any tools. Simply stopping the array and swapping a drive is the way I have done upgrades lately. A refresh of the GUI afterwards allows to select the new drive instantly. I didn't even have to refresh the GUI. It auto refresh and populates the drop down lists. I just had to put in the new drive. If I removed the drive the GUI would auto refresh the drop down for me. Quote Link to comment
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