Migration Question

[nicecube]

Hello, I am new to Unraid and I have some questions.
I currently have a Windows server with 13 hard disks that I use mainly as a Plex Server.

My hard drives are all different I'd like to create an array with Unraid.

I wanted to know how much disk I can lose in the pool with the following configuration:

 

What is the best way to transfer my data, my drives are in NTFS
I listened to some video and I think the best way is to install UD and Krusader.

Create an array and copy my data then repeat the procedure by enlarging my array

I wonder if krusader will see my data in NTFS i dont want to copy over my network

 

(Parity)
1X 6TB WD Red

 

(Array)
1X 6TB WD Red
1X 4TB WD Red
4X 3TB Seagate
5X 2TB WD Green
2X 1TB WD Black

 

(Cache)

2X 120Gb Kingston

 

If you have suggestions this would be appreciated

Edited August 24, 2017 by nicecube

[tdallen]

Hello and welcome.

 

You don't "lose" any disk capacity with unRAID except for parity (if you want to say that) and also unRAID doesn't have pools.  The unRAID "array" has data drives, up to 2 parity drives, and optional cache drives.  All of the capacity of the data drives is available to you.  The parity drive(s) protect the data drives.  The cache drive(s) can be configured with XFS or BTRFS - if you pick BTRFS you have some RAID type redundancy options available in the cache pool.  Wiki Reference .

 

The best way to migrate is probably UD, as you discovered.  You would add a new/unused drive to the unRAID array, mount the NTFS drive via UD, and then copy the data from the NTFS drive to the unRAID array.  Afterwards you can add the NTFS drive to the unRAID array to create more capacity there.  Rinse and repeat for each drive.  Note that you can start with a parity drive, or you can add parity later.  Two additional notes - 1) this requires at least one empty disk to get started as unRAID will format each drive you add to the array, and 2) you should really have all your data backed up elsewhere before you start the migration.

 

Hope that helps.

[nicecube]

Thank you for your valuable advice, what I also wanted to know is if one of my disks fail the parity will re synchronize the data on a new disk.

If i loose 2 drive in the same time will i lose all my data, In a raid 5 i can loose 1 drive what happen if i lose 2 drive in the same time

 

Sry for my english im using google translate im french

Edited August 24, 2017 by nicecube

[Tybio]

With unraid you can lose as many disks as you have parity disks.  So with one parity disk, you can have one failure without any data loss (provided you rebuild onto a good disk). If a second disk fails then you lose the data on both of the disks that have failed, but data on other drives is fine (but unprotected until you fix parity)

[Squid]

5 minutes ago, nicecube said:

If i loose 2 drive in the same time will i lose all my data,

In RAID5, that circumstance means you lose all your data

 

With unRaid, if you lose 2 drives at the same time, you will only have lost the data that is stored on those particular drives, and if one of the disks was you parity disk, then you will only have lost the information on one of the data drives.

 

Note that you can also run unRaid with dual parity drives so that you can lose up to 2 drives at the same time with no loss of data.

[nicecube]

2 minutes ago, Tybio said:

With unraid you can lose as many disks as you have parity disks.  So with one parity disk, you can have one failure without any data loss (provided you rebuild onto a good disk). If a second disk fails then you lose the data on both of the disks that have failed, but data on other drives is fine (but unprotected until you fix parity)

 

1 minute ago, Squid said:

In RAID5, that circumstance means you lose all your data

 

With unRaid, if you lose 2 drives at the same time, you will only have lost the data that is stored on those particular drives, and if one of the disks was you parity disk, then you will only have lost the information on one of the data drives.

 

Note that you can also run unRaid with dual parity drives so that you can lose up to 2 drives at the same time with no loss of data.

 

Thank you very much to both of you, I understand better now, I will start my migration tomorrow, I hope that all goes well!

[nicecube]

Another quick question, what is the best way to store my media

/Media
   /Movies
      movie01.mkv
      movie02.mkv
      movie03.mkv
   /TV Shows
      Game of thrones
      /Season 01
         s01e01.avi
         s01e02.avi
         s01e03.mp4
      /Season 02
         s02e01.avi
         s02e02.mkv
         s02e03.m4v

or creating multiple share like this

 

/movie

   movie01.mkv

   movie02.mkv

   movie03.mkv

 

/TV Shows

Game of thrones
      /Season 01 s01e01.avi

        s01e02.avi

        s01e03.mp4

      /Season 02

        s02e01.avi

        s02e02.mkv

        s02e03.m4v

 

This way i can use split level 2 for movie and split lever 3 for tv show

For a plex server what is the best allocation method High-water, Most-free or Fill-up

I dont care about where are my media movie on disk 2,3,4 and tv show 4,5,6 bla bla bla

What is the best way to configure unraid for a Plex Server need some advice ! 

Edited August 25, 2017 by nicecube

[Tybio]

The top level "Media" directory is totally optional, I can see why some people like it so they only have one share on the network.  It's personal preference, no real impact to operation either way as you would still add the TV and Movies directories separately.

 

As to allocation, I prefer to have my media mixed for the simple reason that TV shows create their directory when the FIRST show of the season comes out, then for the rest of the TV year episodes are added to that directory (and with split level, the same disk).  This means that if you are running all of your disks near capacity then you can get into an ugly situation, so I always check toward the end of each summer to make sure I have one disk with a fair amount of free space that Unraid will use for new season directories for the new year.  That means I often "fill up" free space on other disks with Movies to max my usage.

 

I'm a huge fan of season folders per disk, as if you binge a show having to wait for disks to spin up between each episode can get a little annoying, but there are considerations you have to take into account doing this.

 

As far as plex goes, how you split directories over disks isn't going to matter a bit to Plex as it sees them as one big folder.