NASLite Network Attached Storage

Yesterday evening I shut down my NASLite+ box as per usual, all done properly via telnet (this time I KNOW it was shut down right).

This morning it took about 20 minutes to start up and when it finally did come up disk 1 is unmountable.

This drive is a practically brand new Maxtor Diamondmax +10 120GB, I will be very annoyed if it's died, but I can't come up with any other reason why this would happen

Thankfully I ran a backup yesterday so all my important data is safe.

I knew I should have bought a Seagate!

you could try checking your ide cables etc first and then do a manual file check somewhere in option 4 of the menu, Eden will put you right
Also just try a reboot.
Good Luck
Wilbur

Hi mongoose,

When I telnet to my nas and power down i can hear the drives spin down and if i wait a few seconds more i can hear the heads park (landing zone). this is the correct time to press the power button.

Like Wilbur said check all the cables and power. reboot the nas and see what happens. if the HD still won't mount you may want to run a few maxtor utils to check the status of the HD.
http://www.maxtor.com/portal/site/Maxtor/menuitem.5d2b41d3cef51dfe29dd10a191346068/?channelpath=/en_us/Support/Product%20Support/Desktop%20Storage/DiamondMax%20Family/DiamondMax%2010
if the HD fails the test you can send it back for a replacement, there is a 3 year warrenty on that model.
Maxtors are good drives and let this put you off them..

Eden

well I plugged the Maxtor drive into my desktop machine.

My ext2 reading whatsit on XP mounted the drive no problems and the data appears to be intact. I ran all the Powermax tests on the drive and it passed them all. All that is wrong with it as far as I can make out is that it wont mount on Naslite anymore.

I am rather confused. Anyone got any ideas?

mongoose,

Have you tried moving the HD around, but as it was working fine i dont think that is the answer...mmmmm i'd copy the data to another HD and then reformat the drive in naslite. then see if it will mount.

its not a ideal way as we still havent solved why it wont mount in the first place.

maybe someone else would like to comment?

Eden

I've taken the data off onto a local drive.

symptoms appear identical to last time (when the machine hadn't been shut down properly), so I'm pretty sure that after a re-format the drive will work properly again. For obvious reasons though I am unwilling to trust it with important data until I can figure out why this has happened twice.

I suppose it is possible that the drive had not properly parked its heads before it was turned off, but TBH if its going to do this every time it is slightly improperly shut down then I can't afford to trust it with anything I need constant access to. Even assuming I always shut down 100% perfectly from now on there are going to be occasional power blackouts, the machine will occasionally have to withstand an improper shutdown.

mongoose,

I agree totally, The kids have just powered off my nas over ten times and the trip switch has powered it off as well. But I have never had a problem with a HD after, ok it would run the disk check but after that, id be up and running.

Id run a few tests to see if i can recreate the peoblem remove the other drives so as not to screw then up and see what cause the problem so u know how best to avoid it.

sorry i cant be of much more help. keep us posted how you get on..

Eden

thanks for your advice edeng,

I am rather busy atm but over the weekend I plan to do as youo suggest and try to recreate the situation in which the drive fails.

I also have another machine which I'm not using much at the moment, so I might try setting that up with the same drive and Naslite temporarily to see if its something to do with the compy I'm using.

OK I finally got around to fiddling again,

I now have a pair of brand new Seagate 'Cuda 160G drives.

Both of these and the original Maxtor (which I still have, having established that there is nothing detectable wrong with it) drop their file systems when ever the NAS looses power without shutting down.

The older drives (80 and 60GB 'Cudas and a 40GB quantum Fireball) are all perfectly happy after a drive check.

I'm going to try building my NASlite+ from a different doner PC, as I have one I'm not using much ATM, Perhaps it doesn't like my old K6.

It may be an issue with the power supply on the K6 machine. If it powers down the motherboard before the disks power down it could cause glitching on the IDE bus, which may confuse the drives.

I would still try another machine like you planned.

its an old AT form factor box so the power switch is hard wired to the PSU. No power down order, just press button, no more juice. I guess that could be what's causing it.

The other machine I plan to try is a rather newer ATX Duron 800 box, so if that is the case then the new box should fix it. Not sure if I can spare the Duron long term, but at least I'll have an answer.

I'm a new boy to this, so please excuse lack of knowledge. My Naslite box has run fine for nearly a year, but now won't mount the (only)HDD. It's a Maxtor, and seems to run up oK. However, unlike Mongoose, it's not recognised by an XP machine...any suggestions how I can retrieve the data from it, please? (assuming it's not completely kn*****ed)
Thanks

Do a Google for "ext2 drivers" I used one called EX2IFS,
I just installed it then shutdown install the drive from you NAS and reboot, you can then map the drive under windows and see the data on it. Worked for me
Best of luck

Wilbur,
many thanks for that advice.....it's worked a treat. I've rebuilt the box witha Samsung drive (it was on offer) and have copied over the data from the Maxtor drive without a hitch.

As we say in Wales...Diolch yn fawr
Hugo
(now a happy Easter bunny)

The problems you speak of sound very much like a bad IDE cable, I would try that and see if the problem clears its self up. Just a cheap fix and can't hurt.

Mike