amateurphotographer

Thanks. The "Duplicate Data Option" did not work as you suggest above. I clicked on Remove and selected that option. Drivepool removed the drive and then when it got near 90% it started to wipe the drive of all data and had completely wiped the entire drive before it finished so at the end of the process I ended up with a completely blank drive and not a drive with a copy of al the data on as suggested above. Adding the new drive in did start the duplication process automatically from the remaining drive to the new drive.

Thanks for the message. Attached is a screen capture of my data pool which is set to pool file duplication. I have sufficient sata and power connections to connect both Golds into the server without disconnecting anything. Does this give you enough info to say whether connecting a Gold and the hitting remove on a Red will simply transfer the data from the Red to Gold automatically. I can make sure nothing is being written to the pool whilst this happens so the server sits isolated. Thanks

Hi Could I get some guidance on replacing disks in my drivepool as the last time I did this I ended up restoring from a backup so that tells you how that went. My home server is a Windows 10 Pro based system that effectively is a file server so just a Celeron G4500 with 8GB of RAM. The system itself dates back to 2015 when I built it but it never gets hammered and sits in the corner quietly getting on with life. I have recently had a drive failure in one of my pools, guess it did not like being powered off for two weeks whilst I went away on holiday as it pretty much gave up once it was powered back on. Pool 1 = Media Pool consisting of 2 x WD Red 6TB dating from 2015 with over 27500 hours - no duplication but fully backed up Pool 2 = Data Pool consisting of 2 x WD Red 6TB dating from 2018 with over 16000 hours - duplication 1 copy on each drive and fully backed up Speaking to the network manager where I work he recommends as all my drives are out of warranty - that I cascade the Data Pool drives into the Media Pool and put new drives into service on the Data Pool. So I have 2 x 6TB WD Gold arriving tomorrow (they were cheaper than Red Pro and not much more expensive than Red Plus drives given they have the extra 2 years warranty. Now my logic is, probably flawed so please do correct me: Add a Gold Drive to the Data Pool making the pool 3 drives Click Remove on one of the Red Drives, I assume that Drivepool will simply copy the data from the removed Red Drive to the Gold Drive for me given it is set to store a copy of each file on different drives and not just delete the data off the Red Drive which is what happened last time I tried this years ago. Once the above is completed the repeat the step with the 2nd Gold and 2nd Red Drive Assuming the above is correct then I do the same with the Media Pool drive that is still working and then restore the missing data from the backup to bring the pool back up to what it should be. My intention is to effectively retire the remaining Red Drive with 27500+ hours on it from service. I do have external backups so may leave the drive in the machine and have it backup the Data Pool more frequently that the external drives do which is either weekly or if someone in the family has done a lot of photography then once they have downloaded their memory cards etc - figuring you can never have too many copies. Also as you can see by the dates it is a while since I commissioned a drive. Normally I would SMART test and then Surface Scan them using the Scanner before adding them into service, is there anything else that is recommended? Thanks for the help Paul

Thanks, am confused. If I save a file to the pool using the above example then I only have the single pool copy until 1am when it is copies to a backup drive. if i set the balance to be at 1am only then surely its the same. Later on If I delete the file from the pool during the dayon then it remains on the backup drive until the pool balances at 1am the next day.

Hi Just installed a further 2 x 6tb drives into my home server so now running with 4 x 6tb. My current system is setup as a 2 drive pool that has a duplication factor of 2 so that 2 copies are stored one on each hard drive. So currently no physical backup, all files are duplicated as the system is set to "balance immediatelty". The question I have is what is the difference between the following, or am I thinking it right that there is no difference. Set the balance to be every day at say 01:00 Installing some backup software or sync software such as EaseUS EverySync to sync from the pool to a backup everyday at 01:00 I am just thinking that Stablebit is tried and true and works like a charm so why go hunting and buying other software if I can configure Stablebit to work in the same way. Is it possible to balance on drive pool with another or do I need to get creative with file placement etc? Thanks Paul

Thanks Guys, apologies for the delay in getting back online. Been too many photography events. You both have hit my question on the head, my motherboard specification says: 1 x PCIe 3.0/2.0 x1 (x16 mode) 2 x PCIe 2.0 x1 https://www.asus.com/uk/Motherboards/H110M-A/specifications/ I appreciate that this forum is for the drivepool but in all seriousness would I be better off not using it and just using Synctoy for example as a backup. Our usage of the server is simply a home device so on a day to day basis there would be probably a couple of dozen files changed. After a photographic event then yes we could be dumping several thousand RAW files but essentially the server is just a file server and I don't think we would see a different in the speed of accessing the harddrives etc if everything was on a drive. Essentially I am in the place of thinking that if the files are mirrored in realtime then a faulty file will replicate so that just both drives have a faulty file and whilst I should have a backup drive (working on it) I am wondering if spending several hundred pounds on a harddrive to be a simple mirror is what is niggling my mind at the moment. Thanks for any thoughts. Paul

Hi As the title suggests I am looking into my next generation home server build. Currently have a G4500 Processor in an H110M-A motherboard which has worked flawlessly for the last two years and have no reason to think it will not continue but the 2 x 6Tb WD Red are going to be full by the end of the year. Currently going through our DVD collection having got fed up of DVD discs failing and having to re-buy them, essentially all perfectly legal as we are keeping the DVD's so essentially it is archival purposes. A solution will need to be found as I only have 1 SATA slot left on my motherboard, but thinking about jumping to a ASUS board with 6 x SATA slots and 2 x M.2 slots, 1 of which functions on PCI-e so allowing all 6 x SATA slots to function (circa £70). CPU and RAM etc will all drop in so not a massive outlay. Currently I am running on luck as I have 2 x 6TB which are a shared Drivepool using Stablebit Drivepool which again has worked flawlessly for 2 years but no physical backup just Drivepool doing 100% replication on the fly. The advice I am looking for relates primarily to backup etc as my current thinking is a M.2 drive for the operating system (Win10Pro) and slowly populate with 10TB either WD Red or Seagate Ironwolf but still need some convincing on the Seagate as they don't have a good reputation in our house. I am thinking towards either running 3x10TB as a drive pool and then using something like sync-toy to backup to a 2nd 3x10TB drivepool. Thanks for any thoughts and advice Paul

Hi Everyone I need some help and advice. I logged onto my server today and Stablebit was advising that the filesystem on one of my disks was having problems. Have tracked it down to my C: drive (boot drive). Have tried many times running Chkdsk and whilst in Windows it tells me that "The mater file tables (MFT) bitmap attribute is incorrect. The volume bitmap is incorrect" but then when I tell the system to run chkdsk with the fix command it obviously requires a reboot, on reboot it tells me that there are no problems during the scan and then reboots back into Windows. Have googled around and downloaded a couple of hotfixs from Microsoft but these are for Server 2008r2 and refuse to install saying that they are not meant for my system. Does anyone have any ideas? I was looking into migrating from WHS 2011 to Windows 10 Pro towards the end of the year but if this is a problem and cannot be fixed I may need to do it now. I am currently trialling Drivepool and will be buying it at the end of the trial period as it seems rock solid, am I correct in thinking that all I would need to do is: Install new Windows on clean O/S drive Install Drivepool Connect up the storage drives Add them to the drive pool and all my data just simply appears with no problems and remains balanced with a version of each file. Thanks Paul