Christopher (Drashna)

As I said, we don't support parity natively. Just file based mirroring. As for how well works, that's why I posted the links. There is some discussion on them, and how best to get them to work.

You're very welcome. I usually check the forums right after checking tickets. So that's every day. For the most part. And yes, absolutely too much work. You should see how bad it was with WHSv1's Drive Extender. That ... was horrible. Every time. Above is simple by comparison. But you don't need to do this to move the pool to a new system. Just move the disks. Well, normally. And yes, absolutely. The license isn't "locked" to the hardware, at least not permanently. You can deactivate the licenses yourself. This disassociates the license from the hardware, allowing you to activate it on a new system. Or you can contact us via the support link (https://stablebit.com/Contact) and we can reset it from our end. I've done this.... more than a few times before starting to work for CoveCube. I have a bad habit of breaking things. Is why HyperV is important to me now. Lets me tinker without breaking anything important.

Okay, just wanted to update you on this... I purchased said Xeon CPU (the E3 1245v3) and the SuperMicro X10SAT board. Been running for a week. Absolutely fabulous. I'm very happy with it, and it works very, very well. Like, literally half the power consumption compared to the AMD 8120 FX CPU I was using. (VA/wattage reported by UPS). 135VA used, vs 200-300VA fluctuating wildly. The issue I have is that the driver page is absolutely horribly setup. the ISO download doesn't work. Even with a download manager. And you need to download everything from the generic "Windows" section first, and then go to your OS... unless you're using Server 2012 or R2. Then grab them from Windows 8 and Server 2008R2. .... Aside from that, the only other issue is that it doesn't support IPMI, and intel vPro isn't as good. Works well, but requires $100 for RealVNC's Viewer Plus to be able to mount ISO's over the network. But both StableBit DrivePool and StableBit Scanner work fabulously with the onboard chipset. At least the Intel one. I'm not using the ASMedia ports (the two last ones, 7 and 8). And that is without any config file in use.

Fir the first, the part in parenthesis, I'm not sure what you mean here. But DrivePool is entirely folder based duplication. And more or less "random" about where the files are placed. As for controlling the location: http://community.covecube.com/index.php?/topic/208-stablebit-drivepool-controlling-folder-placement/ But in the meanwhile, you could set up two Pools. One on internal disks, and one on external USB drives. And then use Free File Sync, Always Sync or other such utilities to copy the files to the "external" pool. Regards

There are a number of other solutions for gaining parity with DrivePool. These are not supported, nor endorsed by us (CoveCube). However, there are a number of members that have used them with StableBit DrivePool successfully. For quick reference, the solutions are FlexRAID and SnapRAID. There may be others, but these are the ones mentioned here. And here are the links for discussions about these products: http://community.covecube.com/index.php?/topic/94-drivepool-and-snapraid/ http://community.covecube.com/index.php?/topic/110-whs-2011-with-drivepool-and-scanner-with-flexraid-parity-protection/?hl=parity http://community.covecube.com/index.php?/topic/137-flexraids-new-traid-and-drive-pool/?view=findpost&p=833&hl=parity http://community.covecube.com/index.php?/topic/49-feature-request-parity-support/?hl=parity

First, we do not support parity at all. We use file based duplication. This means that files are copied 1:1. (so basically mirroring, but file based). However, there are a few products around that you absolutely can use with DrivePool to get parity (such as SnapRAID or FlexRAID). There are a couple of discussions on this topic already, as well: http://community.covecube.com/index.php?/topic/94-drivepool-and-snapraid/ http://community.covecube.com/index.php?/topic/110-whs-2011-with-drivepool-and-scanner-with-flexraid-parity-protection/?hl=parity http://community.covecube.com/index.php?/topic/137-flexraids-new-traid-and-drive-pool/?view=findpost&p=833&hl=parity http://community.covecube.com/index.php?/topic/49-feature-request-parity-support/?hl=parity

Sooner even. Sorry, I've been busy, and didn't get much done yesterday. As for for the balancing, if you have a LOT of files (or a lot, a LOT of folders), it may take a while to finish checking. Also, if you have any additional balancers installed (such as Ordered File Placement, or Archive Optimizer) make sure that these are up to date was well. We've found a couple of issues with them, recently that .... among other things, can "lock" up balancing. However, if you want to upload the service logs, I can take a look at them and see if I can find anything obviously wrong. http://wiki.covecube.com/StableBit_DrivePool_2.x_Log_Collection Do steps #5-8, and let me know when you've finished uploading the logs. As for the balancer, see this forum post by Alex about it: http://community.covecube.com/index.php?/topic/568-adding-3tb-hard-disk-in-whs2011-to-existing-pool-crashes-dashboard/&do=findComment&comment=3509 Also, you may want to upgrade DrivePool as well.

StableBit Scanner will check the file system as part of its scan. To force it, click the "+" on the disks and "mark as unchecked" (under file system, should be a button with a green circle and yellow arrow). As for creating a new pool..... no. we only support any disk being part of ONE pool. Though, if you wish to completely recreate the Pool: Stop the "StableBit DrivePool Service". Move the contents of the "PoolPart.xxx" folder into the root of each drive Delete the new empty PoolPart folders on all of the disks. Once the last disk has it's pool part folder deleted, the pool should disappear (if it doesn't, reboot) Start the service back up. Add the disks to a new pool. Move the contents back into the new PoolPart.xxxx folder. Remeasure the pool

Yeah, some of the built in tools don't like it when you don't have the disks mounted.... Which is kind of sad, considering that the tools in question don't need them mounted. As I said, you can use the volume ID to run chkdsk manually. Though, at least for easy, maybe you should mount the drives to folder paths: http://wiki.covecube.com/StableBit_DrivePool_Q4822624

I apologize for that then. But it does still sound like one of the disks in the pool is the cause of the issue here. Either way, Alex should be able to confirm that, or hopefully, see exactly where the issue is popping up at.

Yup, exactly. Specifically, we use the full Volume ID for the disks when access them (\\?\Volume{GUID}\path\to\files). So it doesn't matter if you use a drive letter, a folder path, or nothing. However, for ease of access and maintainence, I recommend mounting the disks to a folder. And if you need help with that at all: http://wiki.covecube.com/StableBit_DrivePool_Q4822624

Wouldn't make a difference, in theory. If the service isn't started, the dashboard would attempt to get it started, and wait until it can connect to the service. Same with the stand alone GUI.

Aah. Those can be even more problematic... Glad you got it sorted out though.

Well, a quick look at the logs seems to indicate an issue with one of the disks. That could definitely cause the change to fail. Specifically, it's "\\?\Volume{4b27d72a-c8a7-447f-a6e8-246252e0c8a4}". you can see which disk this is by running "cmd /k mountvol". This will list all the disks and the volume ID. Find the one in question, and that is the disk it's referring to. Also, you mentioned something about file system error in another thread. It is entirely possible that this is connected (hey, didn't I just say that). Additionally, you can use this volume path ("\\?\Volume{4b27d72a-c8a7-447f-a6e8-246252e0c8a4}") to run chkdsk, actually. Use the full string instead of C: (or whatever letter) and it will scan that volume. Same goes with any other volume. And as I said, you can use the "mountvol" command to list all the available volumes. I've also flagged the logs for Alex, just in case (https://stablebit.com/Admin/IssueAnalysis/2160)

That PDF looks familiar. As is that information. The normal recommendations (resetting settings) have already been tried, so I'll handle the rest in the ticket.

I'm glad to hear it, and thank you for the kind words! If you have any other issues or any questions, don't hesitate to ask.

I'm glad to hear that everything went great. Though I can't say that I'm surprised about the enclosure. USB3 driver issuers?

Well, we don't use lot of CPU or memory. In a large part, because we rely on built in Windows API to handle stuff. And because we want our code as efficient as possible. One thing you may want to check out is this command: fsutil behavior set memoryusage 2 Details about what this does here: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc785435.aspx For DrivePool specific settings that you may want to check out then: I believe this just hard codes "Network IO Boost" to be enabled. This prioritizes network IO over local Disk IO, at the cost of CPU cycles DrivePool_BackgroundTasksVeryLowPriority - Sets the CPU priority of background tasks such as re-measuring, background duplication and re-balancing to IDLE (Windows Priority 1). Note that this setting does not affect I/O priority which is set separately. Setting this to true, will run the service at a higher very low priority. The service handles duplication, balancing, measuring the pool, and any other tasks. However, this won't increase the speed that the actual tasks occur at, as that is dependent more on IO than CPU/memory, I believe. DrivePool_VerifyAfterCopy - After performing a file copy (or move), verify that the destination file was copied successfully by comparing it with the source. Setting this to true may cause duplication errors, but every time a file is copied (duplicated) or moved to a different disk (such as re-balanced) it will calculate the checksum of the files and compare them. CoveFs_BoostNetworkIoPriorityWrite - Boost the priority of write network I/O. FileBalance_BackgroundIO - Use background I/O for re-balancing the pool. Setting this to false forces balancing to be done at normal IO priority, instead of "in the background". This may interfere with performance of the pool, but will speed up the process. FileDuplication_BackgroundIO - Use background I/O for background file duplication. Setting this to false forces duplication to be done at normal IO priority, instead of "in the background". This may interfere with performance of the pool, but will speed up the process. CoveFs_AsyncCriticalThreads - How many threads to use for critical asynchronous tasks. Asynchronous tasks are used throughout CoveFS to parallelize various file system operations. In particular, this affects how many disks in the pool are accessed at the same time when we need to query all the disks for some information. Increasing this may boost performance, at the cost of system resources, however with the specs of the system you have and the number of drives, this may cause a noticeable increase in performance, default is 8) CoveFs_AsyncNormalThreads - How many threads to use for normal asynchronous tasks. (increasing this may boost performance, at the cost of system resources) I think I'll be checking these out as well, as I have a similar CPU (and much more RAM). Also, I'm not 100% certain about all of these settings. The file is mostly a "don't touch unless you're sure about it" sort of thing.

How is it error-ing out? Is StableBit Scanner actually having the issue, or is Windows? And how is the drive "mounted"? to a letter, to a path, or not at all?

Only if you have issues again. Though, one "trick" I recommend is to use the "File Placement Limiter" balancer to clear out the disk prior to removing it. That way, you can keep on using the system (we set the pool to "read only" when removing a disk), and have the disk cleared out, ready for quick removal.

Well, as for the "other", it looks like it needs to be remeasured, but ..... If the disk is still in the pool, then it sounds like it may have failed to properly remove the drive. This happens occasionally, unfortunately. Could you grab the logs from the system? http://wiki.covecube.com/StableBit_DrivePool_2.x_Log_Collection Namely, steps #5-7. And let me know when they've been uploaded. After doing that, restart the server (or at least the "StableBit DrivePool Service"), and see if it will let you remove the disk.

Is this happening for the whole pool? Or just the "root directory"? Also, could you enable tracing (click the "Gear" icon >> Troubleshooting >> enable file system logging) and then duplicate this? (aka rename the pool drive). Then do steps #5-7 from the following link? http://wiki.covecube.com/StableBit_DrivePool_2.x_Log_Collection

Default settings are fine. These are some fine tuning and compatibility settings. For the most part, you shouldn't need to edit the Advanced settings file unless either a) you know what you're doing here, or B.) are instructed to do so by support. Most of the settings also include a brief description of what they do, so it should be pretty self explanatory. But it does depend on exactly what you want to accomplish here. And I'm not sure what you mean by "maximize duplication." Could you explain what you mean here? Also, what version of DrivePool are you using?

Umfriend is correct here. However, if you don't have access to the old box, then you need to contact us: https://stablebit.com/Contact (either to reset the activation or to recover your Activation ID)

The easiest way would be to enable the Guest account and configure that to allow access on the folder. That, or use "SERVERNAME\user" for the user name on the share for the RaspPi.