Shane
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Posts posted by Shane
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Have you opened a support ticket with Stablebit?
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If the only balancers you are using are the Ordered File Placement and Scanner, you could try ticking all the boxes under "Plug-in settings" and "File placement settings"?
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Just out of curiosity, what version were you running when you initially encountered the problem?
21 hours ago, viperpray said:2.3.11.1663 does not allow ppl with older pools to use duplication. any new folder made is made without proper perms for the program that made it to access it afterword's. Unless these programs are run as admin. this is no longer the case with versions newer then this.
Huh. I'm not seeing anything mentioned in the changelog from 1663 to 1680 that would do that, and the screenshot of chatgpt mentions a problem that was fixed in 1345 which is before both of those builds.
Glad the latest version worked for you anyway!
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20 hours ago, eujanro said:
Should I assume that if such issues were critically problematic between the DrivePools, I should have seen reports of Syncthing struggling to keep the files in a clean synced state?
SyncThing does not rely at all on persistent FileID and does not rely solely on watcher notifications, thus it is not vulnerable to DrivePool's FileID collisions and is insulated against DrivePool's change notification bug.
However, as MitchC mentioned, there is another DrivePool issue, the Read Striping bug. While that bug is apparently not omnipresent across installs (so you may just be one of the lucky ones) and requires Read Striping to be both enabled (warning this is currently the default on new installs) and active (because even if enabled it only affects pools that are using duplication) it is definitely something to be neutralised.
TLDR as far as solely SyncThing + DrivePool is concerned, if you're not using duplication you're fine and if you are using duplication but not using Read Striping you're fine; if you have been using duplication and Read Striping then you should disable the latter and check for corrupted files (and the nature of the bug means a file corrupted on one pool could then be synced to the other pool in that corrupted state).
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There is no such version of DrivePool, chatgpt is making stuff up.
You can find all 2.x Releases at https://covecube.download/DrivePoolWindows/release/download and all 2.x Beta versions at https://covecube.download/DrivePoolWindows/beta/download - the latest build is currently StableBit.DrivePool_2.3.12.1680_x64_Release.exe which was uploaded 7th May 2025.
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Hi, what version number is chatgpt claiming exists? And are you asking about StableBit Cloud (which provides centralised management of other StableBit products) or a different StableBit product such as CloudDrive, DrivePool or Scanner?
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The short of it is that CloudDrive allows you to designate a supported storage provider (e.g. dropbox, a network share, even a local drive) and 'format' a specified amount of space in it to present that space as a cloud-based drive to Windows.
If you're familiar at all with mounting disk image files over a network share (using tools like VirtualBox, HyperV, etc) that's basically what CloudDrive lets you do except the "image file" is a folder full of block files kept in your cloud account.
E.g. if you had a Dropbox account and you reserved 1TB of space as a CloudDrive drive, Windows would see a SCSI drive of that size in File Explorer.
Pro: you can treat your cloud storage just like it's a physical drive on your computer, and you can do things like encrypt it locally so it can't be read by anyone in the cloud without the password you set in CloudDrive.
Con: just like a physical drive, it can only be "plugged into" and readable from one computer at any given time (unless you have a way to share it out - just like a physical drive).
As far as syncing/storing Dropbox files locally, you could use a CloudDrive drive as a drive in a DrivePool pool and mirror via duplication or you could use a tool such as FreeFileSync or SyncThing to mirror between your dropbox folder and your pool drive. There are technical pros and cons to either approach.
If you just want to mount your entire Dropbox as a network drive (basically just give it a drive letter instead of being a folder) there are other third-party apps that can do that.
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Condolences on the data loss. Sounds like you got hit by something nasty.
14 hours ago, smark36 said:But I now have two disks with the same folder structure each. So can I add my data to the PoolPart folder of each of the disks like this which would mean that I create the same folder structure on both disks? E.g. I would have a "BACKUP" folder in PoolPart of disk 1 and disk 2? (I assume yes, cause that's what DrivePool also does)
Yes, that's correct.
14 hours ago, smark36 said:And what happens if I add a file with the same name (and same path) on disk 1 and on disk 2? This can be the case because the data recovery software may have detected the same file on multiple disks of the old pool. Maybe the file was on one disk at first but then was moved to another becasue of balancing. In any case it can be that I now have a file of the same name (maybe different file sizes, maybe on of the even has filesize 0) on both of my 20 TB disks.
DrivePool considers a file that is in the same folder tree (e.g. folder\subdolder\name.ext) on multiple poolparts inside a pool to be a duplicated file, because that's how it does duplication. However if you weren't using duplication then yes it is most likely due to balancing and the recovery software un-deleting the moved files:
1. If the "duplicated" file has different last-modified dates on those disks DrivePool will consider that an error and offer to keep only the newest file or let you resolve it manually.
2. If the "duplicated" file has the same last-modified dates on those disks but different sizes DrivePool will also consider that an error but leave it up to you to resolve manually.
3. If the "duplicated" file has the same dates and sizes on those disks DrivePool will presume there is no problem even if the files are not identical in content, and proceed normally - which if you have duplication turned off means it will delete one of the "duplicates" to free up space in the pool.
In theory so long as the what happened to the old lost pool was only the deletion of its files, the recovery process restored the deleted files in full, and the files going into the new pool are only from the old lost pool, then you could simply seed the new pool and you should only run into issue #1.
In practice it's possible that the recovery software may have only partially recovered some file contents, leading to issues #2 and #3.
Another issue you'll run into is that recovery software can't tell the difference between deleted files you wanted deleted and deleted files you didn't want deleted - so you'll have to get rid of the former all over again.
14 hours ago, smark36 said:I would be grateful for any help or past experiences any of you may have. With this amount of data it's not so easy to back up everything quickly. It always takes days.
If possible make a back up of the recovered content before you do anything else with it (including recreating your pool).
Then perhaps use something like DigitalVolcano's Duplicate Cleaner (I used this as an example because it's the one I know best) to identify duplicates and uniques by date, size, name and content so you can resolve the above issues in an interface that's designed for it, again before you recreate your pool. While there's a bit of a learning curve, as a dedicated tool it has a lot more capabilities (such as being able to detect files that look identical but have different content) than DrivePool's basic same-name-but-different-date detection.
P.S. If you do plan to use duplication in the new pool, remember to turn off read-striping.
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You can use Windows' Disk Management to remove (or change) a drive's associated letter entirely: open WDM, right-click the drive, choose "Change Drive Letter and Paths".
Thanks for the registry tip though!
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I've found it flaky too, never figured out why but it wasn't something I was worried about to more than poke at briefly.
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Does Scanner or HDD Regenerator give the same warning if the test is run with the drive on a different computer?
On 4/24/2025 at 7:33 PM, dominator99 said:Would Seagate reject a warranty claim based on their test results?
This'd be something you'd have to ask Seagate.
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A few options that come to mind:
You can right-click the column labels row in the Scanner GUI and enable display of drive letters if it isn't showing those.
You can right-click a specific disk and select "Disk Settings" to (amongst other options) change the Name of it from the default (the latter usually being its model code) to something you can more easily match with DrivePool.
If you don't use drive letters for your poolpart drives, you can mount them to a path in Windows Disk Manager (e.g. c:\disks\1, c:\disks\2, c:\disks\3, etc) and both Scanner and DrivePool will show that path instead of the drive letter.
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Hi Expo,
Where it says "Manage Pool" (about halfway down, left side), click that and then "File protection" and then "Folder duplication".
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That's fine. The thing to avoid is any risk of recursion - e.g. if you've got a drive mounted as a path on another drive, never add the latter drive to a pool that includes the former drive. So in this case you should make sure you never add your C:\ drive as a disk to either pool.
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Hi priyan, sorry for the late reply. If it keeps getting stuck on those same % for those same drives even after restarting or rebooting, I'd be suspecting those drives are faulty. If it gets stuck at changing % it might be bus or power related (e.g. if they're USB drives).
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Hi Korok, I'll have a go at answering:
On 4/3/2025 at 1:44 AM, Korok said:#1 I liked the option to be able to Swap an old drive with a new one in Drive Bender.
Not just adding the new drive to the Pool, but First Move all Data from OldDrive to NewDrive, then remove old drive, then Balance the complete system.
A direct replacement of the old one.
I would like to have this option even more for DrivePool, as I can here set specific folders that should be saved on a specific drive.
What happens to that folder when I remove that drive? Will the files be moved to any other drive? (Delete the rule for location).
Do I have to create all these location rules again on the new drive?
It would be great if I could swap drives and all these configurations get transfered to the new drive that I replaced to old one with.- There's no "one click"-style option built into DrivePool to do a direct swap between an old and new drive.
- If you remove a drive, files on that drive will be moved to the other drives according to any rules set for those drives or the pool in general.
- You'd have to either (a) update your location rules in advance of removing the drive or (b) update your location rules afterwards. If you have a rule that says files can ONLY go on a particular drive and you remove that drive it will revert to allowing ANY drive (otherwise it'd get stuck) so I'd recommend updating your rules in advance as it will ensure the files go where you want.
On 4/3/2025 at 1:44 AM, Korok said:#2 A question about the Scanner. I can set the interval of days the scanner should check my drives. But I only see the option to set it globally for all drives.
That would mean that all drives will be scanned in 90Days. Than again, all drives in 90Days. And nothing between. Is it not possible to scatter that more.
With a big Pool with many TB, it is a huge task to scan them all, as scanning is not happening in parallel, but only one by one.
From what I saw from the 3 drives I have currently in the system, the scanner checks a little bit on this drive then the other then the other. So it wil probably finsh them all at once.
I woud like it better, if it focus on one drive and then the next. My NAS is turned of most of the time. It can be, that the Scanner fished scanning and then I dont use the NAS for 3 Months. If I then turn it on again it would start all from the beginning. So it would always be scanning when he is on. I already changed the interval to half a year.- If you right-click a disk in the GUI there should be the option "Disk Settings..." which will let you set change some settings just for that disk.
- Also, buried in the Advanced settings for Scanner is the option "ScanMaximumConcurrent" which lets you change how many drives Scanner scans at the same time - but unless it's been updated it may instead be the maximum per controller. E.g. if you set it to 2 and you have five disks on controller A and five disks on controller B it might scan 2 of each at the same time. Haven't tested this recently.
On 4/3/2025 at 1:44 AM, Korok said:#3 How to see what files were lost if a drive breaks. I dont care for the files that have a copy on another drive.
I would just like to know what files are now gone for good. Is there any way or a good tool for that?
As I understand it, DrivePool does not have a database or anything like that to know what files were on the now missing drive.
I never lost a drive on DriveBender, but I think I had read somwere that drivebender will give you a CSV file for the missing files.- Correct, there's no database of files kept in DrivePool. You'd need to find a third-party tool and run it on a regular basis.
On 4/3/2025 at 1:44 AM, Korok said:But it looks like for DrivePool, there is no Original and Copy of it. All are handled as originals.
But to make sure I get it right:
Duplicated = All Files that have 2 or more Copies (Files marked to have duplication)
Unduplicated = File that have only one entity on one drive. (Files set to not have duplications)- That's correct! Any given file simply exists on one (no duplication) or more (duplication) drives.
On 4/3/2025 at 1:44 AM, Korok said:On Bay1 there can be Files that have only one entity and also files that have many copies.
Bay4 only accepts files that are set to have copies. (in this case the file would be saved in Bay1 and Bay4 but not allowed in Bay6)
And Bay6 accepts only the files that will not have any duplications.Did I understand that correct?
If yes, that would mean I block any file that is set to have at least one duplication, to be saved on the drive in Bay6 accordig to my understanding.
What would happen if there is a larg folder (2TB) on Bay6 that had no duplication till now and I now change it to have a duplication.
Will DrivePool remove that folder from Bay6 and save 2TB on Bay1 and 2TB on Bay4? Or will it stay on Bay6 and make the copy on Bay1 or Bay4?- Correct, and while I'm not sure whether it would "duplicate first and move second" or "move first and duplicate second" (I'd guess the former) the end result would be the duplicated files being on both Bay1 and Bay4 and no longer on Bay6.
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DrivePool shouldn't be moving files out of a disk (whether or not Scanner is doing a full disk scan) unless Scanner is actually picking up a warning from that disk that triggers the plugin.
There's no cli or api option; you could make a feature request here.
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Glad it fixed itself!
Each pool should be visible in Windows Disk Manager as a 2048.00 GB NTFS primary partition on a 2048.00 GB Basic disk. Opening the Properties of that partition should show the combined size (used, free, capacity) of the actual drives that form that pool.
The unallocated disk COVECUBECoveFsDisk____ that showed up is the virtual disk failing to be initialised for some reason during boot, though it's (even) weird(er) that it also showed as an initialised version too.
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Manage Pool -> File Protection -> Pool file duplication = lets you set the base pool-wide duplication level.
Manage Pool -> File Protection -> Folder duplication = lets you view and set duplication level (including none) for specific folder(s) (trees) differently from the base pool-wide level.
If you haven't enabled duplication for a pool it won't give you the option to disable it (because there's nothing for it to do).
But if you have enabled duplication and it's still not giving you the option to disable it, that's sus. Close the GUI, run a command prompt as an Administrator and try the command dpcmd reset-duplication-cache p: where p: is the pool you want reset, then open the GUI again and check if it's working properly.
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It's been a looong week.
You could open a support ticket with StableBit or you could manually recreate the pool?
The latter would involve stopping drivepool, renaming all of the hidden poolpart folders on the pool's drives (e.g. putting an x in front of the name), starting drivepool, adding the drives you want to a new pool, stopping drivepool, moving your content* from each drive's old hidden folder into its new hidden folder and starting drivepool again).
*not the system volume information, $recycle.bin or .covefs folders
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I'd suggest contacting StableBit directly (choose "An issue with licensing").
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Hi!
4 hours ago, TareNeko said:My setup has 2 external drives, 8TB and 10TB
36 minutes ago, TareNeko said:I still have the "unusable for duplication 1.82TB" note, which I don't understand,
Any files that took up the last 2TB (1.82TB after formatting) of the 10TB drive couldn't be duplicated onto the 8TB drive because the latter wouldn't have enough space.
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Writing/reading a pool should be close to as fast as doing so with the underlaying drives, so something's broken; ten minutes to open a folder is just flat nope.
If you create a second, new pool on a new drive does it have the same problem?
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Hi arizzi, please see this thread: https://community.covecube.com/index.php?/topic/12577-beware-of-drivepool-corruption-data-leakage-file-deletion-performance-degradation-scenarios-windows-1011/
TLDR, DrivePool's implementation of FileID is persistent across neither reboots nor moves, and increments from zero on the former so collisions are inevitable.
Furthermore, for potential problems with checksums if read striping is not disabled on a duplicated pool see this thread: https://community.covecube.com/index.php?/topic/5414-pool-file-duplication-causing-file-corruption-under-certain-circumstances/
TLDR, to avoid potential checksum/data corruption you should disable Read Striping on any pool that uses duplication.
There is no ETA on a fix.
Removal of 18 TB drive hangs.
in General
Posted
I've seen this a couple of times over the years with large old(er) pools/drives. If I had to make a wild guess I'd suspect the removal process gets stuck while attempting to clean up the empty folders after it's moved all the files, maybe from either a bug (too much folder depth hitting a pathing limit?) or Windows locking a folder when it shouldn't or a broken NTFS ACL somewhere. After double-checking the duplication was in order (it was each time) I removed the "missing" drive and it carried on normally.