SOLVED Adding new hard drive to the pool/volume

[kamhoe]

Hi there,

I have been using Plex in FreeNAS 9.3 for about a year now and I usually do the settings through the GUI and I am not good with coding/script.

My current hard drives are ZFS: Volume1 - 1x3TB & Volume2 - 4x5TB (RaidZ1)

I am going to remove the Volume1 - 1x3TB and add another 5TB and recreate a new single Volume together with the current 4x5TB as RaidZ1. I am planning to transfer out about 6TB media into some empty USB hard drives and transfer the data back after the new Volume is ready.

My questions are:

1. What is fastest method to transfer data between internal ZFS and external USB drive? Can I format external as ZFS and create a Volume name and transfer out and transfer in later?

2. My Plex jail is located in Volume1 - 1x3TB and I need to move the Plex database into new 5x5TB. I have a cron job that backup Plex database from time to time. Can I use the backup and restore it into new 5x5TB? Do I need to create a new Plex jail 1st before restore?

3. Since FreeNAS 10 is in beta version and I assume it will have a stable release version later. Should I update to 9.10 now or hold until 10?

Thank you and I appreciate all your comments and suggestions.

 

[nojohnny101]

I'll take a stab at the ones I know:

2. My Plex jail is located in Volume1 - 1x3TB and I need to move the Plex database into new 5x5TB. I have a cron job that backup Plex database from time to time. Can I use the backup and restore it into new 5x5TB? Do I need to create a new Plex jail 1st before restore?

I've done this personally multiple times and yes, backup your plex database and then you can create fresh jail install (i use this excellent guide: Plex Jail Install) and then stop the jail, copy of your database, then restart the jail and everything should be fine. Note you will have to reconfigure your server side plex settings if you don't save those (they are a separate file than the database file).

3. Since FreeNAS 10 is in beta version and I assume it will have a stable release version later. Should I update to 9.10 now or hold until 10?

This is just a personal opinion, but I would go with 9.10.x because no one really knows when FreeNAS 10 comes out and even when it does, and even with the excellent beta testing period, there will be bugs to work out. Which is to be expected with any major overhaul. So unless you enjoy fooling around, troubleshooting, and are fairly advanced at FreeNAS, I see no disadvantage to running 9.10.x for a while until you have the time and energy to move to FreeNAS 10 (once it comes out). Just my 2 cents.

 

[m0nkey_]

If you're brave enough to actually use USB temporary, you can create a new single drive pool and use zfs send | zfs recv to transfer the data. This will bring over everything, including permissions, attributes, etc.

 

[GBillR]

Hi there,

My current hard drives are ZFS: Volume1 - 1x3TB & Volume2 - 4x5TB (RaidZ1)

I am going to remove the Volume1 - 1x3TB and add another 5TB and recreate a new single Volume together with the current 4x5TB as RaidZ1. I am planning to transfer out about 6TB media into some empty USB hard drives and transfer the data back after the new Volume is ready.

My questions are:

1. What is fastest method to transfer data between internal ZFS and external USB drive? Can I format external as ZFS and create a Volume name and transfer out and transfer in later?

Do you have 1 pool or 2? I am trying to figure out how you need to move 6TB of data out if Volume 1 is only 3TB...

If they are separate pools, there is a way to replicate a snapshot over to the other pool, and then send it back once you have rebuilt the new pool... assuming you have the space to spare. Search the forum and you should find it.

EDIT: Would this work for you.

 

[kamhoe]

Do you have 1 pool or 2? I am trying to figure out how you need to move 6TB of data out if Volume 1 is only 3TB...

If they are separate pools, there is a way to replicate a snapshot over to the other pool, and then send it back once you have rebuilt the new pool... assuming you have the space to spare. Search the forum and you should find it.

EDIT: Would this work for you.

I have 2 pool; 1st pool as Volume1, only 1x3TB and 2nd pool as Volume2 that has 4x5TB. My motherboard only supports 5 SATA and I have to remove the 1x3TB and replace with another 5TB. Then, I will create a single pool that contains 5x5TB. Therefore, I have to transfer the data out 1st before I destroy the Volume2 data.

 

[kamhoe]

If you're brave enough to actually use USB temporary, you can create a new single drive pool and use zfs send | zfs recv to transfer the data. This will bring over everything, including permissions, attributes, etc.

I have to divide the data into 2-3 USB drives because my external drives are 3TB (~2.x TB).

 

[GBillR]

I have to divide the data into 2-3 USB drives because my external drives are 3TB (~2.x TB).

So you need to essentially wipe both pools and create a new one right?

I think you're going to find that with usb drives, your best best is going to be to do the transfer over the ethernet using a networked machine... unless you have a single usb drive that is big enough for all of your data, I wouldn't begin to try connecting it directly to the FreeNAS box. Transfer over the network will be slow, but is probably your best option... either manually with a file manager, or with rsync.

 

[kamhoe]

I'll take a stab at the ones I know:

I've done this personally multiple times and yes, backup your plex database and then you can create fresh jail install (i use this excellent guide: Plex Jail Install) and then stop the jail, copy of your database, then restart the jail and everything should be fine. Note you will have to reconfigure your server side plex settings if you don't save those (they are a separate file than the database file).


This is just a personal opinion, but I would go with 9.10.x because no one really knows when FreeNAS 10 comes out and even when it does, and even with the excellent beta testing period, there will be bugs to work out. Which is to be expected with any major overhaul. So unless you enjoy fooling around, troubleshooting, and are fairly advanced at FreeNAS, I see no disadvantage to running 9.10.x for a while until you have the time and energy to move to FreeNAS 10 (once it comes out). Just my 2 cents.

I am using this script to backup my Plex database

cd /mnt/VolumeData/jails/plexmediaserver_1/var/db/ && tar cvfz /mnt/VolumeData/Backup/FreeNAS/Plex/plexdata.tar.gz plexdata`date +"%Y-%m-%d-%h-%m"`

What is the Plex setting file/folder that I also need to backup and restore?

 

[nojohnny101]

this article references everything:
https://support.plex.tv/hc/en-us/articles/201370363-Move-an-Install-to-Another-System

specifically, the preference files are located in /mnt/tank/jail/plex/usr/local/plexdata/Plex_Media_Server/

 

[nojohnny101]

I'll echo what @GBillR said. I would access the data on the freenas box by mounting a share from another computer and then transferring to the USB drive(s) that way.

ZFS does not generally like USB.