Another FreeNAS crash - similar to rds13, but different

[TB4217]

Hi Forum

As this is my maiden post, please excuse my Noobiness and other poor attributes.

From the previous post of rds13 and the likely solution, as well as a similar post of 4 years ago, I believe I may have a faulty USB stick boot-drive. However this is further complicated by a sad tale of events, none the least of which is my lack of any real knowledge or ability in this arena.

I built my FreeNAS about two-and-a-half years ago by carefully following the excellent instructions, since I have no Linux, Python, or other OS level skills whatsoever. (Apart from some old-school MSDOS commands, I have done nothing but point and click in GUIs for the past 30 years). Once I initially configured the storage, I haven't had a need to do anything other than copy files and stream media, so don't really know where to start to fix this.

Yesterday we had a half-day power outage (UPS was only rated at 15 minutes). By the time we arrived home, the power was restored and everything looked OK, however today I could not see my FreeNAS in my Mac's Finder.

It was powered-on, so I went to the Web interface shortcut in my browser (Chrome), only to connect to my Receiver instead, so what was previously a static IP address for the FreeNAS had apparently been re-allocated to the Receiver. I tracked down the new IP address the router had allocated to the FreeNAS, but when I tried to connect, got the following error (see "connect_error.png" attached).

After connecting a monitor and keyboard to the Server to use the console, it appeared to be endlessly scrolling "mangled entry" errors, interspersed with some other details, which I had to resort to photographing so I could see what they were (see "console_error" attached). Apparently Ctrl-C doesn't work to stop the scrolling. I have power-cycled the Server while using the console, and the POST and BIOS messages all look normal, but everything turns to pot when FreeNAS attempts to load. After powering-down the Server, I removed the USB stick boot drive, but cannot read it on my Mac or Windows VM (they both just want to re-format it).

My immediate questions are -

1. is there any way I can retrieve anything useful from the USB drive - like a config file or similar?
2. can I download and install a later version of FreeNAS on another USB stick?
3. will all my data and jails and plug-ins still be OK if I install another version of FreeNAS?
4. is there anyone out there who might be able to provide a solution in simple easy steps that someone like me might be able to follow?

Thankyou for reading, and any assistance gratefully appreciated.

 

[Robert Trevellyan]

1. Possibly. What you want is the config database, unless you have a backup of it elsewhere. You need to figure out if the boot device was UFS or ZFS, which depends on which version of FreeNAS you were running.
2. Yes, but you're probably better off installing the same version you were running before. Once you have your system working properly, step through the upgrades to the current stable release, backing up the config database before each upgrade.
3. Your data should be fine. The contents of jails and plugins should be fine, but if you're unable to recover the config database, you may have some configuring to do to get them running.
4. Step one: upgrade your RAM to the 8GB minimum requirement ;)

 

[TB4217]

1. Possibly. What you want is the config database, unless you have a backup of it elsewhere. You need to figure out if the boot device was UFS or ZFS, which depends on which version of FreeNAS you were running.
2. Yes, but you're probably better off installing the same version you were running before. Once you have your system working properly, step through the upgrades to the current stable release, backing up the config database before each upgrade.
3. Your data should be fine. The contents of jails and plugins should be fine, but if you're unable to recover the config database, you may have some configuring to do to get them running.
4. Step one: upgrade your RAM to the 8GB minimum requirement ;)

Thanks Robert

I have upgraded RAM to 16GB, and acquired 2 new 16GB USB Flash Drives.

I couldn't find any incremental versions of FreeNAS, so I went straight to 9.10.1-U4. I installed it on 1 of the new 16GB USBs and it ran fine, but I didn't know how or where to find the config on the old 8GB USB that had been corrupted to cause the original problem.

In reviewing the documentation, I came across the upgrade option, so thought I would take a chance and try to upgrade the 8GB, and thankfully it has worked, so I now have the latest stable release, together with my original config, and all storage looks fine. I will just need to work through updating plugins etc later, but my immediate concern now, is that an alert has appeared on the GUI - "CRITICAL: 21 Dec 2016, 11:39 p.m. - Device: /dev/da0 [SAT], 1 Currently unreadable (pending) sectors".

Could you please suggest the best method to save and transfer the config from the failing 8GB drive to the new 16GB drive? Thanks again.

 

[SweetAndLow]

Your last paragraph is confusing. You said you got the 8gb stick working but then ask how to get the config file. You download the config file using the gui, under system settings.

Or you can try plugging in the bad USB into the freenas system and poke around on the cli and see if it mounts and can be read.

Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk

 

[TB4217]

Your last paragraph is confusing. You said you got the 8gb stick working but then ask how to get the config file. You download the config file using the gui, under system settings.

Or you can try plugging in the bad USB into the freenas system and poke around on the cli and see if it mounts and can be read.

Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk

Thanks Sweet'nLow. Sometimes it's just knowing where to look.

Have downloaded the config now, and will upload it to the new USB Flash Drive when I reboot. (Just waiting for iTunes to catch up after a week off the air)

 

[Robert Trevellyan]

Sounds like you're in pretty good shape.

an alert has appeared on the GUI

Start by looking at the hard drive troubleshooting guide in the Resources section. Then start a new thread with any further questions.