Can I install FreeNAS 8 over older version

[rogueakula]

Alright, I am brand new to FreeNAS and have just relieved (today) as our organizations LAN administrator. The previous admin was showing me the GUI interface when it started acting funny and locked up. He powered the box off by holding down the power button and then promptly left. Now it will not boot in any mode. It will get to the point where it will do a file check then stop. I have downloaded FreeNAS 8 but I want to make sure that if I install it I won't lose all of the documents that we have on the server. What is my best way ahead? I have no knowledge of FreeNAS and very little Unix experience. Please help me from being fired from my job on my first day. Thanks.

Josh

 

[praecorloth]

That is quite the icky situation. First things first. What are the last couple of lines displayed when the system stops?


Now on to your question. You can install FreeNAS over FreeNAS without having to worry about your data so long as you DO NOT create a new volume. What you'll want to do (when we get there) is Import a volume. That's where things get tricky. If that old version of FreeNAS is .7, then I believe FreeNAS 8 cannot import the volumes (assuming they're ZFS). Do you know what the old version was? If not, the failure mode is you try to import the volume(s) and FreeNAS says "error importing volume" and then you try a different version. But if you would, get us the last couple of lines from when the system is stopped. It worries me that it's doing a file system check and then freezes.