Freenas mini 1 (fn1) stopped running. Import single mirrored drive from fn1 to a new fn2?

[trstone]

Hello fellow forum members,

I'm hoping to draw from your collective wisdom and guidance in figuring out the best course of action to take.

Hardware:

fn1:
[] Freenas Mini from ixsystems.com purchased through Amazon https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00EQJ1BTU/?tag=ozlp-20 . Nothing has been upgraded. Running FreeNAS-9.3-STABLE-201604150515 64-bit (was going to upgrade after transfer to fn2)
[] 2 6TB WD Red drives installed (also purchased through Amazon https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00LO3KR96/?tag=ozlp-20).
[] 2 empty drive slots.
[] Mirrored configuration.
[] 80% full.
[] no disk encryption (I'm pretty sure they are not encrypted).

fn2:
[] Freenas Mini from ixsystems.com purchased through Amazon https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00EQJ1BTU/?tag=ozlp-20 . No upgrades added.
[] 4 6TB WD Red drives installed (also purchased through Amazon https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00LO3KR96/?tag=ozlp-20).
[] 0 empty drive slots.
[] Not setup. Just pulled out of the box and installed the 4 6TB drives. Never be turned on.


Challenge:
Preparing to export/import for data transfer. Before I could get started. Linux computer using nfs with freenas mini (fn1) stops working. I go to investigate at fn1. Vga display shows a full screen of data but before I could take a picture with my phone, the power goes out. I don't recall what was on the screen before power outage. Power comes back on later and I attempt to boot fn1. It attempts to start up, sounds like it is working, the two drives have solid blue lights on .. but nothing on the vga display and unable to login to the web gui.

I've read through the users guide (manual). I've also read through many postings on this forum. This challenge seems to be different than the posts I've read.

My plan before this happened was to migrate the data from fn1 to fn2. Not sure on the best course of action at this point. Import one of fn1's mirrored disk to fn2? If so, any recommendations?

Any advise you can offer would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you

P.S. the participants that were added were based on some other similar import posts. Please forgive me if I added incorrectly.

 

[Sakuru]

Are you sure the monitor is OK? If it is, trying booting FN1 without the hard drives.

 

[trstone]

Thank you Sakuru for your reply.

Good question. I took both drives out of fn1 and connected vga to a different monitor that I know is working. I then rebooted.

After reboot:
No signal is detected on different monitor (same as first monitor).
One solid green light is on next to the light bulb symbol in the front and the ethernet cable is blinking in the back.
No web gui access.

 

[SweetAndLow]

Plug drives into fn2 and see if it boots? Then import your volume from the gui.

 

[trstone]

Thank you SweetAndLow for your reply.

I just want to make sure I'm understanding you correctly.
Put both drives from fn1 into fn2 and import those volumes from the gui?
Is it safe to put both in? They are a mirrored copy of each other.
Wouldn't it be safer to just put one of them in and attempt the import (in case something goes wrong)?
Just asking cause I don't know and I really don't want to loose the data.
Thank you.

 

[Sakuru]

Wouldn't it be safer to just put one of them in and attempt the import (in case something goes wrong)?

It's not very dangerous, but I suppose you are correct. Connect 1 drive and boot up, then post the output of "zpool import" in code tags please (the Insert... button to the left of the Drafts button)

 

[Mirfster]

Not trying to pass you off, but have you contacted IXSystems?

 

[Sakuru]

Not trying to pass you off, but have you contacted IXSystems?

Does the Mini come with support? I dug around a bit, but I couldn't find anything.

 

[Mirfster]

Not really sure, but I would assume that there would at least be some type of limited support on anything purchased from IX. Course, I could be wrong.

 

[Sakuru]

Yeah, definitely worth a shot.

 

[trstone]

Thank you Sakuru and Mirfster for your replies.

I put both of fn1's drives into fn2 and it booted up.

It didn't ask me to set the root password once booted up. I attempted to use fn1's password and get the "Your username and password didn't match. Please try again" message. So I switched to the vga attached display. Plugged in a wireless keyboard/mouse into fn2. Selected option 7 to reset the root password.

Afterwards, I was able to login via web gui.

Once logged into web gui, clicked on "Shell" on left hand side and typed in

------------------------------------------------------------------
[root@freenas ~]# zpool import
pool: main
id: 36622769582752285
state: The pool was last accessed by another system.
action: The pool can be imported using its name or numeric identifier and the '-f' flag.
see: http://illumos.org/msg/ZFS-8000-EY

config:

main
mirror-0
gptid/3457803f-874d-11e4-8a86-d050992ecf ONLINE
gptid/351f2556-874d-11e4-8a86-d050992ecf ONLINE

pool: tank
id: 10796113054024274
state: UNAVAIL
status: The pool wsa last accessed by another system.
action: The pool cannot be imported due to damaged devices or data.
see: http://illumos.org/msg/ZFS-8000-EY
config:

tank UNAVAIL insufficient replicas
1693469631398662142 UNAVAIL cannot open
[root@freenas ~]#
------------------------------------------------------------------

The question is can this import succeed? If so, how should I proceed?
Thank you

 

[Robert Trevellyan]

Looks like this should do it for 'main':

1. At command line: zpool import -f main (to override "last accessed by another system")
2. At command line: zpool export main (to tidy up)
3. From the GUI: import the pool

Caveat: I don't know what's going on with 'tank'.

 

[trstone]

Thank you Robert Trevellyan for your reply.

Your advise was exactly what was needed!

I attempted first using the commands in fn2 to use only 1 of fn1's drives and was given a degraded message. This is confusing to me since the drives are a mirror of each other. So, I took the risk, and attempted using the commands in fn2 with both fn1's drives (along with the other two empty drives). After running the commands in fn2 (as well as the import in the gui), main was restored :) I also extended the mirror with the other 2 empty drives. I then created nfs share and mounted it on my main linux system.

The only issue I had was with the permissions. After re-reading the 9.3 guide 10 sharing section, I set owner to nobody and group to nogroup. After the mount, I was unable to create files in the /mnt/main nfs share. This is confusing since the permissions on /mnt/main are for nobody/nogroup (owner/group) to read, write, and execute and other is set to only read and execute. Also, set permission recursively even though the picture doesn't show it.

The /mnt/main nfs share is also set to Mapall User to nobody and Mapall Group to nogroup. The only way I go this to work was by permitting sudo on both groups nobody and nogroup. I know this is a security issue and would be interested in any guidance offered.

Also any idea what happened to fn1? I would like to get it back up and running. I figure it can be used as a backup. I don't believe ixsystems.com will support it (about 4 years old). I will check. I'm pretty sure its not the power supply. It just won't boot.

Thank you for any guidance and assistance.

 

[gpsguy]

If fn1 is ~4 years old, it's the "old mini" that didn't support ECC RAM.

That being said, if you think it's a motherboard issue, I believe it used an Intel BOXDQ67EPB3. They can still be found on eBay.

 

[trstone]

Thank you gpsguy for the reply.

Feels like I've had fn1 (Freenas mini) for years. After digging up the invoice, it was purchased on 12/15/2014. So it's almost two years old. So it does have ECC RAM (8GB DDR3 1600Mhz ECC Unbuffered). Please forgive me for this.

ixsystems.com warranty is "1 year beginning on the date of invoice".

I'm still going to contact them and see what they think the issue is.

Anyone have any thoughts on what it could be?

 

[Robert Trevellyan]

When I set up datasets for sharing via NFS, I set the dataset ownership to the appropriate user/group, and the NFS mapall user and group to match. The obvious thing I do differently from you is not using nobody/nogroup.

Also any idea what happened to fn1?

I agree that a failing PSU is most likely. The fact that it delivers some power doesn't disprove this. It could also be the motherboard. Less likely, but possible, is the CPU or some other component.

 

[trstone]

Thank you Robert Trevellyan for your reply.

NFS
I maybe setup wrong. I re-read section 10.2.1 of freenas 9.3 guide and realized that by using the nobody group that I'm actually turning root privileges off. I'm going to set up different groups and test.

fn1
PSU was my first thought and it makes since. I'm going to look into purchasing a new one and see what happens. Worst case scenario, I have a backup PSU :) I hope it's not the mother board. Looks like I need to look into a UPS to attempt to keep this kind of thing from happening again. I also sent an email to iXsystems to get their take on it.

Thanks for the help and information.

 

[cyberjock]

For those that read this thread, iXsystems only provides hardware support for FreeNAS Minis. There are no software support options available at this time.