NAS HDD double failure

[MCDU2]

Have been having problems with a Netgear Readynas Duo dropping off the home network when I tried to transfer reasonably large files eg: an Mp4 movie file. It would drop the connection and then I was unable to ping the NAS. The only way to get it back online was to reset and reboot it.

On reviewing the log files Netgear Tech Support reckon it is due to both HDDs having bad sectors and about to fail completely.

I have had it about 2-3 years and from memory I think both HDDs were brought at about the same time as part of an offer where you got the 2nd one free. So presumably they would be from the same batch although I am feeling very unlucky as it seems remote that these things can fail in a relatively short period of time.

I see that there are manufacturer software solutions for testing the HDDs, in my case a pair of 2TB WD Green sata drives.

Question is if I throw them into my pc and run the tests and they come back okay will a reformat of the drives make them useable again in the NAS? I am wondering whether a few power outages that we have had over the past couple of years was no good for the drives and a simple reformat will make them good to go again.

I had a spare 2TB HDD drive lying around that I was going to put into my pc which I hotswapped into the NAS and so far so good. After it resynced with the remaining drive I transferred across 14gb of stuff and it didn't drop the connection at all. Would be good to save the two "old" drives if there is some way.

Cheers

[Bushfiva]

I's probably dump the drives and start over, since drives are so cheap now. I think you have a 3-year warranty on the drives themselves, right?

Yes, manufacturers have their own test utilities which you can find on the various web sites. Also, there are plenty of utilities that will read the SMART data off a drive so you can see what the problems are. Acronis has a free one, as do many others.

I don't know much about the Netgear stuff, I think there are two possible drive formats neither of which are readable on Windows, so whatever you do you'll be reformatting drives on the PC to do much useful.

If SMART shows no errors, then I guess you can re-use the drives, re-initialising them once again in the NAS. But if one of my drives so much as farts funny, I bin it.

[Saab Dastard]

Test the drives with WD diagnostic software (downloadable). If there's any errors, you can check if the drives are still in warranty by entering the serial number here:

WD Support / Warranty Services / Warranty Services for End User Customers (http://support.wdc.com/warranty/index_end.asp?lang=en)

I've had several drives replaced (WD, Seagate) over the years, so it's definitely worth checking.

If they are out of warranty and have errors - you're out of luck.

Sd

[MCDU2]

"In limited warranty" it says so yippee.

Gotta love the interweb don't ya! Thanks for that SAAB. Will run the tests and take it from there. Have already downloaded the WD diagnostics.

[MG23]

Test the drives with WD diagnostic software (downloadable).

I would, however, add that I have a problematic WD 3TB Green drive in my gaming PC and the diagnostic software claims it's all working perfectly fine. So it won't catch everything.

[Milo Minderbinder]

this may possibly indicate a bigger problem


Western Digital RE4-GP 2TB Drive Problems | Pieter Viljoen's Blog (http://blog.insanegenius.com/2009/09/21/western-digital-re4-gp-2tb-drive/)

I seem to remember those early green 2TB drives had other issues as well....can't remember the details, but I have vague recollections of a firmware flash being required
could be worth looking on the WD site to see if there are any updates there.

Having said that, trusting a drive over three years old with key data is iffy

[MCDU2]

Thanks for that link, it got me thinking further about these drives. Have been digging around and it would appear that the WD Red series are best designed for use in a NAS. I don't remember them being around when I purchased the NAS and from memory I think I got a deal with a free green drive thrown in as well.

Interestingly enough the Green Caviar variety such as mine are still listed on the Netgear website as being compatible. As mine are still under warranty I am going to attempt to get them replaced with Red drives and offer to pay the difference. Fingers crossed.

[Bushfiva]

Well yes, Red are rated 24x7 while Green aren't, but I'm not sure how many people actually take note of that spec. I don't, and I never turn my stuff off. At one point the issue with the Green drives was either head parking or thermal recalibration after 8 seconds of no activity (I can't remember which), so in a NAS the Green drives would actually be doing a lot more head movement to limits than a Red drive.

In your specific case, Red drives would have given you far better performance while they failed. Over simplifying drastically, they would give up on a bad sector after a few seconds rather than battling on for up to 2 minutes, giving the RAID software an earlier opportunity to do its thing. You'd get better performance during the death spiral. If it were the only drive in my computer, I might prefer the Green approach. (But I, personally, wouldn't).

[MG23]

Well yes, Red are rated 24x7 while Green aren't, but I'm not sure how many people actually take note of that spec. I don't, and I never turn my stuff off.

My 1.5TB Green drive has been on for about 28,000 hours so far and is still going OK. I didn't see problems until the 3TB drives; I had to replace one because of bad blocks and another because it causes Windows to lock up for long periods when reading from it.