Use mdraid to restore a volume after a NAS server wipeout

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I own a NAS, which I'm trying to upgrade by installing - most likely - Debian Stretch on it. In itself that's a relatively straightforward task, but there's one thing I'm a bit uncertain about. My NAS has 2 drives in RAID1 configuration, it's an mdraid setup as far as I can tell and because it's configured by some proprietary software currently running on that NAS I'd like to wipe it clean and start anew. I backed up as much data as I could from the NAS on other media, but there's still some stuff I will no doubt lose if I just wipe everything out "the windowsy way". So I started to explore what I can do with my drives to avoid that loss.



My question is this - is it possible to carry out operations in the following way:



  1. remove one of the drives (let's call it HDD2) from the RAID1 array (does this require any mdraid operations - in theory (marketing theory anyways) the drives in my NAS are hot swappable, but I have not needed to put that assertion to test)

  2. install Debian on a drive that's not part of the RAID array - let's say an SSD. Wipe out the remaining HDD1 drive and partition it to my liking without yet setting it up as a RAID1 array.

  3. put the HDD2 back in, and copy whatever I need from that drive to the newly partitioned HDD1

  4. remove the HDD2 again

  5. configure mdraid as if HDD1 was the sole drive in a RAID1 array, source which any additional drives would be mirrored from.

  6. reinsert HDD2 again, this time expecting mdraid to wipe it out and make it a mirror of HDD1.

Does the above make any sense at all? I'm a software developer and not a sysadmin by trade, so I haven't really done any serious administration, but from a purely logical point of view the above scenario should be feasible. Unless of course there's stuff I don't know.



I know that any such operations come with a risk of data loss, but as I said - I've backed up all I could and even borrowed some drives from friends to be able to hold more, but there's still a fair bit I can't cover. Not life-critical stuff so I'd probably take the risk if there was a chance that the above idea could work out fine.










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    1















    I own a NAS, which I'm trying to upgrade by installing - most likely - Debian Stretch on it. In itself that's a relatively straightforward task, but there's one thing I'm a bit uncertain about. My NAS has 2 drives in RAID1 configuration, it's an mdraid setup as far as I can tell and because it's configured by some proprietary software currently running on that NAS I'd like to wipe it clean and start anew. I backed up as much data as I could from the NAS on other media, but there's still some stuff I will no doubt lose if I just wipe everything out "the windowsy way". So I started to explore what I can do with my drives to avoid that loss.



    My question is this - is it possible to carry out operations in the following way:



    1. remove one of the drives (let's call it HDD2) from the RAID1 array (does this require any mdraid operations - in theory (marketing theory anyways) the drives in my NAS are hot swappable, but I have not needed to put that assertion to test)

    2. install Debian on a drive that's not part of the RAID array - let's say an SSD. Wipe out the remaining HDD1 drive and partition it to my liking without yet setting it up as a RAID1 array.

    3. put the HDD2 back in, and copy whatever I need from that drive to the newly partitioned HDD1

    4. remove the HDD2 again

    5. configure mdraid as if HDD1 was the sole drive in a RAID1 array, source which any additional drives would be mirrored from.

    6. reinsert HDD2 again, this time expecting mdraid to wipe it out and make it a mirror of HDD1.

    Does the above make any sense at all? I'm a software developer and not a sysadmin by trade, so I haven't really done any serious administration, but from a purely logical point of view the above scenario should be feasible. Unless of course there's stuff I don't know.



    I know that any such operations come with a risk of data loss, but as I said - I've backed up all I could and even borrowed some drives from friends to be able to hold more, but there's still a fair bit I can't cover. Not life-critical stuff so I'd probably take the risk if there was a chance that the above idea could work out fine.










    share|improve this question


























      1












      1








      1








      I own a NAS, which I'm trying to upgrade by installing - most likely - Debian Stretch on it. In itself that's a relatively straightforward task, but there's one thing I'm a bit uncertain about. My NAS has 2 drives in RAID1 configuration, it's an mdraid setup as far as I can tell and because it's configured by some proprietary software currently running on that NAS I'd like to wipe it clean and start anew. I backed up as much data as I could from the NAS on other media, but there's still some stuff I will no doubt lose if I just wipe everything out "the windowsy way". So I started to explore what I can do with my drives to avoid that loss.



      My question is this - is it possible to carry out operations in the following way:



      1. remove one of the drives (let's call it HDD2) from the RAID1 array (does this require any mdraid operations - in theory (marketing theory anyways) the drives in my NAS are hot swappable, but I have not needed to put that assertion to test)

      2. install Debian on a drive that's not part of the RAID array - let's say an SSD. Wipe out the remaining HDD1 drive and partition it to my liking without yet setting it up as a RAID1 array.

      3. put the HDD2 back in, and copy whatever I need from that drive to the newly partitioned HDD1

      4. remove the HDD2 again

      5. configure mdraid as if HDD1 was the sole drive in a RAID1 array, source which any additional drives would be mirrored from.

      6. reinsert HDD2 again, this time expecting mdraid to wipe it out and make it a mirror of HDD1.

      Does the above make any sense at all? I'm a software developer and not a sysadmin by trade, so I haven't really done any serious administration, but from a purely logical point of view the above scenario should be feasible. Unless of course there's stuff I don't know.



      I know that any such operations come with a risk of data loss, but as I said - I've backed up all I could and even borrowed some drives from friends to be able to hold more, but there's still a fair bit I can't cover. Not life-critical stuff so I'd probably take the risk if there was a chance that the above idea could work out fine.










      share|improve this question
















      I own a NAS, which I'm trying to upgrade by installing - most likely - Debian Stretch on it. In itself that's a relatively straightforward task, but there's one thing I'm a bit uncertain about. My NAS has 2 drives in RAID1 configuration, it's an mdraid setup as far as I can tell and because it's configured by some proprietary software currently running on that NAS I'd like to wipe it clean and start anew. I backed up as much data as I could from the NAS on other media, but there's still some stuff I will no doubt lose if I just wipe everything out "the windowsy way". So I started to explore what I can do with my drives to avoid that loss.



      My question is this - is it possible to carry out operations in the following way:



      1. remove one of the drives (let's call it HDD2) from the RAID1 array (does this require any mdraid operations - in theory (marketing theory anyways) the drives in my NAS are hot swappable, but I have not needed to put that assertion to test)

      2. install Debian on a drive that's not part of the RAID array - let's say an SSD. Wipe out the remaining HDD1 drive and partition it to my liking without yet setting it up as a RAID1 array.

      3. put the HDD2 back in, and copy whatever I need from that drive to the newly partitioned HDD1

      4. remove the HDD2 again

      5. configure mdraid as if HDD1 was the sole drive in a RAID1 array, source which any additional drives would be mirrored from.

      6. reinsert HDD2 again, this time expecting mdraid to wipe it out and make it a mirror of HDD1.

      Does the above make any sense at all? I'm a software developer and not a sysadmin by trade, so I haven't really done any serious administration, but from a purely logical point of view the above scenario should be feasible. Unless of course there's stuff I don't know.



      I know that any such operations come with a risk of data loss, but as I said - I've backed up all I could and even borrowed some drives from friends to be able to hold more, but there's still a fair bit I can't cover. Not life-critical stuff so I'd probably take the risk if there was a chance that the above idea could work out fine.







      raid raid1 nas






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      edited Apr 4 at 9:43









      Rui F Ribeiro

      42k1483142




      42k1483142










      asked Mar 11 at 19:35









      ChrisChris

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