N7700 Teething Issues

[currie021]

Hi there,

I'm new around here and have a few problems and hopefully some of you guys may be able to help!

I have just purchased 2x N7700 units with 1.5TB drives and also 2x external eSATA 1.5TB drives to compliment..

My intention is to use these in a HD outside broadcast environment to back up large amounts of video to cut down on tape costs.

I have set my NAS connected to a netgear gs724ts switch along with a high spec MacPro, an XPPro machine and a number of EVS machines [live slow motion machines] Essentially the EVS machines record live camera feeds continuously and when video clips are created with their proprietary controllers XML is created to tell the XP based machine to back up this data to the NAS

I have configured the switch and all machines to run jumbo frames @9000 and all appears to work OK - except i cannot get a transfer rate of over 50MB/s - this is alright but the faster i can go the less time i will be there at the end of the tx backing up to disk.

I am going to try the link aggregation 802.3ab tomorrow to try to maximise bandwidth but i feel that i should be able to get a better transfer speed than this through a 1Gb/s setup bearing in mind the cables are all brand new Cat6 and none longer than 15m

I have read Yvon's post claiming nearly 100MB/s and hopefully with some pointers i can achieve this.

Finally my other problem is the eSATA drives and connection to the N7700 - I was under the impression that being a 3Gb/s interface i should be able to back up data from the RAID array to the external drive at good speed but it appears to only transfer at a rate similar to that of the other file transfers. i think that copying the data in a 'drag and drop' fashion in an explorer window is effectively routing the data from the RAID to the XP machine and then writing to the eSATA, this is not good so i need to find a way of setting up a file transfer internally - *maybe through the browser*?? to save time - as 1TB takes a while to backup at 50MB/s!

I hope somebody can help,

Kind Regards, John

[peterfu]

For internally transferring files there are two possibilities.
1) do it via console commands (You need the modules SHD and SYSUSER)
2) do it via the module PHPFILEMGR (that gives You a browser window)

All modules You need can be found on the thecus wiki : http://www.onbeat.dk/thecus/index.php/N7700_Module_List

Don't forget to unzip the downloaded packages before using them - the module itself is within the zip archive and is called <modulename>.mod.

br
Peter

[currie021]

that is excellent, i have installed PHPfilemanager and it looks good, do you have any kind of setup guide, i only have a basic folder system but cant seem to get onto my RAID.

help is very appreciated but i really need to get it working by tomorrow!!!

[GoNz0]

go to the config and change the folder path in File Manager Root

[currie021]

Right, i have worked out my root and can see all my files but cant seem to select any so that i can copy them from one place to anyother, could this be to do with the permissions?

some of them have permissions 0 and others 777 but none of them are selectable..


EDIT - i have just realised i can select and move folders but not the files in them.. could this be becaause they are being copied from an XP based machine giving them the wrong permissions..

Also - i have noticed it doesnt seem to recognise some large files.. i have one that is 1.2GB - this is fine, another is 14GB and this will not show up with details...

[currie021]

I have also installed the sysuser ans sshd modules..

if somebody could give me some basic instructions as to what to use to log on with and how to copy a folder full of files from the RAID to the eSATA that would be awesome!

[peterfu]

There seems to be a problem with large files in PHPFILEMGR - have not figured out exactly what it is - and this causes also the problems with the selection of files in a folder with large files.

I would not recommend to use console commands if You don't have at least basic linux knowledge.

br
Peter

[currie021]

well, i did a bit of research today and off the mac terminal i sucessfully logged into the 7700 and went up and down the file tree.

the one thing i found suprising was that even though i typed for instance

/raid0/data/foldername

the prompt came back appearing to be from whatever the units called@/root:-)

so i never seemed to be on a specific level.

hopefully with a bit more mooching i will be shiftin files like a good un tomorrow.

what programs do you all use on a windows platform? i found one called 'putty' but was wondering if telnet supported it.?!

i assume there isnt any kind of built in gui file browser that i can log into?

cheers. jon

[GoNz0]

WinSCP is a little better as its got a GUI, and i use putty and WinSCP on the thecus with the SSH module

[peterfu]

Hi Jon,
putty is a common ssh tool on windoes platforms.
Be carfull doing commands on the console - and no, there is no graphical user interface on this level - You may destroy or at least damage Your system, so it will be a hard work to recover it.

Search for linux commands on the net and get familiar wth them

Some examples:

cd .... this is the command to change into directories (change directory)
cd /raid/data/foldername .... this changes You to the directory /raid/data/foldername
ls .... this gives You a list of files and folders in the directory
ls -lsa ..... shows more details on files
cp <source> <destination> .... copies the source to the destinitaion
cp -R <sourcedirectory> <destiniationdirectory> ... copies the source directory and all files within to the destination directory

br
Peter

[currie021]

well i have successfully moved 70GB around various places with no worries today. lovely stuff, thanks for the help!

one question.

i have 2 eSATA drives..

one of them i wrote all my data from the first job to and the other sat in a box.

at the eng of the night i gave the client the full drive and plugged the empty drive in.

i have just looked at the drive and appear to have all the data i wrote to the other drive present. my first thought was -ive been an idiot and given them the wrong drive.. BUT when i look in the drive info it shows power on hours as 0.

so from this im now certain i have the correct/new drive but why is the data there? does the thecus build it as part of its internal raid?

[GoNz0]

have you refreshed the drive to make sure ?

[peterfu]

Are You sure You have Your data on the eSATA drive ?
OK - some commands to check it.
put in the command mount - the ouput should be following:

root@127.0.0.1:~# mount
rootfs on / type rootfs (rw)
/dev/root on / type ext2 (rw)
/dev/hda5 on /app type ext3 (rw,noatime)
tmpfs on /tmpfs type tmpfs (rw)
/dev/hda6 on /logfs type ext2 (rw)
proc on /proc type proc (rw,nodiratime)
sysfs on /sys type sysfs (rw)
none on /dev/pts type devpts (rw)
/dev/cloop0 on /lib/modules type ext2 (ro)
/dev/cloop1 on /opt type ext2 (ro)
/dev/cloop2 on /img/www type ext2 (ro)
/dev/cloop3 on /img/bin type ext2 (ro)
/dev/cloop4 on /lib/security type ext2 (ro)
/dev/cloop5 on /usr/share/zoneinfo type ext2 (ro)
sunrpc on /tmpfs/var/lib/nfs/rpc_pipefs type rpc_pipefs (rw)
nfsd on /proc/fs/nfsd type nfsd (rw)
/dev/vg0/lv0 on /raid0/data type ext3 (rw,noatime)
/dev/vg0/syslv on /raid0/sys type ext3 (rw,noatime)
/dev/sdf1 on /raid0/data/usbhdd/esata/sdf1 type ext3 (rw)

This is with a eSATA harddisc connected and the HD is formatted in ext3 and is writeable - You see this on the last line - the device is named /dev/sdf1 and it is mounted on directory /raid0/data/usbhdd/esata/sdf1
You can change now to this directory and see what data are stored there.
If You disconnect Your eSATA drive and issue the mount command again, then the output is the same, except the last line is missing, so no harddisc is mounted there.

The tricky thing now is:
If You copy files to the /raid0/data/usbhdd/esata/sdf1 folder and there is no harddisc mounted, the sdf1 folder is created by the copy command and Your data are on Your NAS and not on Your external harddisc. However the folder structure is a little bit different.

Example:
if the HD is not present and you make a copy of a directory with the command:
cp -R Testdir /raid0/data/usbhdd/esata/sdf1 then all the content of the TestDir is copied to the sdf1 directory. If You plug in now again the external HD, then the HD is mounted on the sdf1 directoy and You see again the content of the external HD.

So check if the HD is mounted, before You check the content.

br
Peter

[currie021]

root@127.0.0.1:/# mount
rootfs on / type rootfs (rw)
/dev/root on / type ext2 (rw)
/dev/hda5 on /app type ext2 (rw,noatime)
/dev/hda6 on /logfs type ext3 (rw,noatime,data=ordered)
tmpfs on /tmpfs type tmpfs (rw)
proc on /proc type proc (rw)
sysfs on /sys type sysfs (rw)
none on /dev/pts type devpts (rw)
/dev/cloop0 on /lib/modules type ext2 (ro)
/dev/cloop1 on /opt type ext2 (ro)
/dev/cloop2 on /img/www type ext2 (ro)
/dev/cloop3 on /img/bin type ext2 (ro)
/dev/cloop4 on /lib/security type ext2 (ro)
/dev/cloop5 on /usr/share/zoneinfo type ext2 (ro)
/dev/cloop6 on /usr/sbin type ext2 (ro)
sunrpc on /tmpfs/var/lib/nfs/rpc_pipefs type rpc_pipefs (rw)
nfsd on /proc/fs/nfsd type nfsd (rw)
/dev/vg0/syslv on /raid0/sys type ext3 (rw,noatime,data=writeback)
/dev/vg0/lv0 on /raid0/data type ext3 (rw,noatime,data=writeback)

so it looks as though my e sata has never been mounted and i have just been writing to the N7700.

so number 1 - how do i mount the drive? it is present in the thecus gui as drive 9 but what is it to me - mount point/volume name!

secondly - how do i format it? i cant format under windows as ext3 can i? is it similar to command prompt ie-format volume [/fs:filesystem] [/v:label] [/q] [/a:unitsize] [/c]?

now i REALLY need to sort this!

[peterfu]

What FW do You have - I have FW 2.00.08 and it works like a charm.

Actually the disc should automount - so plugging the disc in should automatically mounting the drive on the approbiate directory - have done now the test on my N7700 and the mount command gives the correct output.

I have it also as disc 9 and the mount command gives then following output (only the last line):

/dev/sdh1 on /raid0/data/usbhdd/esata/sdh1 type ext3 (rw,data=ordered)

You can try following command:

mount /dev/sdh1 /raid0/data/usbhdd/esata/sdh1

After it is mounted You will see the disc format and if it only readable or writeable

But as I wrote above it should do it automatically - may be You update the FW if it's not FW 2.00.08.

Formatting the disc with windows as ext3 is possible - but You need some extra tools - i.e. Partition Magic, or You do it with a linux live CD - see the following link : http://www.pixelmagicforum.com/forum...ead.php?t=2700 - for reading ext3 harddisc with windows You need to install an ext3 driver - this is also mentioned in the above link.

But You can format the harddisc on the N7700 itself.
1) check with the mount command if the HD is mounted
2) if not then try to mount it with the command

mount /dev/sdh1 /raid0/data/usbhdd/esata/sdh1

3) if it claims that the mountpoint does not exist, then create it with:

mkdir /raid0/data/usbhdd/esata/sdh1

and do the mount command again
4) check now with the command mount if it is mounted
5) now unmount it witrh the command

umount /dev/sdh1

6) now format it with ext3 with the command (all data on the drive will be erased)

/sbin/mke2fs -j /dev/sdh1

7) wait till it is finished
8) mount it now with the command

mount /dev/sdh1 /raid0/data/usbhdd/esata/sdh1

(the mountpoint should already exist, cause You created it before or it was already there)
9) check now with the mount command if it's realy mounted

The above steps are done within a few minutes.

I'm not sure on the N7700, but on the N5200 NTFS formatted (Windows default) harddiscs are only readable, except You use a module called NTFS3G. You have then to unmount the device and mount it again with the ntfs3g tool - it's described in the wiki entry of the module - but I have not tested it on the N7700 - it works on the N5200. Writing data on a NTFS mounted disc is much slower than writing data on a ext3 formatted disc.

br
Peter

[currie021]

thats a brilliant reply!

i will give all this a go, i brought the 7700 home with me last night so i can actually see what i am doing.

i did think also last night that i have a knoppix cd of linux so i could possibly use that but it would be better if i can learn it properly over ssh in case i have problems in the future.

progress report to follow.

Regards,

John