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[chadb]

Ok, i have 2 500gig drives that i need to upgrade to 1.5 tb each. I have enough space on one of my laptops to backup the 400gig that i am using but its taking forever at 6m/s.  I tried pulling a drive out and putting it in a usb enclosure but neither my mac or windows could read it.  There has to be a good way to do this rather than using just the network at 6m/s. 
thanks for any suggestions.

[gunrunnerjohn]

There really isn't.  If you connect using gigabit connections, you'll get considerably faster access.

[mzpx]

To read the data via a USB enclosure you can try one of the tools listed here:
http://www.howtoforge.com/access-linux-partitions-from-windows
I did not try any of these myself, but if I hook up the drive to a Linux machine it can read the data w/o any problem. The partitions are typically formatted ext2 (older firmware) or ext3 (option in newer firmwares). (There is a small partition created on each drives, where config data is stored, do not touch those. Look for the big data partition.)

I am pretty sure there are tools to do this on a Mac too, although what I found is not that promising:
http://discussions.apple.com/message.jspa?messageID=9433712

If you are using two drives in RAID1 (mirror) mode I would advise against writing anything on them outside of the DNS-321, that would seriously mess up the raid. Theoretically you could re-sync after, but there are many posts complaining about re-sync problems, so I would advise against it. (If you are not using raid you can write data using the same tools that let you read it.)

If your laptop has no Gb network or you have no Gb switch, you will have to wait. And wait. Try to do 20GB at a time. Even over Gb the speed will vary depending on the file sizes. Writing lots of small files should be slower than fewer but bigger files. I have a Gb network and recently uploaded about 100GB data of large files - that took about 3.5hrs. Moving 400Gb over a 100Mbs network... will take time. Sorry.

Actually once you confirmed that you can read the data, you can just put the two new drives into the DNS-321, format, setup raid1, hook up one of the old drives (I assume you were using mirroring, so they have the same data) via USB to your laptop, mount the DNS-321 and start copying the data from the old drive using the laptop via the network to the DNS-321 with the new drives in it. This won't make your network speed any better, but at least you don't have to copy the data twice....

Post your experience. Please.

[gunrunnerjohn]

You could probably also use the direct backup using the applications on one of the NAS units, this would eliminate the dual movement of the data across the network.

[peas]

gunnerjohn - What's the direct backup application you're referring to?  D-Link's support page for the DNS-321 doesn't have an add-on with that feature.
http://www.dlink.com/products/?pid=DNS-321&tab=3

I guess I could use a telnet console via fun_plug and copy it directly within the 321.
UPDATE: Using a telnet console, copying 1TB from one drive to another directly within the 321 has taken 20+ hrs.

[tfiveash]

Hey GRJ:

How do you have you system configured?  I am running a total gigabit network and all I can do is is about 6MB/s.  Are you running Jumbo frames and if you have any other tidbits I am sure that all of us would like to see how you did it.

Thanks for any help.

Terry

[gunrunnerjohn]

I wasn't getting notifications for some reason, hopefully it's fixed.

I have my systems all gigabit with 4k jumbo frames.  If you're only getting 6 mbytes/sec on large files, it sounds like you don't actually have gigabit connections.

[JoeSchmuck]

GRJ:  What format are your drives?  I'm sure you stated it a few times in the past.

Chadb: Did you ever get those new drives installed?  It's been a few months since your post.

[gunrunnerjohn]

I use EXT2, don't feel like reformatting for EXT3.