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[kenjidnb]

The other day I was prompted for a re sync of the raid 1 array from the dns323 admin page. After the resync, I performed a reboot, and then I realized the horror. The NAS wasn't recognizing the hard drives anymore, I was prompt for formatting the drives which of course I did not do. I tried swapping the drives, factory reset and upgrading the firmware but it did not fixed it. I was running v1.07 when it happened.

So my next step was to eject one of the drive and read it off a sata docking station plugged to my computer. With the necessary software, I was able to mount the drive as ext2. Once mounted I realized that a few folders were unreadable. I can list the name of the folders but I can't explore them and recover the data.

I am now desperate to recover files contained in these folders. Please help!

[dcx_badass]

Have you tried both drives?

[chriso]

One reason I don't run RAID on my DNS-323.

Anyway what it sounds like to me is you need to run e2fsck on the drive.  For that you will need to either have a way to get into the DNS-323 with telnet or ssh or have a Linux machine to run the command.

[kenjidnb]

One reason I don't run RAID on my DNS-323.

Well That's lesson learned for me. But now my only objective is to recover the data. I used to be able to ssh in the dns-323 using fun-plug but since the failure I can't.

I have tried both drives of course and they both list the exact same good and corrupted files. It looks like I have to use some linux system tools to try to recover the files. I can try to mount it on a linux box and run e2fsck. Worst case scenario, I will send the drive to a data recovery specialist and pay the $ for the few files I really want to recover.

[chriso]

If you have a spare drive around you can set it up on the DNS-323 and get telnet/ssh working on it and then add the other drive in to run e2fsck on it (you need the drive you are running e2fsck not to be mounted anyways).

If you don't have another drive around and you are sure they are the same (most likely true based on what you said and the fact that is exactly what mirroring does it mirrors the problems), then you could stick in one of those drives to the DNS-323 and format it, and setup telnet on it and then stick in the other so that you can run e2fsck on it.

A couple of things though.  One make sure you have the drive unmounted.  Two e2fsck can lose data in the process.  It will try to put any files it can't figure out the names in lost+found, but without their names.
But it is the best bet I know to recover as much as possible short of a professional service.

P.S. Future reference and for anyone reading this thread.  This is why Raid 1 is not a backup system, you need a backup in addition to Raid 1, if you are going to use it at all.

[jamieburchell]

Your easiest solution is most likely to boot in to a Linux environment with one of those live CDs then use your docking station to run e2fsck on the drive *unmounted*

I've got one of these docking stations connected to my NAS. It has an SD card containing FFP and each month I insert a SATA drive and run a custom script to rsync the important files on the NAS, email me the log file and send an SMS. You might want to consider your own backup system. I'd gladly share any scripts etc.

[kenjidnb]

I would rather automate backups to an online location, but online storage is expensive and not necessarily secure.
The manual backup is one option I may have to consider since I know I can't trust my NAS anymore.

I will try e2fsck tomorrow. Really hoping I'll recover my files.

[jamieburchell]

Don't trust anything
Live each day as if your NAS will explode or be stolen, one day you might be right.

[kenjidnb]

It took me a while, but I finally recovered all my files. e2fsck on an alternate superblock was the key, thank you chriso for the tip. The repair took about 2 hours for a 1Tb drive, I was then able to mount the drive and read all my files successfully.
Before I really started digging into those linux recovery/forensic techniques, I got an quote from a professional data recovery business who was asking $1500 for the work ... Really happy I persisted and did it myself:)

I purchased an extra drive and a docking station as a "real" backup. Storing the backup drive away from home (at the office), I will periodically bring the drive back home and synchronize what's on the NAS to that drive.