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[mattmcg]

Hello,

I'm having an interesting issue with my D-link DNS-323 and am trying to get to the bottom of it.  I have two Seagate 1.5TB drives installed and am running the 1.07 firmware currently.

Here is my issue.  After initial boot up, the two drive lights are blue.  After transferring a large quantity of data, the drive lights change from blue to a pink/purple color.  What does this mean?

Now I understand that the device has two drive light LED colors (blue and amber) to denote drive failure status.  I've read the manual and there is nothing there discussing a pink/purple drive light color.  I can still access the device through the web GUI and connect to the drive to view/change files on the drive.

So what is going on?  Is this a DNS-323 bug?  Is this a DNS-323 hardware failure?  Is this a hard drive failure?  I put a lot of my personal photos and videos on this device as a secure storage facility to protect against hard drive failures (experienced that on a PC one time, never again) but I'm really lacking any trust on the DNS with how its operating.

Thanks in advance for your assistance.

[D-Link Multimedia]

Which model seagate drives? It sounds like the ones that are affected by bad firmware on the drives and need an upgrade.

[mattmcg]

They both are the Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 1.5TB with firmware SD17.

[rws8258]

mattmcg,

Here's my setup: DNS-323 (BNS323A....B1), F/W: 1.07 with two 1.5Tb Barracudas (7200.11, ST31500341AS), F/W: CC1H. I bought all three items about three months ago; the DNS-323 arrived with F/W: 1.05, which I flashed to 1.07, and, notably, the Barracudas arrived with (the newer) F/W ver. CC1H. (I waited on my purchase until I was sure I would get the drives with the newer firmware.)

Searching elsewhere here (e.g., for 'SD17') and on the net (e.g., for 'Barracuda' and 'SD17'), F/W ver. SD17 has a serious problem. I suggest you check your HDD's for a firmware upgrade...

Go here: http://seagate.custkb.com/seagate/crm/selfservice/search.jsp?DocId=207957

Heed Seagate's warnings and follow their instructions to the letter!

[sylaan]

Not so sure the drives are to blame. I have 2 Hitachi 1TB drives (HDS721010KLA330) in a RAID 1 configuration in my DNS323. Until 3 weeks ago I was running 1.06 and everything was fine.

Then I upgraded to 1.08 and I started to get the pink/purple lights, for both drives LEDs. The status screen shows no errors (i.e. RAID status is Completed) and I can access the NAS just fine. The lights are blue after reboot but after some intense file copy operation (or some intense folder scanning done by twonkymedia server) the lights turn pink/purple.

Since this started immediately after upgrade to 1.08 I really don't think the drives are the problem. I also could not find anything about what purple means, would be nice if we could get some official info about that.

Regards,
Sylaan

[mattmcg]

I saw the same problem with 1.06 and 1.07.  Nowhere is it documented that "pink/purple" means anything from Dlink.  After trudging through about 3 hours with tech support and being transferred from 1st level tech support, to a product specialist, to 3rd level support after being hung-up on twice during the whole charade (don't ever want to do that again) I was told that it was either a software bug or a hard drive failure.  Someone else mentioned that it might be a "past" failure of the drive but that things had recovered (thus the amber and blue lights were lit displaying pink).

It would be nice to get some definitive closure on this.....

[neuwirth]

I have been experiencing the same problem.  Firmware at 1.07 level.  I have two identical Western Digital 750GB drives installed.  I'm not sure of the model number, but the model was on the 'D-Link approved' list.  When the lights turn pink, I get a nasty write protected, talk to your system administrator message.  With Windows Explorer I can display the directories, but not the files themselves.  I can log into the DNS323 firmware and do a graceful power down and then press the power on button and everything is fine again.  The drives are configured in RAID 1, so all my data is at risk if both drives really fail at the same time.  I installed the drives when I purchased the DNS323 over a year ago.  At that time I configured the storage as two separate drives.  A couple of months ago I upgraded the firmware to 1.07 and in the process backed up everything and reformatted the drives for RAID1.  Since doing this the 'pink light condition has appeared twice.  After reading the numerous posts about this problem, I believe another firmware upgrade is needed to fix the problem.

[nzmike]

I'm also getting this problem after upgrading to 1.06 - after reboot all is fine (blue lights all round) then during a copy of any large files to the drive it stops and tells me it can't find the drive and then the lights turn pink.

I have two Samsung Spinpoint 500GB HD501LJ drives and the web admin status shows everything to be fine, I can see it in the networked devices etc - but there is no access once the drive lights turn pink except via the admin webpage.

I wish we could get a solution for this - I do my backups to this drive as well as using to stream media to my network so I really need a fix!

I can't help thinking this is a bug introduced in v1.06 so I might try going back to v1.05 (if I can still find that version) as all was well beffore I did the upgrade to 1.06 yesterday

Mike.

[D-Link Multimedia]

Try reseating you drives in the device ( removing and firmly re-inserting drives to make sure the connectors are lined up and all the way to the back ). This is not common and not happening on drives here so either its something environmental related or drive specific.

[neuwirth]

Try reseating you drives in the device ( removing and firmly re-inserting drives to make sure the connectors are lined up and all the way to the back ). This is not common and not happening on drives here so either its something environmental related or drive specific.

This never happened when I had my two drives configured as stand alone drives.  It started when I reconfigured them as RAID1 and went to version 1.07 firmware.
I do not think this is drive specific.  According to the forum, this is happening with several brands/sizes of disk drives.  I believe the fault is with the processor or the firmware.

[mattmcg]

I've tried reseating a number of times.....  That does not resolve the problem.  This seems to occur once you've had a loss in connectivity or responsiveness due to a transfer of data to the DNS.

[sylaan]

It's obvious that the problem appeared after a software upgrade and re-seating won't do anything.

I can't believe Dlink has no clue what the pink/purple color means! Didn't they program the thing ? In which case do the lights turn pink/purple ?

[jazzishouse]

I had this problem when upgrading from FW 1.05 to 1.06 and also 1.07. I posted this in a couple of related threads a while back...

"The 323 would work fine initially after startup but after a while I would get part way through copying files from my PC to the DNS-323 and I would get a "network path no longer available" message. After this I would not be able to access any files on it. If I turned it off and started it up again it would be okay again. I also got pink drive lights and intermittent reporting under status that my drives needed rebuilding. Again, turn it off and back on again and all would be fine again, for a short while. I gave up trying to track the problem down and reinstalled 1.05, since when it has operated flawlessly."

Since then I have installed the 1.08 beta firmware which, touch wood, has been fine so far - although I'm not the Media server is working properly!

[DementedBuddha]

I posted about this on another forum but haven't received a response...

I was getting the pink light as well as the network path unavailable problem.  To make a long story short, it looks like Twonky was storing it's data files in var off the root folder.  I think this folder is a ram drive or something so it's not permanent storage, it's also very small.  Twonky would recreate its db files on every reboot and fill up this drive, which seemed to be causing havoc with my system. I created a symbolic link to the twonky files in var in a startup script and put the files elsewhere.  It seems to have solved my problem but it would be nice if someone else could confirm.  I think the pink LED might be related to system errors when the root folder has no disk space... just a theory though.

[rws8258]

Matt,

I've waited for some others to make some posts; now... I wanted chime in, once more, with my (refreshed) opinion(s)... Again, these are just my thoughts [grain of salt, eh?]...

First, let's consider that you actually have TWO problems here. What are they? Well, one is clearly the firmware on your Barracudas. The other, well, that's a bit more gray, or more correctly (in this case), pink.

Step 1) Separate the two problems.

Step 2) If your data is important to you, back up your data... IMHO, while separated from the DNS-323. Pull the drives and direct-link one directly to a PC. Back up your data and then flash the drive. Set it aside.

Step 3) Search this site for "pink". You'll find a few posts that may give you an idea of what your dealing with here. My suggestion? Reset the device to factory defaults. (Do it all. Do it all the way. That is to say, "graceful shutdown and hard restart"... E.g., shutdown cmd, pwr off, unplug n/w cable, unplug pwr, then wait for the electrons to die off.) Reverse the process. Flash the firmware to whatever ver. you want. Repeat the graceful shutdown/hard restart to verify your flash took.

Step 4) Install the freshly flashed HDD into Slot 1 (the one on the right), prep it up (part and format, etc.) -- DO NOT SET UP A RAID!!! If everything looks okay to you, COPY (not move) the data you backed-up (to the PC) before to the Barracuda through the LAN. Then, wait and watch... hours/days/whatever.

Step 5) When you're satisfied, i.e., no pinkage after working data back and forth... flash the other Barracuda (on a PC) and, in this case, I would wipe it, too. Install it in the left slot on the DNS-323, prep it up, and set up a nightly sync or copy routine, or whatever you want.

Again, I'm pretty new here and I am not an expert on this.... Just thinking out loud. Good luck.