My venerable QNAP TS-251-4G (from 2015) seems to have given up the ghost. I just want to double-check with the wisdom of the community whether that is the case, and if so what to do next (e.g. suitable replacement chassis that will take my two 3TB WD Red SATA drives with existing mostly home video/photo content).
But getting back to the symptom(s) - I tried a few things, for better or worse:
Was working fine, until I shut it down to relocate it, and on switching back on, the status lights were lit up l like a Christmas tree (forget exactly which LEDs, although at least one of the HDD LEDs was red), and couldnāt connect to it.
I tried connecting monitor (via HDMI) plus USB keyboard + mouse, and rebooting (via holding in power button till it shut down). But monitor remains blackā¦ not even a BIOS screenā¦ and no beeps (on shutdown or reboot).
I tried shutting down and removing both drives (as seemed to be suggested elsewhere) and booted: screen remained black, no beeps, only LED lit is solid blue USB (+ LAN flashes orange) (other LEDs not lit)..
I shutdown QNAP again, reinserted both drives, and powered-on, same black screen/no-beep, and now Iāve got HDD1 solid green, LED solid blue. LAN flashes orange. (Status and HDD2 are not lit at all)
So, is my TS-251 toast? Or is there something else worth trying (that doesnāt involve a soldering iron)?
If it is toast, are there new replacement boxes, that I can slide my 2 drives into and expect them to work without too much hassle? My main use is for storage, mainly as a media server (I currently use(d) Twonky to play up to 4K home videos) - and to backup to the cloud. (My drives are not in a RAID arrayā¦ hopefully one mirrors the other). In terms of O/S it was running QTS - probably not bang up to date, but I applied all available updates a couple of months back - canāt check now.
So I understand (per the migration page) that my QTS cannot migrate to NAS running QuTS hero safely. So I need a system running QTS.
Meanwhile, according to the migration tool, my TS-251 canāt migrate to TS-216G or TS-233 directly (it talks about backing up, which is not an option with my bricked TS-251). (Iām guessing this is an Intel vs ARM thing). I think that leaves the TS-264. The migration tool does say that TS-264 will work.
Just wanted to sanity check, before I fork outā¦ as I read it, the TS-264 will be shipped running QTS (which suits my needs) and not QuTS hero (but that platform provides the option of switching to QuTS hero later), right? In which case it should do the trick.
You really canāt āswitchā to Hero. Itās a completely new install. Youād have to backup your data, reset the NAS, install Hero, restore data. Itās a long process.
Also, if you are going to buy a new NAS, I would spend as much money as I can afford on one.
First, I would NOT run Hero on that NAS. I think you will tap it out with just a Celeron as CPU. Plus you will want lots of memory to run Hero.
Second, I thinking the future you may want more than 2 drives. I would get at least a 4 bay unit so you can end up with a RAID 5 configuration. Just mo betta for reliability.
Only you can decide how much you want to spend and what you can afford. But Iād go as big as I could if I were you.
Backups need to be done !!before!! stuff breaks or is deletedā¦if you ever get your data back, start doing backups, it will save you lots of tears and/or money
Thanks for the info about QTS folks. Will also look into RAID5 and 4 bay options.
dolbymanā¦ sorry I wasnāt clearer. The reference to backups from the migration tool was as follows when I specified source of TS-251 and destination of TS-233 or TS-216G::
āYour source NAS does not support direct migration to the destination NAS. To move files and data to the destination NAS, please use HBS to back up and restore files and data from one QNAP NAS to another. Check the tutorial for more information.ā
To be clear, I do have backups (Iām not that bad), just not to a second QNAP device - those two drives back-up each other for starters , but all of the data is backed up to both AWS and OneDrive clouds. But Iād just like to slide my existing drives into a new QNAP chassis without the hassle of retrieving that data. Call me lazy. (Then if I can get that going, Iāll probably need to spend some TLC on newer bigger drives, a bit later).
dolbyman - All fair points. Am considering a WD Elements USB drive or equivalent.
I did dig out an old SATA hard drive dock this morning, but Iāve changed laptop since last using it, and donāt have an eSATA port to access that dock any more (but Iāll order a new eSATA to USB-C cable). Is there any reason why I wouldnāt be able to recover data from one of the drives in this way, if the need arose? i.e. do QNAP encrypt or otherwise āprotectā the content of the file-system to prevent simple retrieval? Thanks.
I had no problem just taking my old HDDs out of my dead 251+ inserting into my new 264. HDD1 into HDD1 slot, etc. After, updating QTS and other apps, I was ready to back up my data via USB to prepare for updating the 10-year old drives as well. Rebuilding the RAID from old to new HDDs one-at-a-time took a L O N G time. QNAP tech support provided all necessary instructions.
, but all of the data is backed up to both AWS and OneDrive clouds. But Iād just like to slide my existing drives into a new QNAP chassis without the hassle of retrieving that data. Call me lazy. (Then if I can get that going, Iāll probably need to spend some TLC on newer bigger drives, a bit later).