Here’s another question regarding how to upgrade and replace drives in a ZFS pool, I currently have 5x 8TB drives in a ZFS raidz1 configuration

  pool: storage
 state: ONLINE
  scan: scrub repaired 0B in 08:15:49 with 0 errors on Sun Nov 12 08:39:50 2023
config:

	NAME        STATE     READ WRITE CKSUM
	storage     ONLINE       0     0     0
	  raidz1-0  ONLINE       0     0     0
	    sda     ONLINE       0     0     0
	    sdc     ONLINE       0     0     0
	    sdb     ONLINE       0     0     0
	    sdd     ONLINE       0     0     0
	    sde     ONLINE       0     0     0
	cache
	  nvme0n1   ONLINE       0     0     0

errors: No known data errors

I now have 5x 20TB drives ready to replace, but I don’t want to pull a drive out and wait for the data to repair itself, I would like to replace them while the drives are attached.

I have a SATA to USB hub where I can move some of my 8TB drives to, so that I can replace the SATA connections with my 20TB drives. How can I initiate a drive replacement with my original 8TB drives in the USB SATA hub and the new drives in the SATA ports that my old drives were in? Sorry if this sounds confusing.

  • alexkidd4@alien.topBEnglish
    1·
    1 year ago

    This is probably possible, but I believe you’ll be in more danger by depending on a USB connected device for the rebuild. I’ve heard of folks losing whole arrays in external USB enclosures due to flaky controllers or adapters.

    • VBQL@alien.topOPBEnglish
      1·
      1 year ago

      Even if you loose the USB hub, wouldn’t there still be parity on the remaining drives? If I were to do it one at a time. I guess the question boils down to is it faster to rebuild from parity or from a USB 3 transfer

  • therealtimwarren@alien.topBEnglish
    1·
    1 year ago

    Startech make an 8 port SATA card. Worked for me.

    Make me array and use zfs send | zfs receive to sync data. Disks can hang out of the side of the pc for a day or two if needs be. You’ll need some power splitters you.