LinkStation Pro Duo in EM Mode

[frodeseverin]

   

My LinkStation, a LS-WTGL/R1-V3 box, mysterioulsy appears in EM Mode everey time I boot it.

 

The Power LED and Activity LED are constantly green.

 

The router is not responding to anything but ping.

 

I read elsewere on this forum that flashing the firmware might help. My concern is that I have a lot of pictures on this NAS. I might even have filled up the disks, unknowingly.

 

Any suggestions for a solution? I'd rather not loose my data.

 

;)Frode

[disputator]

   

Yes, correct. A firmware update would bring the LS back to normal life and moreover the procedure will not erase or damage data under normal circumstandes. In fact you have a more than 90% chance just with installing the firmware getting it all back. Nevertheless, there is no better feel in the world to have a backup when you need one.

In the topics is a guide, not overly complicated, just make sure the firewall is off while the update is running.

[chugger74]

Hi, Disputator .... thanks for the advice. My Pro Duo mysteriously when into EM mode and I am having heart failure.  Under what circumstance will data possibly be lost?  It is in Raid1 configuration, so as it stands now, if there is an alternate way to access the data, I can probably recover it all.  My fear is that if the flash fails or whatever I do is part of the 10%, you reference, all will be lost.  What do I look for?

 

Also, the name of the device has been changed from LINKSTATION1 to a bunch of other characters - is that usual in these circumstances, or is there something else going on?

 

Thanks

   Marty

[chugger74]

Here is the "new" name for my LINKSTATION1:    `©Õ¾La

 

I can't tell if there are leadig/trailing blanks, but not having gone through this before, is this normal or is there something else going on that I should be afraid of?

 

Thanks.

[CapnSmith]

The only way data loss is possible is if the partition table on the disks has gotten scrambled, perhaps because of a loss of power during a raid check/raid rebuild.

 

If the partition table was damaged, the firmware updater will give you an error message similar to this:

"Could not confirm partition exists.  Would you like to format the disk(s)."

 

If this error shows up, I would recommend contacting a data recovery service, as they would have the facilities neccessary to deal with this issue.

[chugger74]

Thanks for the info.  Here is what I did ...

 

- Disabled AVG firewall

- Ran LSUpdater in normal mode -

   - seemed to find the LS Pro Duo

   - ultimately came back and said it could not find a LS that needed updating

- Changed the LSUpdater.ini as per the FAQ info

    VersionCheck = 0

   

    [Special Flags]

    Debug = 1

 

Ran LSUpdater again and now it cannot find the LS at all.

 

Maybe this is my worst fear ... is the unit bricked?  Is there any hope at all?  I've started the search for a data recovery company, but I am still hoping I can get this usnit back without that extreme measure.

 

Anything you can suggest would be appreciated.

 

Thanks

   Marty

[chugger74]

Oh, one more thing ... the unit does not seem to respond to the power switch - it does not turn off when the switch is moved to the off position.  Any suggestions on how to turn it off (other than pulling the plug)?  If it is bricked, then probably no harm doing that, but I want to minimize the damages so that I can maximize the recovery possibilities.

 

Thanks

   Marty 

[disputator]

How would you know it is EM mode if you cant find the unit?

 

first I would try a newer NAS Navigator version and see if this one can find the LS. Before you do anything, try to find what the matter is. Maybe it is still there. If not:

 

There is another method what involves taking the drives out. The unit is likely out of warranty- so no issue. Connect the drives to a PC.

read this- works well in my opinion

http://www.ufsexplorer.com/inf_terastation.php

 

The program is worth the money.  There is always hope - if the data re important you might want to try. Dont mess with partitions, if you consider data recovery you should also think about doing a HDD image before you start. This images you also could mount in a virtual Raid1. So play safe! 

 

 

 

 

[chugger74]

I believe it was in EM Mode because NASNavi2 V2.24 told me it was.  Here is the chain of events ...

 

- Friday 7/29: around 8AM PST I ran an executable from the Linkstation (LINKSTATION1) on one of the networked PCs.  It worked fine.

- Some time around 11AM PST, I got a popup (running Win7 Home Premium) stating that there was an issue communicating with LINKSTATION1, to check NASNavigator for more detail

- I checked NASNavigator which (I guess) queried LINKSTATION1 (whose name, somewhere in this chain of events, got changed to  `©Õ¾La  ). NASNavi returned with a red bar across the LINKSTATION1 icon announcing it was in EM Mode.  Meanwhile, LINKSTATION2 (a Quad) was fine, and remains good (turned off, but good).

- So, I started casting around the net to what EM mode was since it was not covered in the documentation. I found many vague references to it being "Engineering Mode" and "Emergency Mode" and a lot of not-very-clear information as to what it really meant or what to do about it.

- I also searched the Buffalo Tech forums and really did not find much, so I posted a question in the Storage forum (LS W2TGL/R1-V3 in EM Mode) .  After posting it, I continued searching and found this thread, and started asking questions here as well - thank you for taking the time to answer.

- Based on what I was told and what I found out, I attempted to flash the firmware around noon PST today, with the results as indicated in the above post.

 

The device is now apparently non-addressable, as it has disappeared from the network.  NASNavi2 V2.24 cannot find it; Windows cannot find it; and since I discovered it in "EM Mode" I have not been able to shut it off using the power switch on the back.

 

So, in truth, it was in EM Mode, but I have no idea why or in what mode it is now.  I will do as you suggest above: install the latest version of NASNavi and see what it can make of the situation.  But at this point, I am not holding up much hope.  I will post back what I find... but I'm not holding my breath.

 

I did come across the UFS Explorer referenced in your post during my "travels" - didn't look into it too deeply given that I was looking more for a solution to resurrect the Linkstation itself.  But I will have a closer look based on your suggestion, after I update NASNavi and see what it can do. 

 

And yes, I bought the NAS in 2009, I believe, so no warranty.  I'm not adverse to pulling out the drives if there is a way to grab the data myself, I am quite up to the task.

 

Also --- what can I do about powering it off.  At this point, the only thing that appears will work i spulling the plug.  And I don't want to do that until either someone tells me it'll be OK, or we've reached the end of resurrection attempts and it is time to start pulling disks.

 

I'll be back!

 

Thanks

   Marty

[chugger74]

OK, I'm back.

 

Upgraded NASNavi 2.34, but still no LINKSTATION1.  Found the second one, but no LS1.  I checked the network connections - all good and the connection shows green on the switch and green on the LS.  All computers are on the same subnet as the Linkstations.  The device is still nowhere to be found after my firmware flash attempt.

 

So, I guess next step is to investigate the UFS Explorer route and see where that takes us.

 

Again the question - the on/off switch has no effect in turning the LS off.  The only way appears to be to pull the plug - any down side? Any gotchas?

 

Thanks for your help so far - this thing is still not solved, but I am still hopeful about the data.

   Marty

[disputator]

If the LinkStation does not show any errors- try to give the PC a static IP and see what a direct connection gives as a result.

 

The LS could be on a 169.254.x.x IP too.

 

Removing the power could damage the firmware. It is not necessarely the case. If the firmware is alredy damaged- no point to worry about. There is no negative effect on the hardware side.

 

Maybe the LS was just frozen, so a start after removing power is worth a try. Look for the LEDs. There is a code for errors.

 

Best wishes

[chugger74]

OK, thank you.

 

I'm not clear on all the IP suggestions that you are making ... the address scheme for my internal net is the standard 192.168.1.xxx, so I'm not sure how would I go about finding the LS somewhere on 169.254.x.x (that's a lot of addresses to guess at).  I'm not really looking for an answer, but if there is an automated tool that will find devices on that network, please point me at it and I will give it a try.

 

But, I have already pulled the plug:  First, I unplugged from the network (which seemed to quiesce the LS) and then I took a deep breath and unplugged it.  It now sits on my workbench, awaiting further actions.

 

I like what you suggested about yanking disks and using a software tool like UFS to scoop the data off the drives.  I want to do that first (create a backup) before I try to revive the LS by plugging it back in and searching for it. That way, even if it works, I have a safe copy of the data so that it won't matter if the LS comes back or not.

 

I've already been in contact with the UFS folks (thank you for that lead), and because the disks are RAID1, they say that a Unix system can be used to read the drives.  Since I can't get to a computer shop to buy suitable connections and backup hardware till tomorrow, I'll spend the rest of today preparing a Unix system to explore the hard drives.  I'll go that route first as the least expensive, but if it does not work, I'll be setting up UFS tomorrow.

 

Thanks again for all your help - it has been great and has kept my hopes up through this whole process.  I'll let you know how things work out once I have tried these suggestions.

 

Regards

   Marty

[chugger74]

[One of the things that bugs me about fora is that people reporting problems never seem to report back on whether the suggestons made by others worked or not (well, I guess they report if things don't work, or else they just give up or maybe find the answer elsewhere).  So, I'm never really sure, if I follow a suggested path, whether it will work or not.  Well, at the risk of sounding verbose, I will record here the success I achieved and how I did it.  Thanks again to the folks who responded so quickly to my plea for help ... IT WORKED!!!]

 

So, I'm back after ...

• Downloading a CD-bootable version of Ubuntu and getting it to up and running on my desktop
• Tearing into the Pro Duo to retrieve the disks - really not made for easy disassembly, but a #1 Phillips does an adequate job. (I started at the back, thinking the cover would slide off, but but found out that by removing the 2 front feet, the front panel virtually falls off and the connectors are right there.)
• Obtaining a connector kit from the local PC parts store, to attach the drives to the PC via USB (I actually left the drives in the Pro Duo cabinet since that is probably the safest place for them, and the connectors are easily accessed.)
• Obtaining a pair of 2 TB WD My Book drives, one to back up each of the possibly faulty 1 TB Pro Duo drives
• Connecting each drive, in turn, to the Ubuntu machine and getting things to work (It's been almost 20 years since I last was in the vicinity of a Unix machine, and figuring out how a RAID drive is configured so I didn't muck it up wasn't in the skill-set at that time.  Overall, Ubuntu was a nice improvement from the old Unix command line.  But, I still needed the command line to install the mdadm package to handle the RAID array.)
• Copying the data from each drive to its own My Book.  The drives are RAID1, so should be exact copies of each other.
• Running compares back and forth between the My Books on the Windows side to see if any data was missing (I wasn't going to push my luck trying to figure out how to do this on Ubuntu.)

... and happy to report that I believe I retrieved 100% of the data from the failed Linkstation on both drives.  Why two 2-terrabyte WD drives? Well, first, I don't have any spare drives bigger than 500GB laying around.  And second, I needed to capture what data I could from both LS drives, in case one or both LS drives had spots of bad data.  That would maximize my chances of getting as close to 100% of the data as possible.  And now that I have apparently retrieved 100% of the data, I have a mirrored back up of data (albeit a manually managed mirror, but a mirror none-the-less) with enough room to grow to last me for a good while.

 

Moving almost a 2 TB of data (yes, the LS was over 75% full) takes a while, and doing the compares, takes quite a while, especially over USB.  But, as I watched the electrons flitting across the wires, I got to thinking ...

• The data on the LS drives appeared good.
• I poked around the other partitions of the drives and Ubuntu was reporting everything appeared OK in the RAID and the various partitions.
• I didn't "touch" anything on the drives to muck them up (that I know of)

So, I got to thinking ... now that I have recovered alI the data from the failed LS, I can afford to try a few things to see if I can resurrect it,  So, I'll be putting everything back together as it should be, hooking the LS back up to the network, and firing it up - will it come back to life?  As per one of the suggestions above, maybe all it needs is a restart kick in the pants.

 

I'm running the last of my file compares (using SyncToy on Windows; it's a Microsoft free tool and seems to work best of all the freebies I have found that purport to do the same thing; happy to entertain suggestions for a better one) and once that's done, and I've had my moring caffein to steady my nerves, I'm gonna give it a try.

 

I'll let you know how it works out ... or not.  Regardless - I am a happy camper now that my data is safe (at least for the time being).

 

Thanks

   Marty

 

[chugger74]

Long explanation to hopefully helped others.  I've put my key info and request for help in bold to highlight them - I'm not yelling at anyone, just bringing attention to the key questions I have. :-)

 

Well, I hooked up the LS to the network and power, and flipped the on switch.

 

• The power LED started flashing and I heard the disks fire up.
• The network light was on, indicating a solid connection to the network.
• Then the power light goes solid and the "i" light starts flashing orange:  1 long and 4 shorts - is that 5 flashes or 4 flashes?  Not sure.
• After about a dozen cycles of the flash sequence, it stops briefly, then comes back flashing red in the same sequence.  It flashes the red sequence about 2 and a bit times, then stops flashing, and the power and network lights come on steadily with no "i" light at all.

So I fired up NASNAVI (Ver 2.34). The LS shows up clearly, no issues, except that it indicates that RAID1 is unformatted. 

 

From the Windows directory perspective (double-clicjing on the LS icon in NASNAVI), I can look at the high level directory to see the "info", "lp" and "share" directories.  I can look into the "info" directory, but the "share" directory can't be opened, and gives the Windows Error pop up:   

• Windows cannot access \\LINKSTATION1\share.   Check the spelling of the name.  Otherwise, there might be a problem with your network. To try to identify and resolve network problems, click Diagnose.
• Error code: 0x80070035    The network path was not found.

If I try to access it from My Computer (the LS\share directory appears to be attached at L: as normal, but it has a red X through it), I get much the same response.

 

I clicked Diagnose and it reported back that Windows can't find \\LINKSTATION1\share.  Thanks, Microsoft, but I already knew that.  As usual, no real help down that path.

 

So, what are my options?  First, is it really 4 flashes or 5 flashes?  And what do those flashes really mean?

- 4 flashes: fan problem ... nope, fan's working fine now, but maybe there was a problem during startup?

- 5 flashes: ROM problem ... maybe that's it.

 

I'm looking for any advice on next steps.  My data is safe now, so if I need to reformat or otherwise reset the device to get it back, I'm free to do that as required.

 

Thanks

    Marty?