I have a Terastation Live running firmware version 2.14 and have been using it fine for about 2 years now. Last week I attempted to backup the station to an external usb drive by scheduling an immediate backup job (about 365gbs). The job started slow but the web interface showed that the capacity of the usb drive slowly increasing, so I let it run for about 2 days. 2 days later I checked and the job appeared to have frozen about half way through. To be sure I let the job sit 2 more days and didn't see any progress. The only way I could get the backup job to stop was to power down the Terastation (properly), remove the usb, and restart the Terastation. I reattempted the backup two more times with a similar result, the backup would freeze in a random spot. After the third attempt, I was able to access the Terastation web gui but it said my username and password were incorrect. My shares were still accessible and data was fine, but it seems like only the web interface was the problem.
Some of the things I've tried to get into the web interface:
1) Reinitialized the Terastation by holding the red button down for 10+ seconds. Terastation reverted from static ip back to dynamic IP, so I'm pretty sure this worked. Tried using username "admin" password "password" with the same result. "Incorrect username or password". Shares were still accessible.
2) Worked with tech support to boot into EM mode. The web gui still told me my username and password were wrong. I tried both the defaults and my standard passwords.
3) Worked with tech support to reflash the unit firmware. The username and password for the TSUpdater was "admin/password", so the tech was confused why the web interface wasn't taking this. After the upgrade I still couldn't login into the web gui, and shares were still available.
4) Techsupport had me change the lsupdater.ini file to set Debug = 1 under the [SpecialFlags] section. This allowed me to access the "Debug Mode" window. Here they had me check the "Force update", "Delete user-config", and "Do not check version" box. Then I tried to reflash the box again. I still got the same "Incorrect username or password" prompt from the web gui but my shares were still usable with the my existing usernames and passwords (I was surprised the shares still worked after the 'delete user-config' was set).
In the end Buffalo told me to buy another box since mine is outside of the warrenty period. They think that there is a hardware fault in my unit, but I think the symptoms still point toward a software problem (everything works except the web gui won't take my password). The tech pointed out that all the software and usernames had been defaulted, but if this is the case why can I still access my shares with my old usernames and passwords? Buffalo didn't seem to be aware there were reported problems with the backup process or the web interface issue, but I could find at least two postings on here where other people ran into the same problem with both issues (although not reporting them at the sametime). One of the users mentioned that he could get back into the web interface only after setting the "Rebuild partition table" option and reflashing the Terastation. This would of course destroy my data so I'm curious if anyone out there has any other suggestions before I'm forced to go this route. I appreciate the help.
If it is not accepting the admin password then enabling the debug options on its own will not work, you need to first of all get the unit into EM mode then carry out the debug process.
- Power the unit down (disconnect the power)
- Reboot it, if the power led is still flashing more than 100 second's from the first beep on, disconnect the power and retry.
- do this until the unit's power led is constant 90 seconds after the beep and the unit is on EM.
- Please bare in mind that it might take several attempts to get the unit into EM mode (upto 20 times)
- To confirm the unit is in EM mode the letters "EM" will be displayed in the hostname of the Terastation in the Nas Navigator and the firmware will be displayed as "---" or no firmware at all.
Once it is in this state carry out the debug process and let me know of the results, also the process of trying to get the TS into EM mode by pressing the reset button when powering on doesnt always work so try the process i outlined above.
Thanks I'll give this a try. To get into EM mode, don't I need to hold down the red button during power on?
davo wrote:also the process of trying to get the TS into EM mode by pressing the reset button when powering on doesnt always work so try the process i outlined above.
davo
That did the trick! Everything is working as expected now. Thanks again for helping a perfect stranger.
No problem mate, glad i could help :-)