Linkstation Disk Failed

[dippydocus]

I have no doubt that this has been dealt with a hundred times before, but I am totally out of my depth. I am hoping someone can tell me how to fix this in very simple language.

I have a Buffalo Linkstation (Navigator says LS-WX4.0TL/R1) and one of the disks has failed. It still works, I mean I can access all my files, but there is a red light flashing and there is an error message in Navigator about Disk 1. I assume I need to fix this quickly. However, it was originally setup by someone else, and I really have no idea what I am doing. To make it more complicated, I am living overseas at the moment, and I can't easily buy a new drive here. Luckily, I can have one brought out in a couple of weeks, but I will have to make sure I order the right thing.

I've read the manual, and what I can find online and I think I just need to change one of the hard disks, and the instructions look simple (is it really that simple?). But then I was looking at the price of hard disks. I was thinking I should buy 2 drives, in case the other one also fails, because I can only get stuff brought out here every 9-12 months, so maybe I should get a spare. But looking at the price of them, it would be the same price to buy a new 6TB Linkstation as 2 x 2TB drives.

If I buy another Linkstation can I just plug it in to the router and copy straight from the old one to the new one over the network? Or is it better to just buy a new disk and try to replace the broken one? If I replace it, how big is the risk that I will totally mess it up and lose everything? Is it OK to keep using it in the meantime, or should I stop using it until it is fixed?

Apologies again if these are stupid questions.

[Texturtle]

Replacing the disk is exactly as described in the manual, not too difficult.

It is possible that the other disk could fail soon as well, but it might last another 5 years. Hard drives are unpredictable that way.

If you decide to go with a newer, larger LinkStation you should be able to do exactly as you described, just copy the data over the network from the old one to the new one.

[dippydocus]

Thanks very much, I think I'll just go for a new NAS. It seems like the safest option.