NAS200: time for formatting a disk...

[SOHO_user]

Hi, NAS200 users. I am trying to format a WesternDigital 1.5TB (WD15EARS) and the console shows it is still formatting for almost two days! The lights in front are still blinking... So, I have the following questions: - how much time will it take to format (slow)? - If I close the console pc and the format keeps going on, when I re-open the console pc the format progress is affected? The percentage progress indicator has disappeared then... - A well formatted and written hdisk has appeared once as a unformatted disk after boot time without any possible reason, so I had to take him out of NAS200 and when I connected it in another pc, booted with Knoppix Linux and it showed that it was 100% OK... Thanks for your time, Anastasios

[jac_goudsmit · Accepted solution]

The NAS200 is very low on RAM, that's why it takes VERY long to format large drives. My 1TB drive took the better part of a day to format. I wouldn't be surprised if a 1.5TB drive takes 2 days. It also depends on whether you're using non-journaled (ext2) or journaled (XFS).

I'm pretty sure the format operation will not be affected if you close the web browser; after all it's not the web browser that does the formatting, it just keeps track of it. While you're not watching, the formatting will continue. When you reopen a connection to the web GUI later it will show you how much (or how little!) the format has progressed.

If you want, you can take the drive out of the NAS and format it on a Linux system that supports the file system that you're using; as long as you don't make changes to the partition table I think the NAS200 will recognize the disk as formatted, and formatting (or just running an fsck) on the partitions should only take a few seconds on a PC.

You should see three partitions: the first one is where the data goes, the second one is where it stores some hidden configuration files and the third one is a swap partition.

Good luck!

===Jac

[SOHO_user]

I am going to format it on a Linux pc definetely!  It has passed the second day, I will leave it as running and if nothing happens I will shut down and do so on... Anyway thanks!

[SOHO_user]

Amazing Linux!! It took me less than 24h to re-format the new 2TB hdisk and re-write from the old 1,5TB the data remaining with the help of KNOPPIX. Afterwards, I re-installed the disk in NAS200 and everything is running smoothly again!! So, next time I'll do these kind of works again outside the NAS200!! Thanks again for the support...

[neubrl]

Try to do it through the web interface: 

I let it running 5 days and stop it because it took too long.

Yesterday I try to format it using Gparted but I don't know how to do it to make it work!

My harddrive is 2TB and i format it as following:

• 1.86GiB ext2
• 118MiB ext2 (I also try with unknow format but it doesn't work)
• 59MiB Swap linux

Can someone told me how to do it using Gparted or another linux tool (In command it may be better if another user want to reproduce it)

PS: I am actually retrying to format using the buildin tool, but I am a little bit hopeless

[aminor]

OK here is the thing after reading countless news group articles this seems to work:

I first tried a 3TB drive which did not work i was able to do this with a 2TB WD WD20EARX from Best buy there green series

First if you get a drive not installed message you will not be able to do any of the following you need the unit to recognize the drive at a bare minimum.

1 Disable the media server temporarily

2 format the disk in Journaled mode ( Should take about 15 mins max)

3 Format the drive again in non journaled mode may take a few hours to complete ( Unsure of the exact time i stepped away but def not a day.

4 re-enable the media server and enjoy.

Al

[aminor]

Orig

OK here is the thing after reading countless news group articles this seems to work:

I first tried a 3TB drive which did not work i was able to do this with a 2TB WD WD20EARX from Best buy there green series

First if you get a drive not installed message you will not be able to do any of the following you need the unit to recognize the drive at a bare minimum.

1 Disable the media server temporarily

2 format the disk in Journaled mode ( Should take about 15 mins max)

3 Format the drive again in non journaled mode may take a few hours to complete ( Unsure of the exact time i stepped away but def not a day.

4 re-enable the media server and enjoy.

Ran into an issue at 100% the unit hung i manually rebooted the nas200 and everything was fine.