Why Does TNAS Sometimes Fail to Start Up?

[TMzethar]

Applicable Models
F2-220, F2-221, F2-223, F2-420, F2-422, F2-423, F2-424
F4-220, F4-221, F4-223, F4-420, F4-421, F4-422, F4-423, F4-424, F4-424 Pro, U4-111, U4-423
F5-220, F5-221, F5-420, F5-421, F5-422
T6-423
F8-421, F8-422, U8-111, U8-420, U8-423, U8-450, U8-322-9100, U8-522-9400, U8-722-2224
T9-423, T9-450
T12-423, T12-450, U12-420, U12-423, U12-322-9100, U12-722-2224
U16-420, U16-322-9100, U16-722-2224, U16-722-2288
U24-612, U24-722-2224

Applicable Versions
All TOS Versions

Fault Phenomena
When starting the TNAS server, there is a probability that the startup is unsuccessful, and there are the following three phenomena when the startup is unsuccessful:
1. A beep is heard about 3 to 5 seconds after the power button is pressed, and no beep is heard after that.
2. TNAS cannot be searched by the TNAS PC client, and the IP address of the TNAS device cannot be found on the router.
3. When the TNAS is connected to an HDMI monitor, it displays "UEFI, boot" related errors.

Cause Analysis
In systems prior to TOS6, all hard discs in the TNAS device may contain TOS, and TNAS will boot from one of the hard discs in the TNAS device at random.
When one of the hard discs has a missing or corrupted boot partition, it will exhibit a probable boot failure.
This problem can be caused by installation errors, power failures, file system errors, power failures, and so on.

Resolution
1. Test and Identify the Abnormal Boot Partition Disk:
Start TNAS with only one hard drive installed.
If you can search for TNAS using the TNAS PC, the startup is successful. If not, or if you cannot ping TNAS, the startup failed.
Repeat this test for each hard drive.

2. After finding out the disc that failed to boot, try to repair it by the following actions:
Start TNAS without installing any hard disc.
After successful boot, insert any disc that can boot successfully.
Connect to TNAS via SSH and login as root user (default password is admin)
https://forum.terra-master.com/cn/viewt ... =87&t=1511
After successful SSH login, insert the disc that failed to boot.
Wait 3 minutes for TNAS to recognise the drive successfully, then run the following command on SSH window to repair the boot partition:

Code: Select all

mkdir /mnt/sdbboot
mkdir /mnt/sdcboot
mount /dev/sdb1 /mnt/sdbboot
mount /dev/sdc1 /mnt/sdcboot
cp –r /mnt/sdbboot/* /mnt/sdcboot/
umount /mnt/sdbboot
umount /mnt/sdcboot

3. Resume Normal Operation:
Insert all hard drives back into the TNAS and reboot the TNAS to resume normal use.

[janegleichner]

TNAS sometimes fails to boot due to problems with the boot partition on one or more of the hard drives in the system. On TNAS devices running pre-TOS6 operating systems, the system can boot from any hard drive containing the TerraMaster Operating System (TOS). However, if one of the hard drives has a missing or corrupted boot partition, the device may randomly select that hard drive to boot from, resulting in an error. This problem can be caused by an installation error, a sudden power failure, or file system corruption. To fix this, you need to test each hard drive to determine the faulty one, then use an SSH connection to copy the boot partition from the good hard drive to the faulty hard drive, making TNAS work normally again.

[chapter13]

So there's no boot loader/config stored on the USB key whatsoever? And whatever installation error, sudden power failure or file system corruption has, at the very least, left your array(s) degraded and in need of replacement disks. Then you're saying TOS will store it's boot partition on any random HDD in the array but don't worry as it can be manually copied from another drive. What happens in the case of a RAID1 mirror? if my boot disk is on the dead HDD how do I recover the boot partition? I will need to bring the NAS online to SSH (why?) a copy across but I have no existing boot partition to copy from?

[crisisacting]

So there's no boot loader/config stored on the USB key whatsoever?

It's simply for initialization; its script checks if there's a system partition available on the HDDs & if there isn't one, it'll load the initialization wizard/environment which loads on demand & will grab the newest version if Internet connected.

What happens in the case of a RAID1 mirror? if my boot disk is on the dead HDD how do I recover the boot partition?

This depends on which build of TOS you were on, as on TOS builds up to ~6.0.229, the system partition was installed on all drives, so in the event of one drive failure, it should boot from another available system partition on the accessible drives.

On newer TOS 6.× builds, you choose where the system partition is installed, so if that particular drive fails, so does the ability to load into TOS.

… need to bring the NAS online to SSH (why?) a copy across but I have no existing boot partition to copy from?

The initialization wizard/environment has SSH available & active, so you can access the TNAS that way; although the system partition may not be working on your drives, the data should still be present on their separate partitions, so you could copy it off to another drive or through rsync (if available) to another NAS.