Buffalo LS-WXL Series NAS RAID data recovery

[nbendall]

Where's it frightening?

Considering I have a clone of Disk 2 but I can't get Disk 1 turned on to get a clone, I only have one shot at Disk 1.

[pepe]

i meant where i was frightening with my words.

Fzabkar: No need to frighten the OP.

snip it with a wire snipper or desolder it.

[Lardman]

We're back to board repair vs data recovery.

Pepe is of course right, if it's important data on there you really should be sending it in, especially if it's someone else's data and you're doing this commercially. - But - a 2 drive raid recovery isn't the cheapest. I don't think any of us offer a board only service or just a single drive from an array, it's too risky and not economically viable for us.

As long as the drive isn't opened you're not going to incur any extra cost for clipping the diode, just don't blow anything important up

If that doesn't work and you need to send the drives in for data recovery at least you know that level of service and therefore cost was justified.

"Meter"? What setting am I using on the multimeter and what result should I expect?

If you're not sure watch Steve's video a few times he explains it better than I will.

[fzabkar]

"Meter"? What setting am I using on the multimeter and what result should I expect?

What is the best way to remove the chip should I need to? I have wire snips, pliers, screwdrivers, and a soldering iron to hand.

All your questions are answered in my FAQ.

[Lardman]

All your questions are answered in my FAQ.

Have you considered putting some of your online resources on Rossmann's Wiki ?

[fzabkar]

Have you considered putting some of your online resources on Rossmann's Wiki ?

My TVS Diode FAQ is too trivial for a repair wiki. It is aimed at people, primarily users, who have zero knowledge of electronics.

[nbendall]

Hello again all, I have removed the TVS diode off the board using a pair of tweezers and a soldering iron. Prior to this, my multimeter was detecting a short on the TVS, which it is now not doing. What is the next step, should I connect the PCB back to the Disk or should I power on the PCB standalone to see if anything "fries"?

I watched Steve's video on removing the TVS but his multimeter had different settings to mine, so I just used the setting that makes the multimeter beep if there is a complete circuit.

It may be worth noting that before posting here, I connected Disk 1 to a computer and now that computer will not boot, but that isn't the point.

If a test of the PCB is needed, can you show me what pins I will need to test with the multimeter? This will be a bit harder to do since the only way I can power up the PCB is using a 3.5 HDD dock and the PCB will be halfway in the dock, see below:


If a test is not needed, then is it safe to just pop the PCB back on Disk 1 and plug it in?

See below the picture of the TVS after it was removed:

Thank you, everyone, for the support so far!

[Lardman]

It may be worth noting that before posting here, I connected Disk 1 to a computer and now that computer will not boot, but that isn't the point.

The insides of PSU probably look like the insides of the NAS.

If a test of the PCB is needed, can you show me what pins I will need to test with the multimeter?

Check the diode pads for resistance to ground the right hand side should be very low the left side should be considerably higher. If both are low you have other problems.

If everything is ok put just the pcb in your dock and power it up, if you kill the 15 quid dock no real loss. If the dock powers up and there's no smoke reattach the pcb to the drive and try powering the drive. Clicking or scratching power off immediately.

[nbendall]

Hi again all,

After snipping off the TVS and testing, we got some good results. I connected the PCB back up to the drive, popped it in the dock, and... It works!

I've cloned Disk 1 in case anything happens but I've run into another problem. Disk 1 was cloned to a 1tb disk, the same as the original size. Disk 2 was cloned to a 1.5tb disk.

So my questions are:
1. What is the best way to reassemble the RAID and read data?
2. Will the different disk sizes affect the RAID?

Thank you everyone for the assistance so far it's been amazing!

[fzabkar]

If necessary, you can use a tool such as HDAT2 to shrink the 1.5TB drive to 1TB (by creating a HPA).

Alternatively, you could use the free version of DMDE to create a virtual RAID, and then clone this RAID to a 2TB drive.

[Lardman]

After snipping off the TVS and testing, we got some good results. I connected the PCB back up to the drive, popped it in the dock, and... It works!

Nice

So my questions are:
1. What is the best way to reassemble the RAID and read data?
2. Will the different disk sizes affect the RAID?

1. Depends really on your definition of best .... easiest is probably getting a copy of https://www.ufsexplorer.com/ufs-explore ... covery.php (free demo) and with both drives plugged in hopefully it will do all the magic for you. If it does - it hurts your wallet a little but you learn a valuable lesson about backups Not sure if there are cheaper alternative methods I'd have to look.

2. Not in a recovery scenario.

[Lardman]

Alternatively, you could use the free version of DMDE to create a virtual RAID, and then clone this RAID to a 2TB drive.

I think this is going to be XFS does DMDE support it ?

[fzabkar]

Alternatively, you could use the free version of DMDE to create a virtual RAID, and then clone this RAID to a 2TB drive.

I think this is going to be XFS does DMDE support it ?

It's not listed. :-(

[Lardman]

Alternatively, you could use the free version of DMDE to create a virtual RAID, and then clone this RAID to a 2TB drive.

I think this is going to be XFS does DMDE support it ?

It's not listed.

The OP appears to like linux CLI - perhaps that would yield results, but we're definitely off board repair and into data recovery now

[fzabkar]

Here's a cheap tool (RAISE, US$25) from the same people who produce UFS Explorer:

https://www.raisedr.com/technical.php

[nbendall]

Good Evening All!

I completely forget to post here, but I have all the data!

I used the trial of Raise to see if it's possible to pull data from the RAID config and it worked. I booted into Ubuntu and mounted the RAID partition and I could access files!

I copied it all off to an external drive and all 200gb of data was saved without a penny spent.

Thank you all for the support and help, I'm so glad I posted here or I would've still been scratching my head wondering what to do.

[Lardman]

I completely forget to post here, but I have all the data!

Thanks for the update - we like to hear when things go well.

I don't think we need to tell you about the importance of backing up your data - but if you haven't already done so sort out a backup strategy. Hard drives are a lot cheaper than DR, you may not be so lucky next time.