Lost all network activity...what next?

[Martin D]

HI,

I converted my DNS321 to Alt-F this summer, as it was the only way to drop in bigger disks without losing all the data.

Except for my mistakes (messed up partition tables with raid...  but the forums - and some patience - helped my recover everything), all went well and I did not lose any data.  (Great software, by the way... if only off-the shelf boxes could get rid of their crippled proprietary softwares, you would not have to do that...)

So all has been running perfectly for months, even started using mini-DLNA, until a few days ago : the DNS321 simply disappeared from my network.

The DNS321 itself seems to be working fine on its own (reacts to the reset / power down, blinking lights show RAID in action, etc.), and the network LED is on.

To troubleshoot, I cycled the power on my router, DNS321, I switched routers, network cable, without success.

My router shows my all the active devices on the network (both wired and wireless), and the DNS321 does not show up in the list.

Is is configured with a static IP address, so this is not a DHCP problem.  Pinging the box address does not return anything...

So...what's next?  Is there a known issue in Alt-F?  Has the Ethernet interface of my DNS321 just quit on me (but the network LED is on...)? Should I try a full reset of Alt-F (losing all my parameters, which, of course, is pretty much the only thing that I did not back up)? Or follow the un-brick procedure?  Start hunting for another DNS or consider upgrading to a new NFS (and lose the flexibility)?

[João Cardoso]

On Sunday, 25 October 2015 02:39:30 UTC, Martin D wrote:

HI,

I converted my DNS321 to Alt-F this summer, as it was the only way to drop in bigger disks without losing all the data.

Except for my mistakes (messed up partition tables with raid...  but the forums - and some patience - helped my recover everything), all went well and I did not lose any data.  (Great software, by the way... if only off-the shelf boxes could get rid of their crippled proprietary softwares, you would not have to do that...)

So all has been running perfectly for months, even started using mini-DLNA, until a few days ago : the DNS321 simply disappeared from my network.

The DNS321 itself seems to be working fine on its own (reacts to the reset / power down, blinking lights show RAID in action, etc.), and the network LED is on.

To troubleshoot, I cycled the power on my router, DNS321, I switched routers, network cable, without success.

My router shows my all the active devices on the network (both wired and wireless), and the DNS321 does not show up in the list.

Is is configured with a static IP address, so this is not a DHCP problem.  Pinging the box address does not return anything...

I would beat on a network cable or router port issue, but you have already eliminated that.

It might also be a box issue, "settings" might have get corrupted and the box is trying a DHCP lease or at last resort using a fixed IP such as 192.168.1.254., 192.168.1.253., ... 252...

I would first try a direct PC<->cable<->box  cable connection making the PC to use the 192.168.1.100 IP; the box will be at 192.168.1.254 That has been addressed in this forum several times.

Your last resort (before soldering wires) will be the reset button pressed for more than 20 seconds.

[Martin Dufour]

In that case, I would have seen the DHCP allocation.  And I already pinged the various addresses of my DHCP server range, without success.

Update : a direct connect to the box did not work.

But the full reset did work, it eventually answered back (and I was still in direct connect).

It recognized the drives, I just had to re-configure password, time zone, shares, etc... to get everything back to normal, and back on the network.

Thanks for the support and the resilient software!

So it looks like somehow the config got corrupt under what seems like normal operating circumstances (no power outage, mainly idle throughout the last week...).  Is there some log file that would have persisted through the reset that could give a hint on what actually happened?

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[João Cardoso]

On Monday, 26 October 2015 11:48:19 UTC, Martin D wrote:

In that case, I would have seen the DHCP allocation.  And I already pinged the various addresses of my DHCP server range, without success.

Update : a direct connect to the box did not work.

But the full reset did work, it eventually answered back (and I was still in direct connect).

It recognized the drives, I just had to re-configure password, time zone, shares, etc... to get everything back to normal, and back on the network.

Thanks for the support and the resilient software!

So it looks like somehow the config got corrupt under what seems like normal operating circumstances (no power outage, mainly idle throughout the last week...).  Is there some log file that would have persisted through the reset that could give a hint on what actually happened?

No. config files could be saved on disk, as already is done with the alt-f.log, but if something wrong is fond that would not explain why did it happens. It could however narrow the search. Most logs override older entries, so even if the issue origin was logged it could disappear (from the logs) after a couple of hours.

As you said that you have not changed anything (not even a "save settings"?) the issue origin would be very difficult to trace down without a live system.

What is your normal uptime? Some software "components" have leaks that accumulate over time, ending to turn the system unusable.

At least now you know that you will benefice by "save settings" to another computer file :-)

 

On Sun, Oct 25, 2015 at 11:47 AM, João Cardoso  wrote:

On Sunday, 25 October 2015 02:39:30 UTC, Martin D wrote:

HI,

I converted my DNS321 to Alt-F this summer, as it was the only way to drop in bigger disks without losing all the data.

Except for my mistakes (messed up partition tables with raid...  but the forums - and some patience - helped my recover everything), all went well and I did not lose any data.  (Great software, by the way... if only off-the shelf boxes could get rid of their crippled proprietary softwares, you would not have to do that...)

So all has been running perfectly for months, even started using mini-DLNA, until a few days ago : the DNS321 simply disappeared from my network.

The DNS321 itself seems to be working fine on its own (reacts to the reset / power down, blinking lights show RAID in action, etc.), and the network LED is on.

To troubleshoot, I cycled the power on my router, DNS321, I switched routers, network cable, without success.

My router shows my all the active devices on the network (both wired and wireless), and the DNS321 does not show up in the list.

Is is configured with a static IP address, so this is not a DHCP problem.  Pinging the box address does not return anything...

I would beat on a network cable or router port issue, but you have already eliminated that.

It might also be a box issue, "settings" might have get corrupted and the box is trying a DHCP lease or at last resort using a fixed IP such as 192.168.1.254., 192.168.1.253., ... 252...

I would first try a direct PC<->cable<->box  cable connection making the PC to use the 192.168.1.100 IP; the box will be at 192.168.1.254 That has been addressed in this forum several times.

Your last resort (before soldering wires) will be the reset button pressed for more than 20 seconds.

So...what's next?  Is there a known issue in Alt-F?  Has the Ethernet interface of my DNS321 just quit on me (but the network LED is on...)? Should I try a full reset of Alt-F (losing all my parameters, which, of course, is pretty much the only thing that I did not back up)? Or follow the un-brick procedure?  Start hunting for another DNS or consider upgrading to a new NFS (and lose the flexibility)?

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[Martin Dufour]

The latest events in the alt-f.log are indeed all related to the re-configuration I made after the full reset. 

The box had been up and running for 2-3 months since last reset.

The last "save settings" would have been made over 1 month ago when I enabled/configured miniDLNA.

The only other "external" event that I could think of would be the automatic update of the external pacakges list...