Hi all,

I've received a diskless ix4-300d (Iomega) - Type 70B8 recently and got it working with the imager containing the most recent firmware here: https://download.lenovo.com/nasupdate/asgimage/h4c-4.1.412.34888.zip

The device is configured with:

• 2 x 1TB WD hard drives set as RAID-1
• No protocols are activated at the moment.
• All other applications are either not installed (like Amazon Transmission), etc.. or disabled (like Media Server, Picture Transfer, QuikTransfer, etc..).  In essence, this device should be idling 99% of the time since nothing is connected to it.

   

That said, I'm suffering from the same problems as this old post, where:

• When the device is shutdown via the front power button or the scheduled power off via the Energy Saving application (Enable device power schedule->Power off), it effectively shuts down to only restart by itself a few seconds later.
• The front HDD activity led is almost constantly on (solid) with occasion blinks.  Normally, I would expect that the HDD activity led to go on when there is activity, but ironically, I'm suspecting that it's in reverse for some reason.  Here's why:
  • When copying files from a USB drive connected to it, blinking during the transfer appears normal
  • When idling though, blue led is almost solid with the occasion blink.  Interestingly, when connected via SSH and doing the following command
    
    

    root@ix4-300d:/# iostat -D 5
          sda             sdb             md0            dm-0             md1            dm-2            dm-1             sdc
     r/s  w/s   %b   r/s  w/s   %b   r/s  w/s   %b   r/s  w/s   %b   r/s  w/s   %b   r/s  w/s   %b   r/s  w/s   %b   r/s  w/s   %b
       2   68   24     2   68   28     0    1    0     0    0    0     2  275    0     1  275   31     0    1    1   518    0   43
       0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0
       0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0
       0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0
       0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0
       0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0
       0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0
       0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0
       0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0
       0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0
       0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0
       0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0
       0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0
       0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0
       0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0
       0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0
       0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0     0    0    0
    ^C

     

    Note that while this was being executed, HDD activity led was constantly blue yet from what we can see above, no IO was happening

     

Anyone have an idea on how I can resolve this?

PS: Also, I don't know if it's normal but every time the device powers up, there is an event like this that appears in the logs:

Edit: struggling with formatting...

So while I'm waiting for some help, I thought I'd dig a bit more into the HDD led activity always on and found why the HDDs always spin up even though all services and shares are closed.

I had 3 terminal sessions  open;

- 1 with the "top" command running

- 1 running with command: watch -n 10 "hdparm -C /dev/sda /dev/sdb" # Done after I had explicitely put the drives to sleep with hdparm -Y  /dev/sda /dev/sdb

- 1 running with command: watch -n 10 ""ls -latr <folder>"

Initially, folder was /var/log as I was suspecting something to be written there but no dice.  Where the drives are in "standby" mode, nothing gets written there (I had cleared out the folder initially)

Then I decided to check the /tmp folder and I had noticed that once the drives spin up, logrotate.status would get updated.  So thinking it was a "write memory cache" to disk think, I had initially symlinked /tmp/logrotate.status to /dev/null.  No luck there

Then I found it.  When the drives would spin up (roughly once an hour at the half-past the hour mark), I would notice a "smartctl" command being executed in "top" so I did a grep loop to capture the command being run:

root     13361 17625 16 08:38 pts/2    00:00:00 /usr/sbin/smartctl -d sat -T verypermissive -s on -H /dev/sda

So trying out each of the flags individually, I found that it is the "-s on" flag that makes the drives spin up **every time**.  I put the drives manually in sleep mode, execute the command above and drives spin up again.  Remove the "-s on" and the drives don't spin up and stay in standby mode.

In my opinion, that flag should only be executed either on boot up, after a raid reconstruction, or at the very least if the drives are flagged as "active/idle" mode, not in standby mode.

Btw, even when drives are in sleep mode, the HDD light is always on.  From what I've gathered from the tests so far, is that the "on" signal/flag is inverted, meaning that it should be on when it's off, and off when it's on.

I wish I had enough knowledge to at least fix the 2 issues mentioned in this post but I don't.  I'm open to any suggestions.

PS: Still have no idea why the system always turns itself on though.  I don't think it's a hardware problem because the unit does shut itself down completely when the initial flash from a USB stick is done.

Edit: typo fixes

So I found a workaround for the "always powering up by itself" issue.

Based on the last paragraph of this page (https://github.com/benoitm974/ix4-300d/wiki), I decided to try connecting BOTH of my ethernet ports to the switch since up until then, I had only connected one of the since I didn't need the redundancy for home.

Well, guess what.  It worked.  Once both eth ports are connected, the unit will shut down completely and not power up.  

PS: Using both ethernet ports is key.  Any configuration will work (bonded or not).

I've never been able to identify exactly what spins up the hard drives, only that it happens once an hour.

So even hard drives went on standby due to inactivity, the drives will spin back up an hour after the last time they started to spin up so it's something that's on a 60 minute timer.

I know this is asking for much but it t would be really nice that Lenovo fixes the following issues before support ends on the device on March 20th:

• Led HDD activity seems "inverted" (on when it should be off, and off when it should be on).  Even when the drives are in sleep/standby mode, the HDD activity led is on.
• HDDs spin up once an hour, even if there is no activity.  This could cause premature wear on the HDDs.
• Need to have the 2 ethernet ports connected for the unit to power down and stay off.  If only one is connected, unit powers up by itself a few seconds later.

I know they are not "security threats", but it would still be nice to have these issues resolved.

Is that something possible?