Adding extra discs to Synology NAS

I don't think you need to format the existing drive. The following page might help if you want to migrate your volume(s) from basic level to RAID 1 protection in your multi bay Synology:

https://www.synology.com/en-gl...upport/tutorials/564

The added disk needs to be of at least the same size as the existing disk.

The existing drive should remain untouched.  Once the new drive is in and formatted, look for the Migrate function to consolidate your discs into a mirrored pair. You should not have to change any settings but after migrating it's always a good idea to check that the user and access permissions for your network shares have not been changed. 

It should be a doddle with a compatible HDD but it may take some time. Just as a watched kettle never boils, a watched RAID array never finishes replicating. But it will, if you walk away and forget about it, preferably overnight, possibly over a weekend.

Many thanks. My remaining question relates to formatting. If I put the new disc in and turn the NAS back on, will the formatting be done automatically, which is what happened when I added the first disc?

Both discs are exactly the same; WD Red 3TB.

Possibly.

My QNAP is supposed to format a new HDD automatically but it doesn't. This is solved at the click of a button in the browser based control panel.

I went from two 1TB discs to two 2TB Reds and the whole process, including, in my case, resizing took a week end.

Wish I'd gone 3 or 4TB now. But that's always the way.

HH

Can't advise specifically as I don't use Synology but have one piece of advice.

If the NAS contains more than just a backup of your Unitiserve, i.e. any downloaded music you have bought then back this up before adding a disk.

Whilst the migration process should be painless and should work as described, introducing a change adds risk and should things get buggered up (technical term) then at least you can factory reset the Synology with the 2 disks in and start again and redo your backup from the Unitiserve.

Richard

Well, the new disc is installed and it seems to format automatically. But the option to change Raid types is not there. The only option is to expand the existing volume. So I'm doing that in the hope that once it's done (which will probably take all weekend) I'll be able to then change the Raid type. Here's hoping.......

Looking again, now it's trundling along (2.68% complete......), it says that the expansion is set as Synology Hybrid Raid (SHR) with one disc fault tolerance. With only two discs, SHR is the same as Raid 1, so I may have cracked it. Can it be this easy?

Experience says....... probably not!  

One disc fault tolerance sounds good, congratulations.

It's now all complete. I've checked in the desktop client and the 4am scheduled differential backup completed successfully. So I now have the main copy of the music in the UnitiServe, with twin backup copies in the Synology.

Thanks everyone for your help. I've said it before and I'll say it again - this is where the Forum comes into its own.

Good.

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