The port multiplier module in my newest external SATA enclosure failed this past weekend.  We went to put on an episode of CSI or something and there were no episodes listed.  After checking the other TV series folders, I saw that none of them had any files in them.  Logging into the unRAID web management showed that all drives active in that enclosure had fallen offline.  The three drives consisted of two that held my TV series and the third which was my NAS share.

A series of reboots and connects/disconnects later, I gave up and marked it as a lost port multiplier module.  The good news is that PC-Pitstop is going to let me just remove the module and ship that back instead of sending them the entire unit.  That will save a good $20 on shipping alone.  If you need any storage-related hardware, I highly recommend that shop.  Good products, fair prices and, so far, their support has been terrific.

This whole ordeal has really made me appreciate unRAID so much more.  Had this been a RAID5 array, it would be completely offline right now - with a possibility of data loss.  With unRAID, all I had to do was unassign those “lost” disks, recalculate parity and I was back up and running with all of my movies intact - and protected.  When I get the PMP module back, I can just plug it all back in, assign those disks and recalculate my parity - everything will be just like it was.  The flexibility of unRAID really does astound me.

Last night I replaced the HTPC3 of my in-laws with an old Hp system that has a Sempron 3000+ and 512MB PC-2700…I don’t remember the model number.  The old P4 just wasn’t displaying video on loading Windows anymore.  I’m sure I could have fixed it, but the Hp was already configured and just needed the 11n card for the network.

I still haven’t gotten around to replacing the motherboard in my son’s HTPC.  I might get around to that next weekend.  That’s about it for me.  Not much happening in my HTPC world, but I’ll be sure to update when it does!

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 3rd, 2008 at 7:06 am and is filed under HTPC. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.