Install slimserver on a drive not in the array


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So, I have slimserver installed and running and I realized that while slimserver is running, it doesn't look like the drive that has slimserver is being spun down (which is also keeping the parity drive from being spun down).  Assuming that my interpretation of this is correct, what do other people do with an application like this?  My thought is that I would get some other drive and put it on the tower, but not add it to the array.  I could install slimserver on that drive.  It wouldn't be part of the array and if that drive crashed, I would lose the slimserver install, but do I really care?

 

What do other people do with stuff like this?  Also, is it possible that the reason the drive is not spinning down is not because slimserver is installed on the drive, but because that is where the music files that slimserver is pointing to are sitting?

 

Thanks,

Chris

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I use slimserver under BubbaRaid.  I am also using the machine for torrents and stuff so the not shutting down of the drive does not really bother me.  Slimserver is going to have to spin up a drive to play the music anyway, so i would just place the slimserver install on the same disk as the music.

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I use slimserver under BubbaRaid.  I am also using the machine for torrents and stuff so the not shutting down of the drive does not really bother me.  Slimserver is going to have to spin up a drive to play the music anyway, so i would just place the slimserver install on the same disk as the music.

 

Well, the problem is not spinning up a drive, it is the fact that when I am not listening to music, it seems like the drive won't spin down.  For example, if I try to stop the array while slimserver is running, the array won't stop.  I go to the bubbaq page it it tells me that there are 90 (or whatever) files still open.  They are all in the slimserver install directory.  If I stop slimserver, then I can stop the array.  That is what makes me think that the fact that slimserver is running is what keeps the drive from spinning down.  If I had 12 drives, 1 drive running wouldn't be such a big deal, but right now I only have 3 drives (including parity) and something that keeps 2 of them running all the time seems like a waste.  So, I guess I am 1) Looking for confirmation that is the fact that slimserver is running that keeps the drive from spinning down (not the fact that I am currently using it to stream music, but that the process has just been started); and 2) Some other strategy for having slimserver running that doesn't keep an array drive plus parity from spinning down.

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  • 9 months later...

1) Looking for confirmation that is the fact that slimserver is running that keeps the drive from spinning down (not the fact that I am currently using it to stream music, but that the process has just been started)

 

What does the output of lsof look like?

 

lsof /mnt/user
lsof /mnt/disk1
lsof /mnt/disk2

 

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Looking for confirmation that is the fact that slimserver is running that keeps the drive from spinning down

 

I can confirm it's slimserver keeping them spinning.  I have slimserver installed on /mnt/disk4 while my music is on /mnt/disk2, and parity and /mnt/disk4 are always spinning.  I got tired of it and shut slimserver down [don't use it much anyway].

 

 

Can't slimserver be installed on the USB stick and run from there, i.e. not copy it to memory when the server boots?

 

If you go down this path, you need to consider that the frequent access described above is likely to reduce the lifetime of the USB stick.  Not quite sure how to estimate the impact.  May not matter when you consider the cost of a USB stick, but it is a bit of a hassle to replace your "licensed" USB stick.

 

 

Kevin

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Running with the USB stick idea - the stick would not be in the array, so what is the difference between using a stick and a HDD that isn't in the array? Maybe that'd be a way for me to use one of my drives that's too small to warrant a slot in my array.

 

anyone tried this?

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I was able to start on this today, using unmenu's excellent support for drives outside the array - would have been lost without that tool. I sorta made progress until my drive seemingly died, so I'll try again tomorrow with another drive. I'm using older IDE drives, so it won't take up a SATA port. These drives were all formatted by some other system at some time in the past..

 

I found a message that pointed me to using cfdisk to create a partition for the whole disk, but have a question on what to format to use for that partition:

 

Is there any benefit or expense to using reiserfs for a disk that will never be part of the array (i.e. should i use ext2 instead)?

 

- Unmenu has a button to format reiserfs, so that be easiest, but i dunno if that would get in the way.

- If I should use ext2 instead, can someone clue me into how to do this on the unRaid box?

 

thanks, John

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Can't slimserver be installed on the USB stick and run from there, i.e. not copy it to memory when the server boots?

 

If you go down this path, you need to consider that the frequent access described above is likely to reduce the lifetime of the USB stick.  Not quite sure how to estimate the impact.  May not matter when you consider the cost of a USB stick, but it is a bit of a hassle to replace your "licensed" USB stick.

 

What about putting it on a separate USB stick. A 16GB Lexar ist about $30 these days, even less.

 

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I was able to start on this today, using unmenu's excellent support for drives outside the array - would have been lost without that tool. I sorta made progress until my drive seemingly died, so I'll try again tomorrow with another drive. I'm using older IDE drives, so it won't take up a SATA port. These drives were all formatted by some other system at some time in the past..

 

I found a message that pointed me to using cfdisk to create a partition for the whole disk, but have a question on what to format to use for that partition:

 

Is there any benefit or expense to using reiserfs for a disk that will never be part of the array (i.e. should i use ext2 instead)?

 

- Unmenu has a button to format reiserfs, so that be easiest, but i dunno if that would get in the way.

- If I should use ext2 instead, can someone clue me into how to do this on the unRaid box?

 

I think that the filesystem shouldn't matter if the disk wouldn't be part of unRAID, as soon as the filesystem is writeable. You can even format ntfs-3g :-) I would probably stick to reiserfs as virtually everything in the box except for the USB stick is reiserfs, so not bothering with other filesystems. There is even a format-Button in unMenu for reiserfs.

 

 

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  • 4 months later...

Sorry for the late response, but I have a few questions on the process:

Did you end up putting Slimserver on a separate IDE hard drive, or the USB stick?

And is there a tutorial that you used for how to install Slimserver for the complete noob? I've seen a few posts where a full Slackware install was utilized, but I'm looking for something simplistic with my UnRaid 4.4.2 with UnMenu.

Thanks in advance

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You should probably make a copy of the USB Stick with slimserver on it and post it. I am ssuming it is self contained and would run on any unraid system.  If not I am sure you could easily make it self contained. Might just need a startup script in the config go file.

 

Would Probably make a lot of people happy. 

 

If you choose to do that and need hosting space I will provide it on my web server. I run slimserver (Squeezebox server) on the same system as my web server so I just decided to leave it there.  The music is all on unraid

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  • 1 month later...

Ditto, I'd love it if someone has a snapshot of a working slimserver install. I tried doing a manual install from a recent version of slimserver, but was running into a lot of permissions issues. Would be curious how portable an install really is, provided it's easy to re-initialize its database, etc. and one has the necessary dependencies already installed on top of a normal unRaid system.

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  • 1 year later...

Hello everyone, my first post here. I've been considering using UnRaid for my home media file server and squeezebox server is an absolute must.

In fact I almost bought the double pack Pro License until I realized I hadn't looked into Squeezebox + UnRaid.

 

Would anyone please share how they were able to install Squeezebox Server on a separate USB stick and use it with their UnRaid server. Have no idea how I would integrate it.

 

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Slimserver on unRAID is possible. I've had it running on the array but as mentioned it does keep spinning the drives.

 

It wasn't easy to run as I would find that the slimserver process would disappear and not be running which caused poor WAF.

Please take that with a grain of salt as that was over a year ago since I had slimserver on unRAID and things may better now.

 

I've moved all my music and slimserver onto another mythtv server.

 

Josh

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Thanks for sharing that. I guess UnRaid is not as solid as it could be with Squeezebox. That's a deal breaker for me.

 

UnRaid seems perfect for an audio and video media server. It's Squeezebox that actually caused me to think about building a unified media server to handle both audio and video.

 

I guess I'll have to think about a linux server with RAID6 for now. 

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It depends on what your priorities are i suppose. Data protection is the first for me and the video so it was fine for me to put it on another server too.

 

I've heard (but haven't tried) of issues with ubuntu server too. Not as easy to add drives/expand array and more disks required for parity. Not quite as user friendly.

 

Josh

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It is possible but has been a while since I tried to get it running. You can try running unRAID in a Virtual Box virtual machine (here) just be sure to update the version of unRAID that comes on that VM.  The unRAID version is outdated by quite a little bit. The VM will give you a way to test out unRAID and see if installing Slimserver will work for you.  There are numorous threads on here talking about installing it.

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Thanks I will look into it before I leave the UnRaid idea.

 

Just wondering, is it an issue of a workaround to get Slimserver installed? I was going to go with UnRaid because it was easy:)

I know people got it installed (will have to see how difficult it was/is) but then there was also the issue of hard drives not spinning down with Slimserver which led me to this thread.

 

I''m using an HP Proliant Microserver. It will have 5 x 2TB hard drives (and if UnRaid, 4 would be data and one parity) but there's an external sata port that can be rerouted to the inside and some people have used that esata to sata port for a cache drive. Can I place a small hard drive (may have to be SSD with space so tight) out of the array and install it there? I imagine that would be better than a USB stick which in time will degrade from usage.

 

Not to sound lazy but if it's a difficult road with UnRaid and Slimserver then I might as well use something free I figure. I was going to pay for the ease of UnRaid but Squeezebox/Slimserver is a must. I'll peruse this thread which seems to have recent activity too: SqueezeBox Server 7.5

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slimserver (or, to use the current name, SqueezeBoxServer) can run quite happily on unRAID.

 

I have SBS installed on the cache drive, with the logfiles directed to the /var/log directory on the memory disk.  My drives do not spin up unexpectedly - all are currently spun down, as I write this.

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slimserver (or, to use the current name, SqueezeBoxServer) can run quite happily on unRAID.

 

I have SBS installed on the cache drive, with the logfiles directed to the /var/log directory on the memory disk.  My drives do not spin up unexpectedly - all are currently spun down, as I write this.

 

PeterB, is there anyway you would kindly provide a short tutorial/guide on the install process for doing this?

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