Replacing my Synology nas. Any tips?

[Baldbloke]

My new toy will be arriving later today. A Synology DS220+.

I currently have a DS218j with two 3TB WD reds. Lots of files and labour intensive configurations for file shares, Cctv (surveilance station) and a bunch of other stuff.

I'm in the process of googling how to use my existing hard drives from the 218j and insert them in to my new 220+. Hopefully it will be a painless and seamless experience.
Whilst I'm doing my googling I thought I'd ask here if anyone has experience of doing similar.

A back up of configs and data is a must before I start the swap.

Any tips for me please?

 

[Baldbloke]

How did you get on? I didn't think it was possible to take drives out of a J and move them to a + model.

I'll l find out shortly,. You may be right but I've got my fingers crossed anyway. My backup using hyper backup took 38 hours. Bloomin' slow that hyper thingy. Backup completed at 9am this morning then had to go to work. Couldn't hang about to stick the old drives in the 220+. Just got back from work now. I'm going to give it a go tonight if I can stay awake long enough.

 

[Baldbloke]

This lists says you can't use the DS418, DS418J and DS218 but doesn't mention the 218J so you might be lucky. Please let us know how you get on.

Yes, I read similar to what you've suggested there. No clear mention of going from 218j to 220+. I'm going to give it a go in the next hour or so. I'll post back to let you know. I have the data backup and sys config back up saved on an external usb drive. All will not be lost if it decides it needs to format my drives. So here goes......

 

[Baldbloke]

By ecky thump! . It looks to be working.
I had made sure DSM was up to date before removing the drives from the 218j.
Installed the drives in the 220+. Powered itself on as soon as I inserted the 2nd drive. (D'oh! moment, that. I should've made sure I had the psu unplugged before inserting. ) Hopefully hotplugging hasn't had any adverse effect.

Anyway, it powered up. I searched with Synology assistant. Nas was found ok. Then it came up with the message "looks like you are using 218j drives in a new220+. Would you like to migrate the data and configs or just the data?"

It then goes on to say configs may not all be transferred over completely. No big deal that though. I sort of expected that much at least. Then it updated to the latest Dsm firmware, automatically rebooted.
Now asking me to log in. Looking good. The name I gave the original 218j has appeared. I'll log in and have a quick shuftie. Too late tonight to do any proper tests or investigations. I'll report back

Edit: This is looking good. At first glance all the data is there. Several exclamation marks overlayed on package shortcuts on the DSM desktop. I imagine these will either need updating or reconfiguring.

In short... Whoop-dee-doo-da!

 

[Baldbloke]

I'm not sure myself if I should just have transferred the data only then configured my settings and stuff from scratch again. There's a wholebuncha configuring needed. It's been so long since I did some of the stuff I previously configured I've forgotten how to go about it. Unscrambling what has been defaulted, misconfigured and just plain lost in the changeover is going to be tougher than starting from scratch. Now is where the tinkering, the learning, the enjoyment and frustration starts all over again. I'll figure it out and no doubt enjoy it in the end but right now..... I just wanna be a tree

 

[Baldbloke]

The only problem with doing what you’ve done is you don’t get to use the new file system btfs which your plus model can utilise.

I wasn't aware of Btrfs up till you mentioned it. Well, sort of stumbled across it in settings I think but didn't take any notice of what it was or what it does. Now had a quick google. Looks like a very useful feature.

The configuration was so messed up after the drive swap. I spent two or three days trying to unscramble the settings. Failed miserably. Couldn't even get share links or quickconnect to work. It was driving me nuts. I gave up and just did a factory reset and fresh install. Then copied what data I wanted from the backup on to the new Nas . It all works fine and flawless as far as I can see now. So, by chance, not by intention, I have ended up with Btrfs enabled. I've just had a quick shuftie at my storage pool. It says it is Btrfs.

Note for anyone else trying to do this the way I did it at first: If you want to keep your sanity, DON'T .

 

[Baldbloke]

Hi the voice,
I had a look at that list of compatible models you linked to. You’re right, the 220+ is not listed.
Then logged in to my 220+ nas. Had a look at storage manager. It does say the file system is Btrfs.
Now, I haven’t tested any of the features Btrfs has. So can’t really suggest it is fully compatible but it says it is Btrfs.
Dunno. Looks alright. It’ll do for me