Sam of Ham

Nor do I! As I said I've always had a great time with Rufus so I didn't even think about it - that said, Rufus DOES, of late, pop up a note about the ISO image type, and not having all the files it needs when preparing to write the HexOS ISO - see below: This reads to me as "click yes and everything will proceed according to plan" but, there could easily be something going wrong during the 'attempt to download' the required GRUB file(s). I should really have thought more about these when I saw them but, because HexOS load(ed) at least initially, and because the image seems to show up fine, I assumed it wasn't a problem, and made the proverbial ass of myself. Thanks again for all your help here, sincerely! I still might reserve the right to be mean to my NAS for a while just to let out my frustrations 😆

I... I was... I would have.... FUUUUUUUU-- Ordinarily, I would absolutely have tried another USB, and I actually was trying a bit ago, but that drive was being funky and wouldn't connect to Windows well and I gave up. I completely overlooked trying Balena Etcher (Rufus has always been rock solid for me so I never bother thinking aoub it) but NOW THAT YOU'VE SAID IT I feel like I remember needing to use it for CORE back in the day TOO! I am an IDIOT! Anyway, I grabbed a third USB, Etcher, and a new copy of the .iso, and set it all up again, and wouldn't you know it, the damn thing worked. Installed HexOS to the SSD, plugged in the HDDs and went to boot, and the box picked up the data drives to boot to. I thought I wasn't out of the weeds yet, but on a whim I tried re-enabling the B120i and going in and deleting the RAID array on the drives but keeping the single "array" on the SSD, which allows me to set the logical array as bootable in the B120i. Rebooted and... LOOK! HexOS!! I am as much at fault as any part of the technology in this thread, but in the end, through all that crap, and with your help, we got there, so... THANK YOU very much!!

Nope, this is on loading HexOS's installer - the system hands off to USB boot, GRUB loads, I select "install HexOS" (out of the list of 2 options) and then I get that message. I don't get into any part of the HexOS installation itself.

This is with the B120i disabled and all 4 drives removed (just the boot drive) in Bay 5: This is with the B120i enabled and all 4 drives removed (just the boot drive) in Bay 5: After cleaning the disk (just by pulling it out, dropping it into Windows and doing dispart clean to wipe the parts) I don't think I can disable the B120i because I think it needs to be there to mark Disk 5 as bootable... Unless I'm crazy. (I'm probably crazy.) Whatever I do, I can't get anything to boot anymore! Losing my shit, haha! Thanks for your help so far @PsychoWards!!

Hey @PsychoWards, thanks for your help. Good point - I HAD wiped the drive prior to installing HexOS the first time, BUT not during the most recent round of struggling through the LSI and B120i cards. I sort of assumed HexOS would still boot, and then when it didn't, figured I would just re-run the installer - I don't think I wiped the disk. I'll do that tonight and let you know how I go, thank you! Screenshot 2 is currently what happens without drives connected - suspect the above might help though. I thought to recreate the HexOS image on the USB drive, but not to wipe the destination drive! Got it, thanks on the RAID info. I had assumed that, if I let a dedicated RAID system handle all that, and just point TrueNAS towards the partitions, I'd be getting the benefits of both, but I can see why that would be the opposite of what I'm getting. If you'd like to, I'd love to learn more about why it's better to go with one or the other, especially when it comes to ZFS - my understanding of ZFS is basically "it's a file system and disk manager" (yes, I know that's like saying Windows is a file system... But that's what I know right now!!) Thanks heaps. Will report back tonight.

Thanks @Manders! I HAD HexOS running at the start but couldn't get any drives to work - now I can't get it to install anymore (see above screenshots.) Yep, though I don't mind if the data is wiped (would prefer not to but I know it may be necessary) Current pool is a bit of a mystery but it was handled by CORE. ZFS it would be I believe as I have the warning to upgrade my ZFS flags in the CORE install. No hardware raid in the old system, but I COULD run hardware raid in the new NAS box. Thank you! Hope that helps!

OH, by the way - yes, I did re-create the HexOS bootable drive, in case something on read screwed up GRUB or the HexOS Image. I used Rufus 4.6 and the lates HexOS .iso.

Hi all, I'm truly sorry to be bringing you all a barely-HexOS related problem, but I come begging for help from the people who likely know best--NAS owners, Self-Host Enthusiasts, and the HexOS team themselves--with my proverbial heart in my hands. I'm at the point where I am truly frustrated and I just need to ask in case anyone has the magic solution for me (and I will owe you big time if you do!) Mods, I more than understand if this isn't relevant and you're welcome to remove this, and I apologise for wasting anyone's time. Here's the story. I'm upgrading from a HP Microserver (circa 2010) with no special upgrades; mainboard, SATA bays, TrueNAS CORE. Over time, the TrueNAS system locks up, and, while it works, I can't access or log into it at all - the login page just gives me "incorrect username/password" and I have to force power-cycle the thing. That's fine; I've wanted to upgrade for a while and found a good deal on a fully-kitted HPE Microserver G8 (with iLO - perfect!) from an enthusiast. HBA card, integrated RAID controller, 4-bay SATA, iLO, Xeon CPU, all the mods to make Disk 5 work for bootable media. I have had nothing but problems in migrating. Wanting to get off of old CORE (iX are discontinuing it, plus, doing moronic things like removing native SMART data...) to HexOS and SCALE, and since I have an EA backer license wasting away, I figured, no worries, I'll install HexOS and migrate the disks. I plugged in an SSD, installed HexOS, claimed the server, happy as. I backed up all the data a second time just in case and moved the disks across (4x4TB WD Reds, FWIW.) No disks in HexOS/SCALE interface. Alright... Probably RAID - it used to be software RAID handled by CORE, this thing has the B120i. That's fine. Go into HP SSA - no disks, only bay 5. WTF? Skip a lot of time and headaching and I realise the backplane is connected to the PCIe RAID controller (LSI 9261-8i) not the board (should have realised that, I know. I'm new to HBA RAID beyond just SW raid on Windows and CORE.) I... can't work out how to use the RAID card, it doesn't use a GUI, so it's all magic unknown CLI nonsense (to me, at least). Also, with some painstaking searching - it looks like LSI RAID cards need to be put into HBA mode for SCALE to control the RAID, but, SCALE doesn't support the card in HBA mode. Okay - fine. F*ck the RAID card - I disable it in BIOS and go back to the B120i. At this point I'm content with the RAID controller potentially losing me my data during RAID config. I screw around with boot modes about 18 times and finally get the drives to show up in HP SSA. Hoo-freaking-ray. Set up RAID, off we go to boot HexOS and install and get my goddamn NAS back up and running. And now we're up to NOW. With the drives in, I get the below: And with the drives OUT, I get this! So I can't use the RAID controller, I maybe can't use the B120i, and it almost feels like I can't use HexOS either. Argh! I am lost! I feel like I'm destined not to have a nas with any form of modern features! No iLO, no RAID controller, no damn apps, just my buggy old CORE interface on a nearing-20 year old box. So, for at least just the sake of your understanding of my current mindset, I plead for any help anyone might have for me. I wrote this a little tongue-in-cheek-humoured, but honestly, I'm so damn angry at this whole process (not HexOS, as I said, but the whole thing; HP, SSA, the B120i, the LSI card, the iLO, the NAS, CORE, SCALE, HexOS, you name it, I'm just soured on the whole lot, meanwhile my NAS is down and my hopes of a simple home freaking media server are shrivelling up.) Thank you for your time and for any help you could possibly offer me.

Yeah the TrueNAS CORE implementation is like goddamn rocket surgery. I'm getting to CORE now via exit node/subnet routing, but without that, I'd still be tearing my hair out. SCALE is Debian (i think!) so it should likely be supported like Proxmox or any other Deb distro! YES. Immich is definitely right up there on my list, probably #3 under HA and Tailscale!

I second this! Would love native Tailscale support. I don't see why a partnership should mean it's off the table - they support Synlology and QNAP after all. Tailscale doesn't have to expressly partner with/support HexOS directly, just be compatible (which the Debian-based SCALE should be, from memory!)

Don't worry, I know this is like talking about the castle at the end of the journey before we even take our first step! I wanted to start this more as a discussion/casual poll of our most wanted apps, however, so that when it comes time to expanding, there's a list of ideas/feedback ready to go! I'll start - I really want Tailscale support, be it natively, or official-unnoficial testing of the FreeBSD compile (if HexOS is built on the FreeBSD CORE image and not on SCALE - but either way!) that works on OPNSense/pfSense, or even in collaboration with Tailscale themselves. I think FreeBSD really needs some love to bring it more seamlessly to FreeBSD platforms and this is a perfect place to start, and if it's SCALE based, then I guess just testing and validation to make that oh-so-ideal one-click app deployment seamless! Bonus entry; HomeAssistant support, but both ways. if HA can be set up ON HexOS, AWESOME! I think, though, that it would also kick butt if HA could connect to HexOS and get info from it; drive health, usage, CPU util/temp, stuff like that! Big thanks to the Hex team and really looking forward to using this system!