I have 2 EX4100 units and i use them sparingly. Last time i had them turned on was in October 2017. I turned them on last weekend and updated the firmware. I noticed that i could no longer access the drive by \ \sharename\Share, only by \ \IP Address\Share.
After that, i noticed i had to pull the power plug because the unit locked up and the power button would not repsond even after being held for a minute. That happened 1 or 2 times last weekend and then again this weekend when i had it powered on. I didnāt have both on, just 1 for now although i did update both firmwares.
My guess is whatever firmware updates have happened since October is the cause.
I have always had them hooked up to a UPS and use 1 power supply each.
I have all cloud and power saving features turned off. I was running about a 6tb backup from the EX4100 to a 8tb USB Drive and it even hung up during the copy at some point, so network activity is not enough to keep it from failing as i have seen some people suggest.
At this point, seeing no sign of it being resolved, I am going to just keep it turned off and maybe focus on getting another 8TB USB drive and then see if they ever fix it with a new firmware update.
Update: I have had a stable NAS for over a year - since uninstalling the Milestone Arcus app back in March '17 (see post above). Probably doesnāt help most folk with this problem though.
3 days have passed now and it hasnāt crashed yet. One thing I also find surprising is that my iowait has never been over 15% since this change (I usually get flooded with mails from NetData warning me the iowait and softirqās are wayyy too high). Also the performance has gotten a boost. Usually, I donāt get more than 25 to 30 MB/s out of this thing. Now it suddenly gives me close to twice that, while I havenāt even setup pairing. So no more warnings, it performs better than ever and Iām thinking: maybe 9000 is just too big forā¦ something. Perhaps the switch? Maybe this EX4100 secretly doesnāt actually support jumbo frames? I donāt know. What I do know is that This thing is doing better than ever before.
Iāll keep you guys postedā¦ Perhaps it will crashā¦ Iām counting on it actually.
Last update: WD has given me an advanced RMA. We now have a PR4100 next to our EX4100 and are moving data to the new unit (which easily manages to do 115MB/s instead of 30-35MB/s). The unit is also much faster than the EX4100. During the migration, the EX4100 has crashed three times already, where the PR4100 is picking its nose begging for more.
WD told me that by the look of the serial number, they could see this particular unit or series of units are faulty. Thatās when they offered me a replacement within the guarantee period.
So in a few days, when all data has been beeped over to the other side, we can close this case and send the faulty EX4100 back. Excellent service from WD!
Our two vSphere servers are still configured for 5000 bytes packet size. When this all is over, Iāll try upping those back to 9000 Jumbo Frames to see whether that makes a difference. But for now, weāre very happy.
WNAG26500714. It was a diskless enclosure. Now Iām in the process of migrating everything to the PR4100 which is fast, but yesterday the PR4100 wonāt show me the dashboard so now I cannot login. Great stuff.
Mine is WNAG25360101, so not really that close in number. I looked up the RMA process here from Australia and would need to ship the unit to Vietnam (which is a WTF moment to me!). My unit is out of Warranty anyways.
Hope you have better luck with the PR4100. Looks like you are off to a flier so far
I have finally bit the bullet and in the process of purchasing a āQNAP TS-453BE-4Gā and will look at transferring over my data to this unit. I am able to get it for around $700 AUD, so donāt think this is too bad a price, considering the EX4100 model is still being sold at $540 AUD. There is also a promotion for this unit in Australia at the moment for an $80 Gift Card. For anyone that is looking at an alternative, I think these look like they will fit the mark nicely.
Now just need to work out how to get all my data across. Might have to try and beg borrow and steal some storage from elsewhere for a week or two
WOW! Iām sorry yāall have gone through this. I just got a new EX4100 out of the box, got the problem, Googled it, found this thread, and returned the thing right away. I will get something else. THANKS to Yāall. I hope this is a lesson to Western Digital. Great customer service and quickly owning and addressing problems gives you and your products a great reputation; when you take years to fix a problem, you scare away users. Iāve been in IT almost twenty nine years, and I relied on your companyās good name to recommend this product to a client. After seeing this, I trust the users. The ones in this thread seem to know what theyāre doing, and it still wasnāt fixed? Thatās just sad. Thank you all for keeping the thread current and keeping us up-to-date with this sad story. I hope they can fix it. They say they canāt replicate it. I wonder why.
For what it is worth, after a long stretch with no issues Iāve been plagued by disconnects recently. I can see why this would be hard to diagnose, as it can run for months between problems, or sometimes just days.
WD has always been reliable for me when it comes to drives, but this is the first and last WD NAS I ever buy.
