Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion Meridian - Streaming Can M predict hard drive failure

Greetings,

Several years ago when Sooloos was first introduced I recall that part of their marketing package indicated that they were able to "watch/monitor" a units hard drive in order to evaluate whether it was on the verge of failing.

Does anyone know if this service is still available?

The reason I ask is that a few days ago I've noticed that the front panel indicator light on my MC200 (500GB) shut itself off. The internal green pilot light remained illuminated, but the MC200 went into standby mode without my manually touching the back panel switch. The remainder of my gear was still powered on so I don't think it was an electrical surge.

I powered down my entire system and rebooted the MC200 and it is functioning normally so far without any recurrence of the problem.

If I seem overly concerned it's because I already suffered 1 hard drive failure in 2012 which resulted in my loss of use of my MC200 for almost 4 months!

If it's likely the MC200 hard drive (or other component) is failing I'd better squirrel away some $ for a CD player.

I do backup my MC200 to an external hard drive, but I'm trying to get ahead of the game here in advance of the holiday season.

Any help/advice is welcomed.

If you have a power blip, the MC200 will turn off and need manually re starting in my experiance.
It needn't be much of a blip either.
Thoughts, Chris.

Hi Matsaly

Backing up your MC200 only backs up your music library, the Sooloos software is also on the disk and if the disk fails you are looking at a return to Meridian for repair as the software is not available.

Russ

I wish that this was true, as I believe so does TD4.

We have both possibly suffered problems with MD600 units, with no warning of imminent disc failure or data corruption from the local, or unlikely remote, diagnostic capability relating to this product.

Hoping not to have to re-rip 50% of my Sooloos library.

Will report back on the whole saga later.

Hector

I would recommend investing in a QNAP NAS and hope the promised Sooloos core firmware app for the QNAP is released soon.

That set up (with appropriate RAID redundancy) "should" be more resilient than the single disk (not-user-servicable) MC200. (And not much more money than a CD player.)

J

Just saw your signature block - you'll have to add an MS200 or other source to get analog output from the QNAP setup.

It seems the consensus is that M doesn't offer a predictive HD failure service. My hope was to proactively "schedule" a HD replacement IF the hypothetical service had determined an imminent HD failure. Last time around (2012) it took M weeks to ship a spare HD from the UK to the US service center.

I understand that the Sooloos backup function only backups my music data and not the Sooloos O/S.

The idea of a QNAP NAS is appealing on the surface as it offers redundant hard drives, but I'm hesitant to purchase it until M actually releases the software to run the QNAP as a core.

Thanks for your collective help.

The peace of mind of having remote monitoring was one of the reasons I spent the money for an MD600. If this is a non-existent feature I'd be very miffed, to say the least.

The Meridian web site has listed under Signature Features for the MD600:The data sheet from the Meridian web site also states:(emphasis mine)

I am aware that the words "can" and "may" are used, but if MD600s are not monitored continuously by M Support, then I wonder what it would take to get a health checkup or whether M can provide a monitoring capability for us, the owners of the MD600. If remote diagnostics is only done after a user calls support because he's experiencing problems, this "signature feature" is not what I thought it was.

Soundserge

It's like Libor and VW all over again!

I have had a disk failure in an MD600 that both Meridian and the MD600 failed to notify me of.

If you want reliable prediction of disk failure move to a QNAP and set it up to email you when a fault is logged. I have had 2 disk failures (bad block count exceeded threshold) in my QNAP and both were identified in the logs before the disk actually failed.

Maybe a dealer or Meridian could confirm if they do indeed actively monitor all MD600's.
I suspect with the QNAP core coming that Meridian are or shortly will be stepping out of providing storage apart from the MC200?

Russ

Meridian do not have any automated way of being notified about a drive or drives going down.

If you had any concerns, speak with your dealer, give them your MAC address of the unit (If the dealer supplied you the unit they should have this) and ask them to speak with Meridian.

Kind regards,
Ian.

I've asked M support directly as the dealer I purchased the MD600 from no longer carries Meridian.

I have a QNAP NAS, but I also have a purpose-built (and bought) appliance in the form of a Meridian MD600 that's 1.5 yrs old and that cost me several thousand dollars. I'm not ready to experiment with a new plugin or to give up on the storage capabilities of the MD600

Soundserge

'THUMBS UP SMILEY'

Most of our clients prefer a Meridian integrated system.

Kind regards,
Ian.