Problem After BI Disk Upgrade

[Q™]

I'm having issues after doing this with my existing BI4 server at work...

1. Booted Blue Iris 4 and turned off the Blue Iris Windows Service
2. Quit Blue Iris 4
3. Pulled the existing WD 6TB (OS Drive V Purple out of the server and put it in an external USB3 Enclosure
4. Installed a new WD12TB Purple in the server (the server only accommodates 1-3.5" driver + 2-2.5" drives)
5. Configured the new WD12TB to be Drive N:
6. Reconfigured WD6TB from Drive V: to Drive S:
7. Copied (5.6TB) of existing Blue Iris (*.bvr) video files from from the old WD6TB drive (S:\Blue Iris\New\*.bvr) to the new WD12TB drive (S:\Blue Iris\New\)
8. Booted Blue Iris and changed the BI Folder paths as follows...
   • Alerts: C:\Blue Iris\Alerts (No charge here: this is how this instance of BI has always been configured)
   • New: N:\Blue Iris\New (The new WD12TB Drive N: )
   • Stored: S:\Blue Iris\Stored (The old WD6TB Drive S: )
   • No other BI Folder Paths were previously (or are currently) defined
9. Ran Database > Repair\Regenerate
10. Rebooted the BI server
11. After regeneration booted BI and set up BI to run as a Win10 Service
12. Rebooted the server

The problem is that -- after performing the above steps) I expected all of the (old) alerts and (old) associated clips from the past several months to be present when I run the BL Administrative interface. However, only new alerts and clips are displayed; all of the old Alerts and old clips are missing.

What did I do wrong?

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[Tinman]

Did you change anything to your original DB location ? I assume you had the DB on C:

 

[th182]

I just replaced a drive in my BI5 machine. Actually I spun up a second machine with BI5 to test, then once I was satisfied with BI5 I took the drive from BI4 and moved it to BI5. What I found is the files have to be in the same spot as the current camera setting expects them to be. In the process of upgrading drives I also swapped some cameras between new and stored. I had to move the files to where each camera now expects them to be. Several TB of files that had to be shuffled between two drives.

For instance: FrontDoor camera used to be on the “New” folder that was D:/New. It is now on the “Stored” folder that is now at E:/Blue Iris/Stored. I had to copy all old FrontDoorxxx.bvr files from D:/New to E:/Blue Iris/Stored. Then do a database rebuild.

Confirm that files for the camera are in the correct spot. Seems like you may have done this but worth a double-check. It’s late for me and I’m on my phone so I may have missed something in your post.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Q™]

Did you change anything to your original DB location ? I assume you had the DB on C:

The database location was not changed during this procedure. Yes, the DB in on c: (SSD).

 

[CCTVCam]

When doing anything with drives I recommend cloning disks rather than copying. Unfortunately since Norton Ghost was discontinued, the best cloning software is now corporate level and quite complex. I use Storage Craft Shadow Protect, but it's far from straight forward at times, at least when copying Window installs. Copying just files is child's play.

Another step I always take is to asign the new drive the same letter as the old removed drive. That way a system sees eg C when previously it saw C, not Drive eg. L.

 

[IAmATeaf]

Do a rebuild of the database. When I shuffled things around I had to do the rebuild twice, no idea why until all the clips were available for viewing without an error re missing clip file appearing.

 

[Q™]

Do a rebuild of the database. When I shuffled things around I had to do the rebuild twice, no idea why until all the clips were available for viewing without an error re missing clip file appearing.

Rebuilding the DB has not resolve the issue; I've tried that several times.

 

[gwminor48]

The files appear to be there when you look with windows explorer I presume? If you double click one of the older bvr files does BI open it?

 

[Tinman]

I'm guessing that BI did not like the new 12TB drive letter changed from V: to N: Might try making New drive V: again and then try rebuild. Or do what I do and wipe everything clean and start fresh

 

[Q™]

I'm guessing that BI did not like the new 12TB drive letter changed from V: to N: Might try making New drive V: again and then try rebuild. Or do what I do and wipe everything clean and start fresh

I am thinking that is indeed the reason. And I’m thinking that’s what I’m going to do.

 

[CCTVCam]

The reason for cloning a drive and not simply copying files is there are often hidden files or registry entries referencing locations that may no longer exist if you just copy the obvious file content of a program. If you copy program files, you simply copy what you can see. If you clone a drive, you clone everything on the drive including hidden files and those in other system partitions. You also can keep the drive letter the same (although the latter can be changed manually provided the old drive is no longer connected with copying).

I also need to correct myself above slightly, Shadow Protect can be hard to use if copying Windows System drives, largely due to partition options / issues. It's easy to clone and restore non system drives as these issues generally don't arise.

 

[Tinman]

The reason for cloning a drive and not simply copying files is there are often hidden files or registry entries referencing locations that may no longer exist if you just copy the obvious file content of a program. If you copy program files, you simply copy what you can see. If you clone a drive, you clone everything on the drive including hidden files and those in other system partitions. You also can keep the drive letter the same (although the latter can be changed manually provided the old drive is no longer connected with copying).

I also need to correct myself above slightly, Shadow Protect can be hard to use if copying Windows System drives, largely due to partition options / issues. It's easy to clone and restore non system drives as these issues generally don't arise.

Try Macrium Reflect free version, it works great. There are no hidden files in BI4 or BI5 clips.

 

[IAmATeaf]

I’ve moved files around drives, admittedly not onto a new drive and had to rebuild twice so it is possible. In my case one of my drives was getting fuller than the other so I moved the clips from two of the cameras over to the second drive.

 

[CCTVCam]

Moving files is one thing. Moving the program and it's folders is another. Unless I misread above, the drive hosted both the program and file folders.

 

[fenderman]

Rebuilding the DB has not resolve the issue; I've tried that several times.

Try deleting the db folder and restarting.

 

[bp2008]

It sounds like the big mistake was not assigning the old drive letter V to the new HDD before turning Blue Iris back on. If you had, then it shouldn't even have needed the clip DB to be repaired/regenerated.

No idea why the clips don't return, though the alerts are gone for good.

 

[Q™]

It sounds like the big mistake was not assigning the old drive letter V to the new HDD before turning Blue Iris back on. If you had, then it shouldn't even have needed the clip DB to be repaired/regenerated....

I think your spot-on about this Brian.

...No idea why the clips don't return, though the alerts are gone for good.

After rebuilding the DB a half-dozen times all of the clips (all the way back to 5/1/19) are back...but the Alerts are GONE. Note that the original Alerts path never changed; the Alerts have always located on the SSD OS boot drive as was the the database...

• c:\BlueIris\db
• c:\BlueIris\Alerts

These two (2) locations have never been edited; all of my historic Alerts (back to 5/1/2019) are still present in c:\BlueIris\Alerts directory.

Neglected to mention that this server is 4.8.6.3 x64

 

[fenderman]

I think your spot-on about this Brian.



After rebuilding the DB a half-dozen times all of the clips (all the way back to 5/1/19) are back...but the Alerts are GONE. Note that the original Alerts path never changed; the Alerts have always located on the SSD OS boot drive as was the the database...

• c:\BlueIris\db
• c:\BlueIris\Alerts

These two (2) locations have never been edited; all of my historic Alerts (back to 5/1/2019) are still present in c:\BlueIris\Alerts directory. View attachment 47193

Neglected to mention that this server is 4.8.6.3 x64

alerts are never stored in the alerts folder, that folder is only for high res alert images if you select to store them - usually a waste of space. Alerts are stored in the database.

 

[Q™]

alerts are never stored in the alerts folder, that folder is only for high res alert images if you select to store them - usually a waste of space. Alerts are stored in the database.

Aha!

 

[srglassw]

In Blue Iris version 4 you would turn off hi-res alert images by unchecking the "Store alerts as hi-res files" option on each camera's Camera Settings / Record tab. Interestingly, the Blue Iris version 5 help file gives the same instruction but that option does not appear on the Camera Settings / Record tab (see attached image).

Edit: The "Store alerts as hi-res files" option is on the Trigger tab in BI5... help file needs to be updated.