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How do I replace hard drives for a QNAP NAS that does not support hot-swapping?

Last modified date: 2025-07-04

Applicable Products

QTS, Storage & Snapshots, QNAP NAS (non-hot-swappable models)

Scenario

If your QNAP NAS does not support hot-swapping, hard drives must be replaced when the NAS is powered off. This article explains how to safely replace drives in such systems, particularly in a RAID 1 configuration—whether you are recovering from a disk failure or upgrading to larger drives.

Solution

Replacing a failed disk in RAID 1

If one of the disks in your RAID 1 storage pool has failed:

  1. Power off the NAS.
  2. Remove the failed hard drive and insert a new drive that has the same capacity or larger capacity.
    Important
    Do not use drives that were previously used in another QNAP NAS, PC, or Mac to avoid RAID metadata conflicts.
  3. Power on the NAS.
  4. QTS will detect the new drive and automatically start the RAID rebuild process.

    1. You can monitor progress in Storage & Snapshots > Storage/Snapshots > Manage > Rebuild.

  5. Wait until the rebuild process is fully completed before performing any other operations. You can monitor the rebuild progress in "Background Tasks" on the Toolbar.  
  6. You may also check the logs to confirm that the RAID rebuilding is finished.

Replacing both healthy disks to upgrade storage capacity

If you want to upgrade to drives of larger capacity:

  1. Back up all data from the NAS.
  2. Power off the NAS and replace both drives with new drives.
  3. Power on the NAS and initialize the system. This will create a new RAID 1 storage pool.
  4. Restore your data from the backup.

Note
You cannot expand RAID 1 capacity on a non-hot-swappable NAS by replacing one drive at a time. You must replace all drives and rebuild the RAID volume from scratch.

Migrating from RAID 1 to RAID 5 by adding a drive

If you want to change your setup from RAID 1 to RAID 5 by adding another drive:

  1. Ensure that the NAS supports RAID migration and the desired number of drives for RAID 5.
  2. Power off the NAS.
  3. Install the third hard drive (must have the same capacity or larger than the existing drives, and preferably a new drive).
  4. Power on the NAS.
  5. Open Storage & Snapshots and go to Manage > Migrate RAID Group.
  6. Follow the on-screen instructions to migrate from RAID 1 to RAID 5.

Recommendation

  • The NAS must be powered off when you install new drives on non-hot-swappable models
  • Always use brand-new hard drives for replacements.
  • Avoid reusing drives from other QNAP systems or computers.
  • Refer to the QNAP HDD Compatibility List to choose compatible models.
  • Maintain regular backups before making any hardware changes.

Further Reading

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