I've got a Raspberry Pi here I've set up to use as a NAS box. I've set up Samba and all correct permissions on the shared folders. I can access them through Windows and begin copying files...


Soon after I encounter numerous errors;

The device has failed because of an I/O error
The network path is no longer available
You need permission tp perform this action

I then login to the machine and attempt to issue simple commands and get:

-bash: /bin/ls: No such file or directory

etc. etc.

I've used two different hard drives in an external enclosure and have made the Pi boot from the hard drives to improve performance.

I'm really stumped at what this could be, my current thinking is that the external enclosure I encase the hard drive in is somehow faulty as I have also tried making the shares available on just the external drive whilst still booting from the SD card.

I really appreciate your thoughts...

How is the drive connected to the PI? How is the drive powered? Sounds like it is loosing power and shutting off as far as the PI is saying (drawing too much power on a USB port perhaps).

Something I have experienced with USB drives is on slower USB 2.0 (which the PI is), the network will take more then the drive can accept over it (fills cache and slows down).

The drive is a self powered USB 2 hard drive caddy and is connected via USB A to B cable into one of the Pi's ports. The Pi is powered with it's own USB micro charger 5V 2A.

You could very well be right...

I'm using this drive here: http://www.amazon.co.uk/CiT-3-5-inch...productDetails

But looking at the power cable for the hard drive it could possibly be wrong, can't find power requirements for it on the web.

I have a ton of power cables but two stand out, one which was plugged into provides 12V with 1.5A while the other is 12V with 2A Output...

Hmmm...

3.5" drives in my experience, typically draw more power. You don't say what model and version your PI is, and I know some of the earlier ones had more issues with power through the USB, so one experiement to try, if you have one, is to plug the hard drive into a powered hub. (might stabilize it)

I was actually using a Pi2 for this - seems to have been a problem with Samba, which is weird because it was causing programs to produce 'command not found' error.

Anyway appreciate the help!

Remember the PI2 has that light sensitive power filter... cover it with some black electricians tape...

The disk should have an external power supply (the CIT container lists an auxiliary power unit)