Recovery Guide: Jellyfin & NAS Mount Recovery

Scenario: The server froze due to CPU overload (heavy downloading/unpacking), causing the network shares (SMB/CIFS) to drop. Jellyfin cannot see media because the /data directory is empty or unmounted.

1. Prerequisites & Health Checks

Before attempting to remount, ensure the "source" and "tools" are ready.

Check NAS Status

Ensure your Samba service is actually running in the NAS container/server. If the NAS is down, the mount will fail.

  • Action: Log into your NAS and verify the Samba/SMB service status.

Verify cifs-utils

Ensure the client VM has the necessary tools to handle SMB shares.

sudo apt update && sudo apt install cifs-utils -y

Note: If it says "already the newest version," you are good to go.

2. Diagnostic: Check the /data Directory

Check if the media folders are currently visible on the VM.

cd /data
ls

  • Success: You see movies, shows, and downloads.

  • Failure: The directory is empty or missing folders. This confirms a mounting issue.

3. The Fix: Refreshing Mounts

If the folders are missing, you need to force the system to re-read the /etc/fstab configuration and remount the network drives.

Step A: Reload the System Daemon

Tell Ubuntu to acknowledge any changes made to configuration files.

sudo systemctl daemon-reload

Step B: Mount All File Systems

Force the system to mount everything defined in /etc/fstab.

sudo mount -a

Step C: Verify Visibility

Check the directory again to ensure the network share is active.

ls /data

4. Restart Jellyfin

Once the files are visible to the OS, restart the Jellyfin container so it can re-index the media.

cd /docker/jellyfin/
docker compose restart jellyfin

Key Notes for Troubleshooting

[!IMPORTANT]

Why did this happen?

When the CPU overloaded, the cifs kernel client likely timed out. Because the /etc/fstab entry exists, the system knows where to go, but it needs the mount -a command to physically re-establish the connection after a hang.

  • Config Location: /etc/fstab (Contains the IP and credentials for the NAS).

  • Verification File: If you see text.txt in /data but not your media, double-check that the NAS didn't unmount the drive internally.