Help rebuild SATA Mirrored Pair
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From: Folkert Rienstra on 10 Jul 2007 14:08 "Arno Wagner" <me(a)privacy.net> wrote in message news:5fhhadF3c6h54U2(a)mid.individual.net > Previously Dead Dead Money <DeadDeadMoney(a)nowhere.com> wrote: > > I have an Asus P4G8X motherboard with Silicon Image 3112a Controller > > and I installed a set of new SATA hard drives a few weeks ago as a > > mirrored pair - everything worked fine. (Only drives in the system.) > > > Yesterday when booting up I got an error, "incomplete raid set" then > > before I could react the system booted into Windows XP Pro. > > > I restarted the system and hit ctrl S to get to the RAID Configuration > > Utility, selected the option to rebuild the mirrored set. Selected the > > option for offlinerebuild and entered Y to start. Nothing appeared to > > happen but I let it go for a few hours but nothing happened. > > > Checked around and found that there should be some indication of percen- > > tage that was complete via a progress meter but it never even appeared. > > > I updated the RAID utility to what I think is the latest version, > > dated 2003 and tried again - no difference nothing happened. > > > I updated the BIOS to the latest version I could find - Rev 1006 and > > tried again - still nothing. > > > I tried the option for onlinerebuild - still nothing. > > > The utility shows Drive 0 Current and Drive 1 Rebuild > > > The computer will boot into Windows and appears to run normally with > > the exception of the drive. > > > Any help would be greatly appreciated! > > Does your RAID BIOS detect both disks? If not, you need to replace the > broken disk before rebuilding. Any disk at least the same size (in sectors, > one with the same number og GBs meu be a bit smalle) should work. The babblebot seems to be finally running out of braincells. > > Arno
From: Folkert Rienstra on 10 Jul 2007 14:11 "Dead Dead Money" <DeadDeadMoney(a)nowhere.com> wrote in message news:26f793prkq7hfnknaj6v2qvqu70kokhuq0(a)4ax.com > On 10 Jul 2007 13:53:17 GMT, Arno Wagner <me(a)privacy.net> wrote: > > Previously Dead Dead Money <DeadDeadMoney(a)nowhere.com> wrote: > > > > > I have an Asus P4G8X motherboard with Silicon Image 3112a Controller > > > and I installed a set of new SATA hard drives a few weeks ago as a > > > mirrored pair - everything worked fine. (Only drives in the system.) > > > > > Yesterday when booting up I got an error, "incomplete raid set" then > > > before I could react the system booted into Windows XP Pro. > > > > > I restarted the system and hit ctrl S to get to the RAID Configuration > > > Utility, selected the option to rebuild the mirrored set. Selected the > > > option for offlinerebuild and entered Y to start. Nothing appeared to > > > happen but I let it go for a few hours but nothing happened. > > > > > Checked around and found that there should be some indication of > > > percentage that was complete via a progress meter but it never even > > > appeared. > > > > > I updated the RAID utility to what I think is the latest version, > > > dated 2003 and tried again - no difference nothing happened. > > > > > I updated the BIOS to the latest version I could find - Rev 1006 and > > > tried again - still nothing. > > > > > I tried the option for onlinerebuild - still nothing. > > > > > The utility shows Drive 0 Current and Drive 1 Rebuild > > > > > The computer will boot into Windows and appears to run normally with > > > the exception of the drive. > > > > > Any help would be greatly appreciated! > > > > Does your RAID BIOS detect both disks? If not, you need to replace the > > broken disk before rebuilding. Any disk at least the same size (in sectors, > > one with the same number og GBs meu be a bit smalle) should work. > > > > Arno > > > Hi Arno, thanks for the reply. > > Yes both drives show up when booting and in the RAID Utility (crtl S > during bootup) > > Interestingly while searching the Asus site I found someone with a > differently model motherboard who, seemingly, has the same problem - > "incomplete raid set" and when attempting to rebuild, no progress > meter. (no reply to either of us from Asus LOL) > > Does the "incomplete raid set" typically mean that the system is not > seeing one of the drives? You just answered that question right above. Please do not encourage the braindamaged "og GBs meu be a bit smalle" babblebot. On a good day it can't even write it's own name. > (I'm a total noob on RAID but this is what > I suspect your question implied...) > > Thanks again for your reply!
From: Arno Wagner on 10 Jul 2007 19:19 Previously Dead Dead Money <DeadDeadMoney(a)nowhere.com> wrote: > On 10 Jul 2007 17:37:27 GMT, Arno Wagner <me(a)privacy.net> wrote: > Hi Arno, > Based on your reply about the drive missing I tried swapping out the > data cable on the "missing" drive and it came back up! Cool! That also explains why the drive was removed from the array: Too many interface errors. The initial drive detection is less critical and could still have worked with a bad cable. > I guess it is time to search out some QUALITY SATA cables... I have had problems with some too. > One last question, hopefully. When the system rebooted without errors > after I replaced the cable I checked the RAID configuration utility > and it showed the drive back in action. > I thought I would go ahead and try to rebuild the array just to make > sure the drives were really synced up however it wouldn't let me do > it. > My question is would the drives "automagically" resync themselves? Usually not. > I > didn't purposely change any data files during the time the one drive > was dead however I figured some system files (swap file, browser > history etc) would have changed just during the times I rebooted and > surfed around looking for possible solutions. That is not how it works. The RAID controller does not know or understand files. In fact it does not know or undertsand the filesystem in the first place. But I seem to remember you said something about a "background reconstruction" earlier? That would be done while the array was in use. To be sure, check the array status with the monitoring/management software. You should be able to get that from the manufacturers (either controller or mainboard) website. Arno
From: Dead Dead Money on 13 Jul 2007 12:16 On 10 Jul 2007 23:19:45 GMT, Arno Wagner <me(a)privacy.net> wrote: >Previously Dead Dead Money <DeadDeadMoney(a)nowhere.com> wrote: >> On 10 Jul 2007 17:37:27 GMT, Arno Wagner <me(a)privacy.net> wrote: > >> Hi Arno, > >> Based on your reply about the drive missing I tried swapping out the >> data cable on the "missing" drive and it came back up! > >Cool! That also explains why the drive was removed from the >array: Too many interface errors. The initial drive detection >is less critical and could still have worked with a bad cable. > >> I guess it is time to search out some QUALITY SATA cables... > >I have had problems with some too. > >> One last question, hopefully. When the system rebooted without errors >> after I replaced the cable I checked the RAID configuration utility >> and it showed the drive back in action. > >> I thought I would go ahead and try to rebuild the array just to make >> sure the drives were really synced up however it wouldn't let me do >> it. > >> My question is would the drives "automagically" resync themselves? > >Usually not. > >> I >> didn't purposely change any data files during the time the one drive >> was dead however I figured some system files (swap file, browser >> history etc) would have changed just during the times I rebooted and >> surfed around looking for possible solutions. > >That is not how it works. The RAID controller does not know or understand >files. In fact it does not know or undertsand the filesystem in the first >place. But I seem to remember you said something about a "background >reconstruction" earlier? That would be done while the array was in use. > >To be sure, check the array status with the monitoring/management >software. You should be able to get that from the manufacturers >(either controller or mainboard) website. > >Arno Hi Arno Sorry it took me so long to get back to you - I had some other problems LOL!!! I checked the Silicon Image site for a monitoring/management utility but they seem refer you back to the motherboard manufacture. Checking on the Asus I wasn't able to find anything there that would let me check the drives - only add or delete members or rebuild mirrored set - however that option doesn't do anything! Is there some generic utility that would let me compare the drives or are they proprietary for the controller? If not could I just delete the array then rebuild it? Thanks again for putting up with all this! Hope you have a good weekend!
From: Arno Wagner on 13 Jul 2007 19:02
Previously Dead Dead Money <DeadDeadMoney(a)nowhere.com> wrote: > On 10 Jul 2007 23:19:45 GMT, Arno Wagner <me(a)privacy.net> wrote: > Hi Arno > Sorry it took me so long to get back to you - I had some other > problems LOL!!! > I checked the Silicon Image site for a monitoring/management utility > but they seem refer you back to the motherboard manufacture. > Checking on the Asus I wasn't able to find anything there that would > let me check the drives - only add or delete members or rebuild > mirrored set - however that option doesn't do anything! > Is there some generic utility that would let me compare the drives or > are they proprietary for the controller? Well, under Windows I fear all this is proprietary. Under Linux there has been some reverse-enginnering and building of non-proprietary tools, but it seems these cheap RAID controllers are generally a sad business... > If not could I just delete the array then rebuild it? If you do not mind looing your data, that should work. It will still not give you any morniroting while the system is running. > Thanks again for putting up with all this! No problem. Arno |