Restoring RAID-5 configuration after RAID controller failure

No, all drives are intact and in their original bays.

Is Server under warranty?
If yes i strongly recommend talking to support from HP.
It would be worth for sure.

Generally RAID information is stored on the disc, but get the exact same raid controller.

That was mentioned here for adaptec, but should be quite similar for hp:
http://serverfault.com/questions/52481/adaptec-3405-failed-recover-raid-5-set

Hope you have ordered exactly same controler.

"Generally RAID information is stored on the disc, " - Which one? Or is it striped across all RAID members?
The HP warranty has expired a while ago (not a critical server). The controller is Adaptec and we ordered the exact model, but we'll check anyway upon arrival. Checking your links now

Be careful at each and every key press and make sure what you are doing, if have questions post them here, not matter if they sound stupid, your 500gb is at risk.

If it is adaptec, then go through the links and read all, may surely help.

Reading the links.
We're not touching the disks, the box is powered off and waiting for the controller. If your guys are right and the controller config is mostly stored on the disks and we get the correct controller, then we should be golden in theory, but then again the harsh reality may still screw up everything.
I'll continue reading and will update you with more questions or when we have the new controller. We'll certainly try the Runtime utility.
Thank you,
S.

Looks like we cannot run the RAID Reconstructor because it is run under Windows. We cannot get to Windows as we don't have any environment to connect all disks to a non-raid controller box.

That won't be a problem...plugins are available so it can be run from Windows PE or Bart PE.

http://www.runtime.org/peb.htm

but:

"Notes
We do not endorse running our programs under WinPE or a boot CD-ROM created with PE Builder (BartPE). You assume all risks from the use of our software. Since WinPE is a very reduced version of Windows XP you should run our software only if special circumstances prohibit the use in a full Windows XP. Some features might not be available and our software might behave unpredictably. Due to limited resources on WinPE our software can close unexpectedly. When using our software under a boot CD-ROM the help system and foreign language modules are not available."

I wouldn't worry about it...its a pretty standard disclaimer.  I've used it many times, works fine.  You don't have to purchase the software unless it works, and its read only, so you won't hurt your disks.  There's no harm in trying...and it may just s.y.a.

Do you have another HP server which can be used to insert drives and see what it picks up from the drives?

no. see details in upper thread.

To answer your previous question: each disk contains your array configuration on the last 16 blocks of each drive in the array (RAID table or metadata).  Not all controllers do this the same, but the adaptec code is pretty standard.  If you still don't want to use raid reconstructor and the controller doesn't pick up your array, you can attempt to recreate the array if your controller allows you to create an array by using Skip Init, which will create a new array without initializing the drives...it basically only updates metadata.  

http://ask.adaptec.com/scripts/adaptec_tic.cfg/php.exe/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=3918&p_created=1026942349&p_sid=pfP*IwIj&p_accessibility=0&p_redirect=&p_lva=1227&p_sp=cF9zcmNoPTEmcF9zb3J0X2J5PWRmbHQ6MSZwX2dyaWRzb3J0PSZwX3Jvd19jbnQ9NDIsNDImcF9wcm9kcz0mcF9jYXRzPSZwX3B2PSZwX2N2PSZwX3NlYXJjaF90eXBlPWFuc3dlcnMuc2VhcmNoX25sJnBfcGFnZT0xJnBfc2VhcmNoX3RleHQ9cmFpZCB0YWJsZQ**&p_li=&p_topview=1

Did you try disconnecting the drives and trying to boot?  See if there is still an error.  What controller are you using?  You may want to try a low level firmware reset or firmware update.

Moderator:
This question is not abandoned. We're preparing feedback today-tomorrow. The radio silence was due to our waiting for the replacement parts as indicated above. Keep it open.
S.

gikkel,

our controller is Adaptec AAR 2410SA, it is SATA-150, not SCSI, so the article from Adaptec web site is not quite relevant. We did try disconnecting the drives and hot-plugging them back in, the controller showed "could connect to SATA ports 0, 1, 2, 3 and same error after the drives were back in bays. The Skip Init option you mention is not available on this controller, or at least we couldn't find it. We reset the firmware with the same one (as it is EOL old controller) successfully but to no effect.
We received the new controller the other day, will be trying it today. I will update the thread.
S.

correction: should read ""could NOT connect to SATA ports 0, 1, 2, 3"

Cool, even easier :)  Take out the drives and put them in another machine, or use a different controller (in non-raid, standard ide emulation mode).  Do not do anything to the drives, just make sure they're not listed in the boot menu.  From there either boot to Windows from another drive or use the windows pe cd.  RAID Reconstructor will help from there.  Just so you know, if it looks like I'm pushing raid reconstructor, its only because I know it works...and very well.

Are you using a backplane?  Try connecting directly to the controller.  At this point I'm unsure whether the new controller is going to identify the array, you should at least try raid reconstructor (it is free to try)...

Everyone:

We received the new 1:1 identical RAID controller and tested it - NO GO. The controller does not see any arrays, it can only initialize the drives, but this is not what we were hoping for. So this leads us to believe that the old bad controller kept all config info on itself, not on the drives, but its memory went bad now or smth and didn't come back even after the firmware reset. Next we tried the RAID Reconstructor (RR), prepared the BartPE disk as instructed with the RR plug-in and all that -> booted up to Bart -> RR didn't see any controller, hence no disks. We then re-booted Bart with F6 + Adaptec driver manually uploaded - same result, no controller visible in RR or in Captain Nemo or in any other Bart utility. In Step 1 of RR when you click on the drive to add there is only 1 available option to do - Select virtual image. So so much for the RR.
Any other suggestions before we wipe the drives back to the dark age, gentlemen?
Thanks,
S.

We don't have another box with 4 bays, only 2 is possible, but 2 won't work.

What do you mean by "backplane" in this context? Is it the board that sits right behind the drive bays and is hard-integrated with them? There is one and the 4 SATA cables are connected to it on the front and to the RAID controller at the back. The original box is a standard HP DL100 G2 server. Do you mean there are 4 SATA ports somewhere on the system board where we can connect the drives to bypassing the controller?

Slavyan: I am not sure if any solution works or not, but you should at the end or may be now, try to call some company who does this data recovery from RAID if your data is worth the recovery cost.

Again that is a risk as well, if company is not that skilled, they may just return back after screwing it and saying cant recover, you cant do anything, but atleast some hope is there.

Trying different solutions may (may not) make this worst to recover or simply bymistake may just get re-initialize, and its history.
Right now it is like playing with fire, you know that right?

If i were you, i would not have tried till here if the data was really important. I honestly respect all the EE Experts here and we all will try our best to provide solutions to you without any issues.
Probably other Experts may object on my comment but at the end its you and your data.

If you think data is not worth, then lets try our best to fix it.

Think twice!!

gikkel:

i dont know why but i didnt see your latest comment dated Sep 25, neither did i see the notification of this comment by email. anyway it's too late now as we wiped the disks 2 days ago. data is history now, we can replace it by bits and pieces from different locations hopefully.
s.