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RAID stands for Redundant Array of Independent Disks.

RAID is data storage technology that allows multiple drives to be used together as a single virtual drive for reasons such as fault tolerance, reliability and performance.

There are several different levels of RAID that determine how the data is stored and the level of redundancy achieved across the drives.

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Hello all,

I have a HP server DL 580 G5, running VMware vSphere 6 Essentials HP Custom version.
The hardware has 2 RAID controllers Smart Array P400. See attach.

Vsphere for some reason can only see the Embedded RAID controller and not the Controller in Slot 10.
I've tried to install the drivers manually but it doesn't seem to work.
However, If I install VMware version 5.5 it can see the controller in Slot 10.

Can some one point me or instruct me on how to inject or install the correct driver for RAID Controller in Slot 10?
I've included a few attachments. The one in question is vmhba4

Pls let me know if you need more information.

Thanks,
Fernando

5 Comments

i have an intel s1200btl mother board trying to install raid drivers.. no drivers to seem to work even from intel site any suggestions

RAID
Storage

7 Comments

I've got 2 T430s, with an Intel Xeon E5-2630 v4 2.2GHz (10 core), 64 GB RAM, a mirrored 300 GB SAS drive for os & 6 2TB SATA in a RAID 10.
Looking to set up Exchange 2016, network version of Quickbooks enterprise, Trend Micro worry free business security, a remote access server, file & print server, as well as the MS stuff, DC (or 2?) DNS, DHCP, etc.
In complying with licensing, I gather the only role I can have on the host is Hyper-V, which is on my 300GB, would any other VM 'parts" go here, as well?
When setting up VMs, does one VM encompass the OS & data, which would normally be on 2 different arrays the 'old way'?
The two directories for VMs would both be on my RAID 10, correct?
Any suggestions on the best way to spread all my pieces between 4 VMs?
If I've got too much stuff here & would be better splitting between questions, lemme know.
Thanks!

8 Comments

Hi all,

Really need some help please. Have a small domain network running on 2012 with less than 10 users set up on it that is running painfully slow for all users. Even saving a 20K file can take a minute. 600MB folder transfer is reporting as needing about 20 hours.

I have just installed this brand new Dell R430 server, 32GB Ram, Dual Xeon Processors, Perc H710 card with 4 x SAS 10K drives in Raid 5 for the main data partition. Running Server 2012 R2 as a host server and have created a single VM running 2012 Standard which has been set up as a single domain controller/file share with DHCP and DNS server roles. I made sure I updated all of the Dell drivers on the host before installing the VM and have run all updates on both the host and the VM. There is a brand new 24 port gigabit unmanaged switch into which the server, a Watchguard T30W Firewall, a Wireless access point, a Synology NAS device and 4 laptops are all plugged in.

I've checked there are no IP conflicts, get a steady ping to the server at <1ms. DHCP is working fine and there are no issues accessing websites however everything is so slow.

I've disabled VMQ in the advanced properties of the VM Host NIC and also disabled SMB signing so I know the issue isn't with those.

Would really appreciate any pointers.

Thanks

Adam

9 Comments

Hi

Info on server :
DL 385 G8
Server is running VMware ESXi 6.0
Controller card P420i

We rebuilt 2x600GB SAS drives in a raid 1 to 2x1200GB without any issue.
When trying to expand the disk space on the logical volume it prevents us of doing this or there is no option as it complains there is a 600 GB Hot-spare drive configured to the same array (Array A).
I do not have any option in ACU on removing of Hot-Spare drive, i have the option to erase the drive.
Will an erase of the drive tell it that it is no longer a hot spare drive ?

How can i remove the Hot-Spare drive ? I would like to repurpose it to another Array B as a hot-spare.

Update, i tried to do this from ESX console using hpacucli using command ./hpacucli ctrl slot=0 array A remove spares=2I:2:8
but got Assignable spares not available (see attached screenshot).

Show command on Array A

Regards
Roger

13 Comments

Hi we currently have had a failed harddrive in our server i have replaced the drive i no seem to be gettin a warning as posted below thanks chris
Untitled.png

4 Comments

I have a box that I configured to use MD RAID during the install process for the OS and boot drive. It's this weird /dev/md0p# structure that confuses me.

The installer produced /dev/md0p1 (/boot), /dev/md0p2 (/var/lib/mysql), /dev/md0p3 (/), /dev/md0p4 (extended), /dev/md0p5 (swap). I noticed it did this for all physically installed machines from the CentOS 6 DVD.

How do I increase the size of the /dev/md0p3? I need this root partition to be expanded. I feel like I need to delete the /dev/md0p3, /dev/md0p4, /dev/md0p5 partitions and then create a new one for /dev/md0p3 with the extra space. I don't care for p4 and p5, because they don't contain actual data. I can create them after the fact.

I am confused on the order of deleting partitions and adding the space in respect to /dev/md0. fdisk -l shows the drives /dev/sda, /dev/sdb and then finally /dev/md0 with all of the sub partitions.

2 Comments

Hello,

I have a PowerEdge 730 with H730 RAID controller. I created a RAID 5 array with 2 x hot spares. The total available disk space is about 4.4TB.

I created a single VD using all the available space.

I installed Windows Hyper-V Server 2016 core. During the install I did not manually create partitions since I intended on having only a single partition of all the available space to allocate to VMs so I just selected the raw disk space, which displayed as 4.4TB. This was the first mistake since now the entire partition is MBR. That being said, it only sees 2TB max.

Now I need to shrink the OS partition to about 500GB so I can create 2nd GPT partition so I can make use of the remaining space.

My second mistake is what complicates the situation a little more. I installed and deployed 3 production VMs assuming I had all the disk space to work with.

I have made a backup of the VMS using Veeam backup and replciation and I moved the production VMs to external storage for the time being so I can adjust the C:\ partition.

Now, my question is... Can I use diskpart to shrink the C:\ partition and then create a second partition with the remaining space on a single VD or do I have to shrink the VD in the RAID utility and create another VD.

Is what I'm trying to accomplish possible without destroying the OS?

I know there is always a risk, which is why I have backups, but I would like to do it with the least amount of down time. I've already had the VMs off…

5 Comments

I have IBM server 3650 with 4 hard disk install slot no 1,2,3 is have HDD 750GB and they are in raid 5 and the same array.
in addition. the slot number 4 have hard disk 300 GB this hard disk was faulty I have removed and inserted into the running server and it went to an orange solid light and flashing green light. I assumed at that time it was rebuilding the drive. it is still it rebuilding the drive.

Moreover, I found one partition disappear

Does anybody know why the light is flashing green light? on the drive? Any suggestions for?

4 Comments

I’m using integrated to mainboard storage controller in RAID1 mode for my Windows Server 2008R2 system.

So one day I’ve corrupted my system and I’ve restored it from full backup, including MBR.

But I’ve got a message that "BOOTMGR is missing" and first thing I’ve decided to do is to load MS DaRT to repair my boot issue and at first boot MS DaRT found some bootable problems and asked me If I want to fix them. I’ve pressed OK : )

After this regular steps the magic had arisen: PC came to reboot and after reboot the problem still here - "BOOTMGR is missing". So, I thought OK, let’s check the MS DaRT again, and while I press to load USB with MS DaRT my system begins to boot.

What the heck?

Now I’m not able to run my system without MS DaRT and also I even can’t run MS DaRT?
Is it a black magic? Please help me!

3 Comments

We have two servers: power edge r610 and power edge t610. Both of these servers are displaying in the front panel error;
w12228 raid controller battery capacity.

Do we have to replace the batteries or can this be fixed by rebooting the server.

How can I get the batteries part # or model for these servers, so that we can order these two batteries.

RAID
Storage

7 Comments

I am attempting to configure a RAID 0+1 configuration on a Dell Precision T3600. The drives were previously in service and want to wipe them clean and start from fresh. My objective is to destroy all current partitions and create a new RAID configuration. How can I accomplish this within the BIOS Setup Configuration? I thought CTRL I would allow me to accomplish my objective, but I am not getting an option for CTRL I during the boot cycle.

Lipotech

2 Comments

I 'm stuck in this problem and have no Ideas.
Can somebody help me, please?
Thank you
Uli

3 Comments

i have ibm x3200 m3 server with hardware raid 5 configure (4 hdd) with simple swap . so how to know all 4 hdd status. & what to do if os is crash

3 Comments

LVL 15

Question by

LockDown32

2017-06-11Solved

RAID Question

I was playing around with software mirroring on a Windows 10 box with two SSD drives. There was no increase in throughput between a single drive and RAID 1. I was under the impression RAID 1 should have increased the throughput because there were two drives filling the pipe as opposed to just one but it didn't change much. Why wasn't RAID 1 better?

6 Comments

I have a Dell T320 server that we just restored from an image backup. It had two (of three) RAID drives in predicted fail, when we removed one to replace it the RAID died immediately. Rebuild of RAID with new drives and then restore from backup went smooth. Now I'm having some trouble.

On boot, it tries to enter system recovery.
If I tell it to boot normally, it tries to load Windows then restarts.
If I go into system recovery, it can't find the Windows installation and asks for drivers or an image to restore. If I load RAID drivers, it finds a Windows install on the RAID volume, which is mapped to the next available drive letter. (Not C:)
Then I can run startup repair and it will prompt for a reboot and boot Windows properly. (With the right volume mapped to C:)
The system runs mostly fine. I have a .NET issue I'm working on but I THINK it's unrelated.
If I reboot the system it goes back to the beginning.

I'm also confused about how it's getting to the advanced boot menu to prompt me to enter system recovery without a Windows volume.

9 Comments

Hi guys,

Scenario:
Dell blade server which has smoke damage due to a fire in the building.
HDD's SATA seem ok.
VMware ESXi

Aim is to get the VM's out.

Is there a way to recover a Raid 10 array of 6 hard drivers, BUT i only have the ability to see one HDD at a time via a PC (maybe I will need some raid recovery software). I have a dual bay SATA caddy that I intend on using.

Any suggestions people? Any other ideas?

Many Thanks.

4 Comments

Hello,

I bought the server about 4/5 years ago, it came with "windows small business server 2011".
This is the chassis
http://www.supermicro.com/manuals/chassis/tower/SC748.pdf

I replaced all the old hard drives recently and decided to start from scratch with new windows setup. I chose RAID 6 expecting to get about 8GB of usable space(ie from 4 * 4GB disks with 2 disk redundancy) . However I wasnt familiar with the difference between MBR and GPT when partitioning. I guess I chose MBR if I was prompted, because now that is the partitioning system and Im limited to 2GB per Volume. I created 1 Volume (C drive).

Is there anyway to convert this current bootable volume to GPT or perhaps there is a way to allocate the remaining space to some other drives?

btw, the BIOS version is "American Megatrends Inc. 3.0b, 01/02/2013" but I seem to be having trouble logging into the BIOS now at startup, Ive tried all the usual key combos.

Any help or suggestions much appreciated

Thanks

3 Comments

Question by

casabo

2017-06-07Solved

Server 2008 Reboot

I rebooted our file server which is a 2008R2 used only for file services. There were two Microsoft updates one of which was a service pack update. It has now been close to two hours and on the screen it still says that it is shutting down. The blue circle to the left of the text is solid and not spinning. It has (8) 2 TB hard drives in a RAID 5 array and the last drive is blinking steady green with no other activity. My question is: Is it possibly still doing something or is it locked up? I don't know whether I should force another restart or not. Any thoughts?

8 Comments

Hi,

I bought HP DL380-G4 server from eBay and it seems to work but I'm having problems installing Win 2003 OS- I've 6-hd @ 146 GB/ - I created the RAID containers- 2-RAID-1 and 3-RAID-5. I tried to separate 6th had as a spare but I unsuccessful or couldn't figure out how to-?
This is my home network- lab I want to practice with it before joining the server team in a month or so.
I tried to run SmartStart 8.70B for x64 and booted to the CD but it ran for a good 5-7 minutes loading but then I was left with a HP screen and no activity. So I decided the power down the server.
Windows is not able to see the hard drives? What am I missing here?

8 Comments

I have a problem to resize my hardisk from the Raid bios. There is no option to resize. So I move to command line.

The actual size of the disk is 1TB but Virtual disk only show 571GB.

root@main [~]# MegaCli -LDInfo -Lall -aALL


Adapter 0 -- Virtual Drive Information:
Virtual Disk: 0 (target id: 0)
Name:
RAID Level: Primary-1, Secondary-0, RAID Level Qualifier-0
Size:571250MB
State: Degraded
Stripe Size: 64kB
Number Of Drives:2
Span Depth:1
Default Cache Policy: WriteBack, ReadAhead, Direct, No Write Cache if Bad BBU
Current Cache Policy: WriteThrough, ReadAhead, Direct, No Write Cache if Bad BBU
Access Policy: Read/Write
Disk Cache Policy: Disk's Default
Virtual Disk: 1 (target id: 2)

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The disk that should be raid as below;

root@main [~]# MegaCli -PDList  -aALL

Adapter #0

Enclosure Device ID: 252
Slot Number: 4
Device Id: 22
Sequence Number: 1
Media Error Count: 0
Other Error Count: 0
Predictive Failure Count: 0
Last Predictive Failure Event Seq Number: 0
Raw Size: 953869MB [0x74706db0 Sectors]
Non Coerced Size: 953357MB [0x74606db0 Sectors]
Coerced Size: 952720MB [0x744c8000 Sectors]
Firmware state: Unconfigured(good)
SAS Address(0): 0x73a13c2fa27fc39f
Connected Port Number: 4(path0)
Inquiry Data: ATA     WDC WD1003FBYZ-01V03     WD-WCAW3K9A34RC

Enclosure Device ID: 252
Slot Number: 5
Device Id: 21
Sequence Number: 2
Media Error Count: 0
Other Error Count: 0
Predictive Failure Count: 0
Last Predictive Failure Event Seq Number: 0
Raw Size: 953869MB [0x74706db0 Sectors]
Non Coerced Size: 953357MB [0x74606db0 Sectors]
Coerced Size: 952720MB [0x744c8000 Sectors]
Firmware state: Online
SAS Address(0): 0x738d3620a180a892
Connected Port Number: 5(path0)
Inquiry Data: ATA     WDC WD1003FBYZ-01V03     WD-WCAW37322576

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I have add another disk and using below command to resize.

root@main [~]# MegaCli -LDRecon -Start -r1 -Add -PhysDrv[252:4] -l0 -a0

Failed to Start Reconstruction of Virtual Drive.

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I read from this link : https://serverfault.com/questions/729711/lsi-replace-disk-in-raid1-with-larger-drives-how-to-expand-raid-to-use-free-spa
I could expand to use Free disk space but unfortunately not working as expedted.

root@main [~]# MegaCli -LdExpansion -p100 -Lall -aAll
Invalid input at or near token -LdExpansion

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Appreciates that anyone could help.

Thanks.

3 Comments

Hello guys,

I´ve been looking for this solution quite long time...and still dont have proper answer...so...what is the best practice for setting up RAID10 storage for VMware VMs?
Do i need to setup same strip size for all layers? - vmware, vm´s, os?
Whats the best practice for large files stored on virtual disks?

Thank you!!

Regards

Jiri

3 Comments

I have this server with 1 tb x 4. Inside I have 4 cables in one
I also have another 1 tb

How to raid all five in one?

In F2, three is option to select raid with 4 drives by a click

6 Comments

Hi,

I ejected each of the two disks in my Readynas NV+ v2 NAS in order to remove dust in the bay. Following this my NAS no longer mount the drives.

When I insert one of the drives it says "new disk added" in the lcd display. Is there any way to recover the content of the disks?

Web interface also stopped working and only shows "permisson denied" message when I try to access the site without presenting a login screen.

3 Comments

This is on a Dell Powervault MD1200 which is serving as storage for an ESXI5.5 host.
There are two 8TB disks for this purpose.
They will act as storage for an RHEL VM server.

Had problems getting it working when setting up as one large VD occupying the entire available space: Link

Thought it was the disks - got new ones: same issue.
Decided to create a VD using only 2TB...success! It works as intended. Seems to be some bug in the Linux or ESXI OS.
I am creating more VDs with the remaining space to make sure this will work.

What I am wondering if this is a good idea? Any potential drawbacks? Is it harder to recover from a disk failure or other such problem?

8 Comments

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