Replacing a failed Drive

Before replacing drives • Be sure that the array has a current, valid backup. • Confirm that the replacement drive is of the same type as the degraded drive (either SAS or SATA and either hard drive or solid state drive). • Use replacement drives that have a capacity equal to or larger than the capacity of the smallest drive in the array. The controller immediately fails drives that have insufficient capacity. In systems that use external data storage, be sure that the server is the first unit to be powered down and the last unit to be powered up. Taking this precaution ensures that the system does not, erroneously, mark the drives as failed when the server is powered up. Replacing drives The most common reason for replacing a drive is that it has failed. However, another reason is to gradually increase the storage capacity of the entire system. NOTE: In fault-tolerant configuration, hot-plug hard drives can be replaced when server is ON, but in case of a Non-hot-plug hard drive, it should be replaced when server is OFF. For systems that support hot-pluggable drives, if user replace a failed drive that belongs to a fault-tolerant configuration while the system power is on, all drive activity in the array pauses for 1 or 2 seconds while the new drive is initializing. When the drive is ready, data recovery to the replacement drive begins automatically. For systems that support non-hot-pluggable drives, if user replace a drive belonging to a fault-tolerant configuration while the system power is off, a POST message appears when the system is next powered up. This message prompts user to press the F1 key to start automatic data recovery. If user do not enable automatic data recovery, the logical volume remains in a ready-to-recover condition and the same POST message appears whenever the system is restarted. Automatic data recovery (rebuild) When user replace a drive in an array, the controller uses the fault-tolerance information on the remaining drives in the array to reconstruct the missing data (the data that was originally on the replaced drive) and then write the data to the replacement drive. This process is called automatic data recovery or rebuild. If fault tolerance is compromised, the controller cannot reconstruct the data, and the data is likely lost permanently. Time required for a rebuild The time required for a rebuild varies, depending on several factors: • The priority that the rebuild is given over normal I/O operations (user can change the priority setting by using HP SSA/ACU) • The amount of I/O activity during the rebuild operation • The average bandwidth capability (MBps) of the drives • The availability of drive cache • The brand, model, and age of the drives • The amount of unused capacity on the drives • For RAID 5 and RAID 6, the number of drives in the array • The strip size of the logical volume • Firmware versions of the Smart Array Controller and Hard Disk Drive • Presence of BBWC/FBWC CAUTION: Because data rebuild time may go upto the rate of 200GB/15 minutes, the system could be unprotected against drive failure for an extended period during data recovery or a drive capacity upgrade. When possible, perform rebuild operations only during periods of minimal system activity. When automatic data recovery has finished, the drive status LED changes from flashing green to solid green. If the drive status LED on the replacement drive changes to flashing or solid amber, the rebuild process has terminated abnormally. If an abnormal termination of a rebuild occurs, identify the cause and appropriate corrective steps. Abnormal termination of a rebuild If the activity LED on the replacement drive permanently ceases to be illuminated even while other drives in the array are active, the rebuild process has terminated abnormally. The following table indicates the three possible causes of abnormal termination of a rebuild. Cause 1: An uncorrectable read error has occurred. 1. Back up as much data as possible from the logical drive. CAUTION: Do not remove the drive that has the media error. Doing so causes the logical drive to fail. 2. Restore data from backup. Writing data to the location of the unreadable sector often eliminates the error. 3. Remove and reinsert the replacement drive. This action restarts the rebuild process. If the rebuild process still terminates abnormally: 1. Delete and recreate the logical drive. 2. Restore data from backup. Cause 2: The replacement drive has failed. Verify that the replacement drive is of the correct capacity and is a supported model. If these factors are not the cause of the problem, use a different drive as the replacement. Cause 3: Another drive in the array has failed. A drive that has recently failed can sometimes be made temporarily operational again by cycling the server power. 1. Power down the server. 2. Remove the replacement physical drive (the one undergoing a rebuild), and reinstall the drive that it is replacing. 3. Power up the server. If the newly failed drive seems to be operational again: 1. Back up any unsaved data. 2. Remove the drive that was originally to be replaced, and reinsert the replacement physical drive. The rebuild process automatically restarts. 3. When the rebuild process has finished, replace the newly failed drive. However, if the newly failed drive has not recovered: 1. Remove the drive that was originally to be replaced, and reinsert the replacement physical drive. 2. Replace the newly failed drive. 3. Restore data from backup. More Resources: • Click here for ProLiant Self Solve. • Click here for Creating and Managing Hard Drive Online Spare Technology. • Click here for 17xx Power-On Self-Test (POST) Errors and fixes. • Click here for HP Dynamic Smart Array RAID Controller User Guide. • Click here for HP Smart Array Controllers for HP ProLiant Servers User Guide. • Click here for HP Smart Array Controllers for HP ProLiant Gen9 Servers User Guide. • Click here for Configuring Arrays on HP Smart Array Controllers Reference Guide. • Click here for Array Configuration, Diagnostic, Storage Administrator and SmartSSD Wear Gauge Utility Software and User Guides.

Do a ghost on the first hard drive install ghost on new hard drive and replace, I can provide more details on procedure just ask

Beep Codes Cause (Depending on RAID Level)

3 seconds on, 1 second off

• RAID 0: One or more drives offline.
• RAID 1: Two drives offline.
• RAID 5: Two or more drives offline.
• RAID 6: More than two drives offline

1 second on, 1 second off

• RAID 1: A mirrored drive failed.
• RAID 5: One drive failed.
• RAID 6: One or two drives failed.

1 second on, 3 seconds off

A hot spare drive has completed the rebuild process and has been brought into the array.

Hello,

With a RAID 5 setup, if you replace the drive with the exact model, you only need to shut down the server, replace the drive, power on, and the RAID will remount the new drive to the needed confiuration.

Good Luck.
C2Solutions

In a RAID 5 config, you need at least 3 drives (you can have more however). A small part of every drive is then reserved for recovery data for the other drives. So two drives together hold all the data needed to restore a 3rd drive.

The Raid Controllers in the Dell Poweredge Servers are hot swappable. So you can just pull the faulty disk and then insert a new replacement drive in the same slot (Needs to be the same type and size or bigger. However, if the disk is bigger than the other 2, then only the size of the two other disks will be used on the new drive). The Raid controller will then see that there is a new disk and automatically start the recovery process. You will be able to see this when you open the Controller software. Once the recovery is done, the RAID 5 will be fully functional again.

While one of the disks is faulty or missing the two remaining disks will continue to work, but at the severely degraded performance. After the rebuild the performance will be back to the way it was before.

The rebuild can take more than an hour, depending on the disk sizes used.

There is also an option on some Controllers to select one drive as a "spare". Then you insert one more disk and set it as spare. It will not start working unless one of the other disks in the Raid fails. That's when it is used automatically as a replacement.

Raid is supposed to self replicate, and you can hot swap drives when one fails, and the information is moved to the new drive..

Revert back to original configuration of hdd in your RAID setup. Boot to SCIS BIOS and double check functionality of hard drives. The error is probably telling you that Disk1 is degraded because disk 0 is failing and you removed the wrong hard drive.

Replacing the drive does not remove the container on the RAID controller. If the drive has failed, and you had a RAID 5, simply replace the drive. If you had a RAID 0, your data is lost. Replace the drive, and start over.

Well if your data is gone at this point, you mines well just proceed with rebuilding a new RAID 5 set with your replacement drive. Even if one drive fails in a RAID 5 set, your logical drive should still be accessible. Goodluck.