Poweredge 4200 RAID HD Recovery

MunkyHed

Hi,

Could anyone help me out with recovering data from 3 x 9GB HDDs in a DELL poweredge 4200 server.
I'm no tech expert and have basic knowledge of raid systems etc..
1, if not 2 of the drives are showing as failing in the configuration utility and the system won't boot into windows.

Can i somehow get the data off the disks and or replace the failed drives and recover the data??

majiktripp

If they were mirrored drives, try slaving one into a normal pc to see if its data is accessible, if its actually a hardware fault with the drives you may need to call in the services of a recovery company ( I recommend Fields Data Recovery based in Wales as they are very good,google them for their website)
In the mean time check the warranty status of the machine,it is quite old from the description of the hardware you statye but *may* by a long shot be under warranty still,check the service tag of the machine on the dell website to find out.
Other than that you may have to call in an IT company's service to get you up and going.

MunkyHed

Ya, the warranty is well gone. I've taken out the drives and tried them one by one attached to a PC with a SCSI adapter (BTW the HDs are SCSI) Couldnt read any of the drives in windows but i presumed thats because they were in RAID. Is there a way of finding out if these drives were in RAID 0 or 1? i can't tell.

SwampThing

Put the drives back into the server in the exact order they were in before - very important!

Assuming you have a hardware raid controller, when the machine is POSTing, you should be able to press F8 or Ctrl+i or Ctrl+s or something like that to get into the RAID controllers BIOS. Check the messages appearing as the machines POSTs. If nothing is showing, it could be you need to change settings in the machines BIOS to display POST messages.

Anyway, once in the raid controllers config, you should be able to see the type of raidset configured. You're three drives. It's most likely to be either RAID 5 or RAID 0. If it's 5, then you should be able to 'fail' the dodge drive or replace it, rebuild the array and all should be well. If it's RAID 0 - most likely you goose is cooked - a recovery company might be able to get some data back for you, but it aint cheap when trying to recover from RAID.

If the raid is setup using software, then I think you're onto a data recovery company.

One warning - if you're not 100% sure about this and can't afford to lose the data, please be very careful when you get into the raid controller config - don't delete, rebuild, undo etc. etc. unless you know what you are doing - you could make things worse!

MunkyHed

Thanks Swmapthing, i've gotten into the Raid BIOS. I believe the drives are RAID0. I think the goose may be cooked here alright.
Theres no way i could replace the drive and rebuild the array if its RAID 0?

majiktripp

I dont think you can rebuild a Raid 0 as far as I know due to the information being striped across the two drives that are being used...only mirrored Raid arrays can be rebuilt due to there being a copy of the information from the first drive on the 2nd array disk.

SwampThing

Yeah, goose for dinner.

It's a professional recovery if you need the data really badly and can afford it - can be very expensive. For example, we paid 42.5K to get files from a laptop drive (no raid). The disk platters were fine, only need new actuators and the drive rebuilt. For RAID, depending on a) what's wrong with the dodge disk and b) what's involved for them to get the raidset up and running - you're looking at serious moolah, I'd guess.

Cuddlesworth

SwampThing wrote:

Yeah, goose for dinner.

It's a professional recovery if you need the data really badly and can afford it - can be very expensive. For example, we paid 42.5K to get files from a laptop drive (no raid). The disk platters were fine, only need new actuators and the drive rebuilt. For RAID, depending on a) what's wrong with the dodge disk and b) what's involved for them to get the raidset up and running - you're looking at serious moolah, I'd guess.

? Thats a bit much. Most I have ever seen was around 3k. 42.5k would be recovery off of a hard-drive that had been formated quite a few times.

majiktripp

SwampThing wrote:

, we paid 42.5K to get files from a laptop drive (no raid). The disk platters were fine, only need new actuators and the drive rebuilt.

Jesus thats a lot! What the hell was on the laptop?! Offshore account details peoples SSIA monies are resting in?

MunkyHed

Hey guys, still tryin to recover these hd's. Can ye recommend a company that can help us out? I'm based in the Limerick / Cork area..
Preferably one of the companies that charge 3K not 42.5K!!