Raid0 Critical status

Mark Hamill

I have been having major problems with my widnows 8.1 PC failing to load to windows on boot, getting stuck on a windowsrepair loop, loading after I disconnect/reconnect the harddrives, but then being very slow for about 30 minutes.
When I boot, the first loading screen gives some warning about a critical status in Raid 0 set up that disappears before I can read it fully. The BIOS menu shows the error in the image attached.
I gather that one of the harddrives has failed or is failing, but disk management, SeaTools (hardrive management tool from seagate*) and hdtunePro don't give any errors, so I can't tell which harddrive is the one that is failing.

Is there anything I can do to fix this without replacing both harddrives? Can you "break" a Raid 0 set up without losing all of your data?

Thanks

*I realise that the harddrives are Western Digital, but WD's own harddrive management tool wont load on my computer for some reason.

Alanstrainor

The bios screenshot says you're running a RAID 1 setup, which means there is redundancy for when one disk fails. If you were actually running RAID 0, you would not be able to boot at all.

Did you setup this RAID config, or what's the craic?

Mark Hamill

Alanstrainor wrote: »

The bios screenshot says you're running a RAID 1 setup, which means there is redundancy for when one disk fails. If you were actually running RAID 0, you would not be able to boot at all.

Did you setup this RAID config, or what's the craic?

Ah, my mistake. It's a PC I use in work, it was setup (at least 2 years ago now) by someone else.

A few times the computer hasn't been able to boot to the log in screen, it gets stuck on an automatic repair loop until I disconnect and reconnect the harddrives. Seeing as this is Raid 1, does that mean both harddrives are failing?
The PSU was replaced a month ago, with these issues first happening about 2 weeks ago, could they be connected?

Alanstrainor

Mark Hamill wrote: »

Ah, my mistake. It's a PC I use in work, it was setup (at least 2 years ago now) by someone else.

A few times the computer hasn't been able to boot to the log in screen, it gets stuck on an automatic repair loop until I disconnect and reconnect the harddrives. Seeing as this is Raid 1, does that mean both harddrives are failing?
The PSU was replaced a month ago, with these issues first happening about 2 weeks ago, could they be connected?

They could be related, but it's impossible to know. These things happen!

All RAID 1 means, is that there were 2 disks (likely the same size/type), and 1 disk mirrors to the other disk. Which means in a case like yours, where one disk fails you can still work, as the RAID controller will fail over to the one remaining disk.

The fix for this is to identify the failed disk and replace it with a disk of equal or greater size and setup the RAID controller to rebuild the array with the new disk.

However, before doing anything, I would be backing up my files. If the remaining disk is indeed failing, attempting to complete the above could cause the disk to fail as it's an intense task.

So:

1. Immediately backup your important files/docs/pictures etc. Use a USB hard disk, any cloud or network storage would be good options.
2. Once backed up, then you can begin to identify the disk and look to purchase a replacement or the same size, or larger.
3. Then you can start the process of replacing the failed disk, and rebuilding the array.

Mark Hamill

Alanstrainor wrote: »

So:

1. Immediately backup your important files/docs/pictures etc. Use a USB hard disk, any cloud or network storage would be good options.
2. Once backed up, then you can begin to identify the disk and look to purchase a replacement or the same size, or larger.
3. Then you can start the process of replacing the failed disk, and rebuilding the array.

Ok, everything is backed up, but I'm having problems trying to identify the failed disk. I'm using AMD RaidXpert and the physical drive view has both physical drives as functional, but with only the one in port 5 as being assigned to the array. The logical drive view says that port 5 is critical.

Am I right in that it seems to be saying there is only 1 physical disk in the array?

Pics of the physical drive view and logical drive view

bonzodog2

Mark Hamill wrote: »

Am I right in that it seems to be saying there is only 1 physical disk in the array?

That wouldn't make any sense; no advantage in either performance or redundancy versions of RAID to use 2 partitions. Have you opened the case?

Alanstrainor

That image shows two physical disks no? One on Port5, and one Port6, Port6 being the troublesome drive.

Mark Hamill

bonzodog2 wrote: »

That wouldn't make any sense; no advantage in either performance or redundancy versions of RAID to use 2 partitions. Have you opened the case?

Alanstrainor wrote: »

That image shows two physical disks no? One on Port5, and one Port6, Port6 being the troublesome drive.

I've opened the case, there are only two harddrives.
The physical view says that the drive in port 6 is just a single drive, not assigned to anything. Doesn't the "assigned" in the physical view mean it's assigned to the Raid? Unless the drive in port 6 is supposed to be assigned to the Raid, and it not being assigned (or losing the assignment) is the issue?

Alanstrainor

Mark Hamill wrote: »

I've opened the case, there are only two harddrives.
The physical view says that the drive in port 6 is just a single drive, not assigned to anything. Doesn't the "assigned" in the physical view mean it's assigned to the Raid? Unless the drive in port 6 is supposed to be assigned to the Raid, and it not being assigned (or losing the assignment) is the issue?

Two hard drives makes sense given the info you provided. So all good there.

Yes the assigned means that it is part of a RAID array.

Before we go any further you have to make sure that your computer only sees 1TB of storage total when you access my computer. This could be split into segments, such as one partition having 200GB and the other 800GB or so.

If you do only have 1TB, then I would go ahead and add the available 1TB drive to the RAID array and rebuild. And see how you get on.

Now this is all providing you are backed up to some external device or cloud service!

Mark Hamill

Alanstrainor wrote: »

Two hard drives makes sense given the info you provided. So all good there.

Yes the assigned means that it is part of a RAID array.

Before we go any further you have to make sure that your computer only sees 1TB of storage total when you access my computer. This could be split into segments, such as one partition having 200GB and the other 800GB or so.

If you do only have 1TB, then I would go ahead and add the available 1TB drive to the RAID array and rebuild. And see how you get on.

Now this is all providing you are backed up to some external device or cloud service!

Sorry for late reply.

The computer see both drives seperately. Each with a 930.98GB partition and a 350MB reserved partition (the D disk also has 198MB unassigned for some reason). I've attached an image of the disk management screen and the devices and drives view from the "This PC" window.

Is that right? Should the computer being seeing the second disk at all if it is not assigned?

EDIT: It only occured to me to open both drives in explorer to see what they contained and both seem to have a windows installation in them (i.e. both have "Program Files", "Program Files (x86)", "Program Data", "User", "Windows" etc folders). The contents of the F drive is about 5 or 6 months out of date though.

Mark Hamill

(Sorry for delay, I was away)

Just an update for anyone with same problem who might find this thread in a few years : I went ahead and just added the second drive to the raid and rebuilt it. Everything seems to working, no more critical errors and the computer seems too run a little bit better too.

Thanks Alanstrainor and bonzodog2 for your help and input .