Raid Help.

[Phantombadger]

Ok this isnt a Q about how raid works or what Raid is. this is a Q about a Raid error. I started up my pc tonight, through post np. then raid setup and it was flashing red, so I entered RAID setup and it had 2 RAIDS of 600gb, under details the first RAID was 1 320gb disk . marked as error. the 2nd one was 2 320gb discs stripped. Now what it looks like to me is that my Raid 5 parity drive lost its raid connection to the stripped drives. which would make it Raid 0 and an independent Raid 1.

Can I just use the setup to rebuild the RAID 5 without any loss?
and will rebuild fix it?
is rebuilding the raid the only option?
can i rebuild it with disassembling the raid?
and if i disassemble it will i lose my data? If I can keep my data intact when killing the RAID, will I need to know which disk is which when rebuilding the RAID; they are 3 320gb seagates with similar Serial numbers?

Help would be appreciated. currently my data is accessible,which leads me to believe its the parity drive thats disconnected from the RAID.I dont have a large enough backup media to back up to so I dont want experiment.

 

[Nodsu]

Hum.. Did you have RAID5 in the beginning? The RAID BIOS should still report the array as RAID5 even if you lost two drives from it. Also, a single drive failure should be totally transparent and your system should still boot and work as normal.

And no, taking one drive away from a RAID 5 array does not equal RAID1+RAID0, that would be true in case of RAID3 when you take away the parity drive.

Assuming that you have a faleraid adapter and you can still boot, get into Windows and use the RAID utility in there - the fakeraid BIOSes are near unusable.

 

[Phantombadger]

It seems to have gone from raid 5 to raid 0+1. I originally set it up in Raid 5. I'm just worried about losing my data; is all. it seems to run fine in windows. I'll look at the windows raid function later and keep this thread up to date.

 

[Phantombadger]

in windows it seems to be working, and states the Drive is in RAID 5. But there are 2 parts to raid 5 that exist. Raid 5 is essentially RAID 0+1 but without a dedicated Parity drive,
So how can my RAID still be functional in Windows is me RAID controller has separated one of the drives?
could I have possibly lost a drive?
and so how can I maintain the RAID 5 for the full 600gb across just 2 drives? and does anyone have any suggestions on testing the drive?

 

[Nodsu]

Raid 5 is essentially RAID 0+1 but without a dedicated Parity drive

No it's not. You are talking about RAID3. Parity information is spread evenly over all the drives in RAID5. Of course.. We cannot know how retarded this fakeraid implemetation may be. Those embedded "RAID" controllers are a huge scam anyway.

So how can my RAID still be functional in Windows is me RAID controller has separated one of the drives?

That's the very point of RAID5 - it is still functional even if you lose one drive.

Do you have a non-RAID controller? Connect the suspect drive to that and run the manufacturer diagnostics on it.

Can you rebuild the array in Windows?

 

[Phantombadger]

the array seems to run in windows but it is raid 5. I disconnected the bunk drive and Windows tried rebuilding paths at startup. and no I dont have a non raid controller as far as i know my raid controller is built into my sata controller.

since I last posted I have been reading up alot on Raid and understand the levels better now. I'm looking at an enclosure to back up my info externally, if I do I'll run it there.