Dell Poweredge 840 - "Backup" Disk

[paulhthomas]

Hi guys, looking for some advice. I've got a customer that runs SBS 2003 on on a Poweredge 840.
Internal to the server (right at the top of the tower) they have a single drive that isn't part of any RAID, that they use for backups, they have 2 of these that they swap "regularly". They were told by the previous support company to just pull the disk and pop the 2nd disk in, and for safety, to keep the 1st disk off site until the it's time to swap them again. All makes sense to me...

However.....
Whenever these disks are swapped the backups (which backup to E: which is the drive on that disk), fail and the event log is filled with NTFS errors. A quick chkdsk E: /f command fixes these errors and we're back in business.
I've tried formatting the disks incase there was some low level corruption, but still the same.

My question is, are these drives even hot swappable?? Or do they need to be ejected safely somehow to stop corruption happening?

They don't show up as Removeable media so that's not an option.

Any advice, greatly appreciated

Paul

 

[technome]

My question is, are these drives even hot swappable??"
No, and that is the reason your getting errors. You would need a backplane ( and possibly different drives) which are specified as hot swappable. Google hot swap cage (or tray)
Another possibility is to convert all the disks to Dynamic, then form a raid 1 from the "single drive" and of of the disks you swap, then you should be able to swap then.

One other point, unless you drive bays are specific for swapping, generally the contacts are not rated for a high number of removals/insertions.

........................................
Chernobyl disaster..a must see pictorial

http://www.kiddofspeed.com/default.htm

 

[rclarke250]

If they want to swap a drive and take off site for backup, and don't want to rely on tape, look at something like an RDX drive, they are built for this, and utilize backup software.

http://h10010.www1.hp.com/wwpc/us/en/sm/WF05a/12169-304616-3755725-3755725-3755725-3741006.html

 

[paulhthomas]

Thanks for the replies guys, forgot to reply back.
basicaly, as they don't want to spend any more money (who does!), I've just got them to shut down the server swap the disk, and bring it backup, all seems good that way

Paul

Paul Thomas
Important IT

http://www.ImportantIT.com

 

[technome]

Any advice, greatly appreciated"
Next time you get a server, get one with a hotswap backplane, setup a raid 1, with a hotswap spare. This way you can pull one of the raid 1 members, as a backup, the hotswap with kick in, rebuild. The next backup, you do the same thing, you will not get errors.
Don't understand how inept support companies survive. If I setup a backup system as they did I would not last.


........................................
Chernobyl disaster..a must see pictorial

http://www.kiddofspeed.com/default.htm

 

[paulhthomas]

Thanks Technome, it's what I'd do anyway, it's just that I'd inherited this kit from a previous support company, so not much I could do other than make best of a bad set up really.
It's funny when you say: "Don't understand how inept support companies survive. If I setup a backup system as they did I would not last." Apparently they've got so much work they don't know what to do with it. Unbelieveable.

Paul Thomas
Important IT

http://www.ImportantIT.com

 

[technome]

Apparently they've got so much work they don't know what to do with it.
Amazing, here I am low on work.


........................................
Chernobyl disaster..a must see pictorial

http://www.kiddofspeed.com/default.htm