Hot swap hard drive replacements

[ison67]

We have a ProLiant ML350 G3 running as a Windows 2003 DC. This server has been haing hard drive issues. One of it's hard drives has a red X and the other keeps daying it needs to be rebuilt. But when you try to rebuild it, it seems to be working but once it gets to the logon screen and you login, it never logs you in. Remotely at this point, I can get into the server using run, \\server\c$.

I have order two new drives for it. any tools or advice on troubleshooting this would be apreciated. The drives are hot swap and scsi. Is there any order I need to swap them? I've never worked with scsi drives.

THanks,
DJ

 

[blister911]

How are your hard drives configured? (RAID level and # of drives). What array controller?

Typically you'd want to replace the failed drive first, but without knowing more information about your environment...

Also, you might want to consider checking into the latest firmware for the array controller and hard drives.

Good Luck.

 

[TheLad]

If you have the Proliant Support Pack installed, you can check in the HP System Management Homepage to see what errors are being reported in there...

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[burtsbees]

Don't forget---when replacing the drive, let it finish rebuilding (if it's in a RAID) before replacing any other drives!!!

Burt

 

[ison67]

If you have the Proliant Support Pack installed, you can check in the HP System Management Homepage to see what errors are being reported in there... "

This is installed. However, I don't have a password for it... the guy before me didn't document anything.

I don't know much about SCSI. How do I check the configuration? Remember, that when I login to this server it doesn't come up. I have use HP ProLiant Integrated Management Log Viewer from a different server to remote in to it.

This is some of what I know. The drive in slot 0 has a red X, 1 and 2 are green, and 3 has 1/2 a green arrow. I believe it is RAID 5. I will be going to the location tomorrow, but for now I have the staff on location being my eyes. It's all I can do since I can't remote in.

Thanks,
DJ

 

[burtsbees]

The green arrow means that it's writing to the drive---nothing wrong with it.
The Management Home Page username and password are usually the same as the administrator and password login for Windows (defaults to use it, I believe).

Burt

 

[TheLad]

Or you can use your domain credentials:

domain\username


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[ison67]

I replaced drive 0. It started like it was rebuiding the drive and now it has a green arrow that flashes everyone in a while and the third drive (that is the other drive I was having problems with)now it has no lights on it. It's been on now for a few hours.

I'm wanting to take it down so I can take it to HQ. Will that hard anything?

Regards,
DJ

 

[TheLad]

If you take the server down during a RAID rebuild, the RAID rebuild should carry on when power is restored. I say should, it has in tests I have done before when I forced a RAID rebuild and deliberately pulled the power plug.

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[ison67]

Thanks. I'm shutting it down now. It has a exployer.exe error so I can't get in it. I'm going to take it back to Head Quarters and work on it when I have time. I'll work on removing it from Active Directory this afternoon. I was going to demote it to a file server anyway. It was a DNS server and had DHCP on it to. I'm sure I'll have lots of questions. Thanks for all of your help.

Regards,
DJ

 

[burtsbees]

The light on the third drive are off because of a few things...
1)The drive is a hot spare, and it took over when drive 0 failed, and since you replaced drive 0, that drive went back to being the hot spare.

2)The LEDs are burned out (happens all the time).

The drive is likely still good, from the info you have given...

I STRONGLY suggest you see what configuration these drives are in before you replace anything, and DO NOT replace another drive before the first one gets done rebuilding! You will destroy the entire array! Bye bye data!

Burt

 

[ison67]

Thanks for the info. I've removed it from the network. It doesn't have any data that hasn't been replacated. So, now I just have to remove it from AD. I will go back to it we I get caught up a bit. Removing it has help a lot with the slowness problems I was having on the master DC. I'll report back once I can get back to it.

Thanks again,
DJ