Oh dear! Servers dead!

[Deeem]

Hi guys..

Rebooted the server earlier and low and behold, NOTHING.

It got past cmos.. IDE HDD is picked up..Then just a black screen with a flashing cursor..

Anyone had this before? I dont have an image of the server, I was just about to do it, thats why I rebooted.

Isnt this always the way.

Regards

Damon

 

[moolie]

No error message? Nothing?
Any POST errors?

Check bios boot order. Something might not be set correctly there.

 

[Deeem]

It posts fine...gets past that.

One thing it started saying was PRIMARY IDE CHANNEL 80 CONDUCTOR CABLE..every now and again.

Although I have tried 4 different ones in there with same effect, maybe mobo?

Damon

 

[mrdenny]

Unplug everything that you can except video, and boot. If you get the same thing you've got a motherboard problem. If that works, start plugging devices back in, one device at a time and see where it fails.

Denny

--Anything is possible. All it takes is a little research. (Me)

 

[fs483]

Do you really have a 80pin conductor cable or are you still using the older 40pins (I think) ?

 

[Deeem]

Looks like im totally screwed now..

Put the drive in another machine and it says its unpartitioned.

Oh dear..Are there any programs out there to recover data in these sort of circumstances?

Otherwise I better look for another job lol

Damon

 

[ascotta]

Eggs and sucking grannies, there is not a cd in the tray. I say this one last week on a Dell Workstation. I looked particularly clever when I pressed the CD tray button, and it then booted.

[blue]Arguably the best cat skinner around ! [/blue]

Cheers
Scott

 

[mrdenny]

Norton might be able to recover some of the data. I take it you have no backups?

Denny

--Anything is possible. All it takes is a little research. (Me)

 

[moolie]

On the internet look for a product called File Scavenger. The product is from a company in Texas and it worked for me when we lost a scsii drive. It can search defunct volumes and can even recover Files from HD's that have been formatted or deleted.

http://www.quetek.com/prod02.htm

link to thier product site.

 

[Deeem]

Thanks for all the replies guys...

I went out and bought a new 80gb maxtor drive today and reinstalled server software and a tape drive *blushes*

I will try that file scavenger, cheers for that.

What I would like to know is the best software for creating images of drives. So next time when the drive dies on me I can boot from floppy and reinstate as it was.

Thanks again.

Damon

 

[moolie]

NT backup that comes with 2003 server (and XP for that matter) has whats called and ASP backup function. It's also known as a COLD STEEL backup. Basically, it backs up the system to a known location, this can be a network location, another HD, tape, it doesn't matter. Then creates boot disks.

When you need to recover, you put in the boot disk and let it go to work. I'm able to recover my 2003 enterprise server in under 40 minutes. Note: when recovering you will need the original OS install CD.

 

[moolie]

Condolences friend.

I have been in the same possition as you are and lived to tell the tale...