RAID 1 Problem

[dirtdevil]

I've recently had a data loss problem that I think was caused by a RAID 1 rebuild. I'm in the process of migrating my RAID 1 mirrored set (hardware controlled) from two 160GB SATA drives to two 1TB SATA drives. The drives are single-partitioned with NTFS under Windows XP. I ended up disconnecting one of the 160GB drives in order to prepare the TB drives individually for eventual RAID 1 setup. At some point I think that I must have altered some data on the 160GB drive, putting the RAID set out of sync. Upon reconnection of the 160GB drive, the original RAID set was not recognized and I rebuilt the set using the RAID BIOS.

The RAID set appears to be working again, but all of the data has been "rolled back" to January 2007!. I've come to believe that the RAID set has not been working properly since January 2007 and only one of the drives has been in use by the system between then and now...leaving the data on second drive untouched. I think that the drive with my recent data was mirrored back to match the other drive with old data and now my new data is gone.

I'm trying to figure out how to undo the mirroring and/or get access to the missing data. Can anyone tell me if it's still possible to recover the current files from the drive and if so, what recovery system/procedure will be the most effective? I have a copy of EasyRecovery Pro that was new as of last year...will it do the trick or have a I basically done a low level format that's erased the data for good? Any help is much appreciated!

My system runs a Sil3114 RAID chipset integrated into an AOPEN AX4SG Max II mobo.

 

[wahnula]

I have had nothing but problems with the Sil3114 controller. Try booting to the removed drive solo, see how that goes. If the drive you kept to build the new array was disjoined form the array in January then maybe you'll luck out and find the new data on the other drive.

If nothing was written to the drive you started with since Jan. there is nothing to recover, hopefully you had a backup plan, but I would first try my forensics on the drive you removed. If it's been formatted it still should be OK.

Silicon Image makes a utility that works within Windows, and will send you an email when a drive fails:

http://www.siliconimage.com/support/supportsearchresults.aspx?pid=28&cid=11&ctid=2&osid=8

The current data has to reside on one or the other of the old 160GB drives. That will be your key to data recovery.

Tony

"Buy what you like, or you'll be forced to like what you buy"...me