RAID 1 setup not working on ML110 G5 SBS Premium

[Kim Lim]

I have configured the on board hardware raid to raid 1 mirroring with two identical 160GB HDD. The on board raid displays as Raid 1 Mirroring and verifys that it is working correctly with both drives in the array. When I boot into windows both hard drives are displayed in my computer c: e: eveything that was on drive c: when creating the raid mirroring array is on drive e: however when you change add or update any file on drive c: it is not reflected on drive e:. When i reboot the computer and check the raid it all verifys that itis working.when the system restarts back into windows nothing on drive e: has
changed.
I have tried downloading the raid drivers for windows but when I try to install it, it says that the driver for this device has already been installed.
Lastly, there are two unknown items in device manager which I have tired installing with no luck.

Regards,

Kim

[KarloChacon · Accepted solution]

hi

C and E are totally different to RAID level

C and E are logical Drive having RAID 1 does mean when you create something on C you will see that on E

RAID 1 means if one HDD fails the other HDD will have the same information I mean Hard Drive not logical units.

so for example if you take one of those HDD and you insert it in another ML110 G5 you will see the same information for each HDD individually so you can see C and E in both HDD individually

bye

[Kim Lim]

Yes I understand, that when you do something on c: it should be mirrored on e:. But for some reason that is not working.

Actually in the past on dell servers I only ever see 1 logical drive. I am not even sure why there are two logical drives in the first place. When I first installed the sevrer there was only one logical drive, E: came after I loaded other system drivers. Very confused as to what us going on.

[KarloChacon]

no If you have C: and E: and you create a file in C it won't replicate or copy a that file a E: remember those are logical driver like any computer or laptop when you create E: F: G: H: ....

and now if the E: just came up if you don't need it

use disk management and delete it
as easy as that

bye

[Kim Lim]

Oh. I think I uderstand where you are comming from.

Let me just regurgitate that.So basically the Raid 1 mirroring is working fine as long as it says in the startup screen that raid 1 mirroring is successful.

As for windows side side of things, because raid is being performed at hardware level, you won't see anything change.

I still find it stange that E: has appeared. When I have setup raid in the past (mainly dell servers) this never happens.

I guess as long as the mirroring is working at the end of the day I am happy.

Do you know anyway of confirming whether the mirroring is actually working?

Kim

[KarloChacon]

well you see it's a mirror using the HP manager software RAID assuming we are talking about Embedded SATA RAID apart of that you can manually fail 1 HDD if you want

[Kim Lim]

Yes indeed it is the Embedded SATA RAID that I am using. Is there a way to confirm that it is working with out actually failing one? For example is there a HP software that will test this?

In order for me to fail one drive I would have to buy a plane ticket because I am supporting the server remotely. :)

Kim

[KarloChacon]

no there is no software to simulate a failure in a RAID 1 and say yes it is a fully working RAID 1 you must believe what it says in the Array utility

bye

[KarloChacon]

you can install this tool

for RAID information

http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/SoftwareDescription.jsp?lang=en&cc=us&prodTypeId=15351&prodSeriesId=3577708&prodNameId=3577715&swEnvOID=1005&swLang=8&mode=2&taskId=135&swItem=MTX-64b379e59a804fe2a97da98a1c

[Kim Lim]

Yeah I have tried using that tool but it cannot find any controller.

Thank you for your prompt replies. Highly appreciated.