Proliant 3000 w/ Smart Array

[deborah_14]

I have this server that has four 18 gig drives. Problem is someone wiped them clean including the System Partition Utilities.

I get an error on startup that say Array Controller Failure and that there are no fixed disks present.

Where do I begin to start rebuilding this?

[ron fisher_1]

Boot it up with a Compaq branded smartstart, not the newer HP branded one.. assuming boot to CD is enabled you should be able to step on through it and get it running.

Good luck!

[deborah_14]

I have the smart start cd. When it boots off of that it says that the erase utility did not finish running and to let it continue. It's been running for about 24 hours, but there are no hard drive lights on or anything. Do you think it's running and I just need to wait for that to finish before I can continue?

[ron fisher_1 · Accepted solution]

That server doesn't sound happy. I'd check that all boards, drives and connectors are seated. Do you get any POST messages prior to the smartstart CD booting? Does RAM init, do your cpu's init, do your array controller init? Or do you just get a black screen with the erase message immediately on boot?

You might try replacing the CMOS battery on the mother board and starting it up again.

You could also remove the array controller and hook the drive cage directly to the onboard SCSI controller to take that out of the equation.

[deborah_14]

It does post, but it sits there for about five minutes trying to init the array controller and then gives a message that init failed. It gives me the option to choose F1 or F10. F10 doesn't work because the drives appear to have been fdisked. F1 allows the boot to Smart Start, but that's when I get the message about it needing to finish the erase utility.

I'm assuming the drives got fdisked, which erased the partition utilities as well as the array configuration, thus its init failure on boot. Then maybe tried the erase utility? (server came from another office, with no history known).

Any suggestions based on this?