Unrecoverable Media Errors Detected on Logical Drive

[sysit]

Hello

I recently had this warning in HPSSA:

Controller: HPE Smart Array P408i-a SR Gen10 in Embedded Slot
Device: Logical Drive 1
Severity: Warning
Message: This logical drive has Unrecoverable Media Errors Detected on Drives during previous Rebuild or Background Surface Analysis (ARM) scan.
Errors will be fixed automatically when the sector(s) are overwritten.
Backup and Restore are recommended.

And this warning in Event Viewer also:

Warning 24685 Smart Array Events:

Array controller P408i-a SR Gen10 [Emebedded] has reported an uncorrectable read error during surface analysis operations for logical drive 1. A media error was encountered that is not correctable due to media errors on other physical drive(s) belonging to this logical volume. The uncorrectable media defects are between logical block adress 38174720 and logical block adress 38177279. The host will be unable to read some blocks between this adress range until the blocks are overwritten. Capacity expansion operations must be avoided while the blocks are unreadable.

The server is an HPE Proliant ML350 Gen10 2016 Windows Server with Raid5.

All the disks appaers to be fine and with green light. No error or imminent failure. This is apparently a "Locgical Drive" problem?

What does it basically mean?

Will the server or Raid5 array crash when a disk will fail, or during a rebuild process? Is this a Smart Array Controller Hardware problem, or anything else?

Can I let the server running that way?? Or do I need to erase and recreate new array, which I don't want to do unless it's absolutely mandatory.

Thank you for your feedback

[Suman_1978]

Hi,

Hope this article helps you resolve the issue.
https://support.hpe.com/hpesc/public/docDisplay?docLocale=en_US&docId=a00104843en_us

Its recommended to keep the Smart Array Controller and Hard Drives firmware up to date.

Thanks

[sysit]

Hi,

Thank you for the link, I had seen it before posting. It says that it is recommended to erase and recreate the array, which is something I'd like to avoid if possible.

So, if I understand correctly, even if I update firmware and controller, it will not resolve the issue? Or is it a bug that can be resolved by updating? or that can be ignored and let the server run that way?

And apparently this is not a smart controller array hardware issue, so if I have to finally erase and rebuild, it will not show the error anymore, am I right?

[BPSingh]

Greetings!

If the 1716 unrecoverable error is recurring then I doubt that these will get cleared with driver and firmware update. However as a best practice it is recommended to have the driver/firmware upto date. 

The Storage logs need to be analysed for the above error. Some drives in the RAID may have excessive hard read/write error and may have to be replaced + deletion and recreation of LD is also required.

Sometimes these error hinders in RAID rebuild process as well. 

[WouterH · Accepted solution]

Hello,

See last line of the Support Alert that was shared earlier:

"Note: The 1716 and 1915 POST error messages will not reappear if additional media errors do not occur during a subsequent scan or file system check, or after files have been restored to the reconfigured array from a backup."

You also want to be aware of below Support Alert:

FIRMWARE UPDATE REQUIRED to Prevent Potential Data Inconsistency on Select RAID Configurations With HPE Smart Array SR Gen10 Controllers 

Personally, I would backup the data, update the Array Controller firmware to the latest version and check in 1-2 weeks if the issue has been resolved by a Background Surface Scan.

If not resolved, delete and recreate the logical drive and restore the data from backup.