PowerEdge HDD/SCSI/RAID

[wirelessmonkey]

We have an R510 with a PERC H700. We have a VD with 10 3TB Hitachi drives (Dell Certified Enterprise...), including hot spare, in a RAID 5 config. On random occasions, though usually when under relatively high load, a drive error will be reported/ flashing yellow.  Typically the hot spare will be loaded, and re-seating the reported drive will cause a re-sync and all will be well for a few days

Before firmware updates a few months ago we could have 2 drives error, but after updating drive and PERC firmwares, only one would go at a time. 

Sadly, last night 3 disks went into error mode. We are currently rebuilding, but it's time to start dealing with this issue.  Any thoughts or suggestions?

[DELL-Jonathan S]

With all the firmwares already updated, the possibility exists that a puncture or double fault previously developed when one of the disks went offline.  What I would suggest is as soon as you rebuild the array, do a consistency check immediately and continue to run consistency checks at least once a month. This will ensure that if the controller needs to account for sector reassignment it will happen sooner rather than later and mitigate the possibility of data loss. You can do a consistency check with OpenManage (web interface or omconfig), MegaCLI, or the controller BIOS. Information on that is at support.dell.com/.../OMSSUG.pdf on page 221. Let us know what the outcome of the consistency check is.