The Operating System Wasn't Not Found - SBS2011

Question

I have the following message on the SBS2001 Standard system I look after Dell Poweredge T320 which came preinstalled. It has only just happend after a reboot.

I think it may have something to do with active partitions.

I have recently just set up the system, ensuring it is all up to date before transferring them over from their existing SBS2003 system

I was having an issue with backups failing on the SBS2011 system and was told it was something to do with the active partition so I looked at them in Disk Management. I don't remember changing any of the settings, but not 100% sure.

The system is set up with with RAID1 with 3 partitions (I think) Recovery(?) OS (C:\) and General (D:\)

I have booted using the SBS Installation disk and then gone to system repair and then command prompt.

I have then used DISKPART, but it doesn't show any drives. Is this because of the raid controller?

All help appreciated as I don't want to have to re install the OS.

Regards

Trevor

Trevor Patterso · Answer

Chris

I am sure it is a PERC H310 Adapter RAID Controller , that came with the system, or may be a PERC H710 Adapter RAID Controller, 512MB NV Cache. I can't remember what was ordered. it was only about 6 weeks ago. The system was set up by Dell when it was ordered. It only needed to be finalized when we received it.

I don't remember seeing the array as offline when I looked.

I am sure it is to do with the active partition, as that was the only thing I did before it would not boot.

Hope this helps.

Trevor

DELL-Chris H · Answer

Trevor,

What is the raid controller installed in the server? Also, what is the status of the array from within that controllers BIOS?

If the array is offline it can cause this.

Let me know what you find.

Trevor Patterso · Answer

Just to clarify.

When I have gone into command prompt through the recovery console and used DIskpart I cannot see any drives or volumes relating to the O/S.

The only drive available is the DVD drive that I have booted from.

Trevor

Trevor Patterso · Answer

Thanks for your replies. With help from Dell technical support, I think it has been resolved.

Booting using the installation disc, we tried to reinstall the OS, but there were no disc found. We had to install the drivers for the raid adapter using a USB drive.

It appears that the drivers for the raid were not installed. Booting again to the recovery console, and installing the raid drivers, the drive was then found using DISKPART.

Then using the information from here, I was able to get the system to load the O/S

support.microsoft.com/.../2501318

Not sure if this was down to me messing about and changing the active partition. I still don't think I did change anything. A windows update that had been installed and was awaiting a restart, or an issue with the raid adapter.

Still it is up and running now.

Thanks for all of your help.

Trevor

DELL-Vivek S · Answer

Trevor, If you problem persists, could you attempt to install the OS using the SMTD disc that came along with the Server? It is also available at Thanks Vivek

PowerEdge OS Forum

The Operating System Wasn't Not Found - SBS2011

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