6 questions about array manager 3.7

Question

Hi all, hi Dell support,

I'm reorganizing partitions/disks on a PE2500 (Windows 2000), and had to use array manager 3.7, and have quite some problems. I'm not a frequent user of these tools.

1. Is there no way to 'unmirror' or 'split' a RAID1 on low level (ctrl-A) ? Is there a tool around that works outside of windows?

2. Is there a way to disable/hide outside of Windows a virtual disk temporarily, without deleting it?

3. Where is the information about virtual disks and RAID configuration stored? My impression was that it is in the controller's Bios. Only there?

4. Is it normal that Array manager does not work in Windows safe mode (F8)? It tried to connect to my local computer, but could not find it, even in safe mode with networking. Note I had to keep the network cable disconnected, and the server has multiple IP addresses. How should I manage partitions without disk manager?

5. Is it possible to re-enable the original Windows disk manager without uninstalling the Array manager?

6. Hotplugging (under Windows) a formerly used boot disk, I got a terrible crash. It's like the actual 'virtual disk 0' moved instantly to a higher position. After reboot, I found my 2 virtual disks to be numbered as 1+2, instead of 0+1.

Version information:
--------------------
Perc device driver: A15
Bios: A07
Perc3/di firmware: A11
ESM firmware: A58
OM: not installed (array manager only)

freddy

warwizard55 · Answer

Hi,

#1 Physically remove 1 drive.

#2 No.

#3 On both controller's NVRAM and on the drives.

#4 Safe mode disables most drivers, the program needs the driver to interface to the controller. Thru the controller's BIOS on POST.

#5 I think it can be done, I do not know the exact method.

#6 See answer to #3, the drive had array info on it, the controller saw that info and brought it up. It had a C: partition and a page file on it... your other partitions got relettered, the page file tried to swap things in that were not there.... Use Ctrl A in POST to delete unwanted array info off of the drive.

warwizard

Freddy_K · Answer

Warwizard,

thank you for answers. Just some general remarks, maybe Dell is listening here:

#4 Disk Manager:
if Array Manager replaces/disables Windows Disk Manager, Dell should deliver an equivalent, that is: a program that runs under safe mode, with reduced functionality, OK. Background: Reorganizing disks imply often unwanted drive letter changes. Safe mode would allow to correct things before all services start up, etc.

#6 hotplugging disks:
you must be right. It's unbelievable, and the Perc system appears to be worse than a virus, which announces probably that it is purging the OS, the Perc driver or controller does it completely silently.

I had Array manager running during hotplugging of this f.. disk, expecting at least a warning! AM has some control over the controller, isn't it, and gets messages, or do they fight against each other?

Does someone know if there is a alternative for Array Manager 3.7.0 (575.6), or a newer version for a Perc3/Di ??

Best regards
Freddy

warwizard55 · Answer

Hi Freddy,

Actually I am in Dell Server support, going on 7 1/2 years now.

The usual reason for hot swapping a drive is to replace a failed drive, in which case you have a degraded array, and if the new drive is containing array info, it assumes that it's a replacement, and starts rebuilding the degraded array. If there is a valid container that thinks it's container 0 on the drive and there is no degraded array on the server, the controller will assume that you are reinstalling drives and it tries to bring the array online, with the results that you saw, the drive you install had to have come from either a single drive RAID 0, or a RAID 1, and had to be container 0. We sometimes see ghost RAID 5's show up but they will not be able to be brought online so could not crash the system. Unfortunately to plug in a drive from another system to be able to do recovery operations on it, you'll have to go into the controller BIOS and specify the boot container approiately.

In W2003 Array manager no longer replaces disk management. For W2k, if you uninstall Array Manager, you get disk manager back.

Version 3.7 is the latest version of Array Manager, there are alternatives...

FAST (Flexable Array Storage Tool) can be used... you would have to uninstall Array Manager and reboot before installing this package, and it still needs the API driver running... our Lenix and Netware using customers will be used to FAST, and it has a nice command line interface if you don't want to use the GUI.

http://support.dell.com/support/downloads/download.aspx?c=us&cs=555&l=en&s=biz&releaseid=R73418&SystemID=PWE_FOS_XEO_2650&os=WNT5&osl=en&deviceid=1375&devlib=0&typecnt=3&vercnt=2&formatcnt=1&fileid=95724

warwizard

Freddy_K · Answer

Warwizard,

thank you for detailed explanation.
Please understand: I'm using these tools + operations occasionally.

I just wanted to reuse this deactivated drive for further usage.
The ugly thing is that I never degraded the array properly,
but simply removed the mirror disk. It remembered well !

Arrays need sometimes reconfiguration: In my case, I had a bad layout from factory,
with a mirrored container of 4MB, holding C:, and another mirrored one, holding data partitions.
C: became too small, and I had not only to resize partitions, but also breaking mirrors + containers,
Thus, I was somewhat enervated.

But now, all is well, and I'll reinitialize this particular drive on bios level before usage.
Where does the drive store its container information? sector 0?

freddy

warwizard55 · Answer

Hi Freddy,

Where does it store it? I'm not really sure, there are two RAID vendors we buy controllers from and about a total of 20 different controllers with 5-6 firmware versions each, and it is not unknown to have the formatting of the RAID header info get changed by a firmware update. (PERC II U75 to U77 changed the header format)

warwizard

PowerEdge HDD/SCSI/RAID

6 questions about array manager 3.7

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