RAID 5 not automatically rebuilding

Thanks for the reply. I'll execute Assign as Global Hot Spare.

On the serial number, I should have been more clear, I meant that the serial number displayed in OpenManage matches the new drive's serial number, thus confirming the identification.

Thanks,

-Dave

There are many things that can prevent a disk from rebuilding automatically. The option you want is to assign it as a hot-spare to start the rebuild.

(What do you mean it has the same "serial number"? No two drives should have the same serial number.)

Ah, ok ... that isn't the actual/full SN. No biggie :)

Looks like I could use some more help on this. Here's the current status (I probably should have shared these screen shots yesterday)... notice how the disk is not included with the other drives (it's supposed to be Disk 0:0:1)...

edit: looks my screen shots didn't work. but anyway, in OMSA, under Storage, Perc6, Connector 0, Enclosure, there are two 'Physical Disks' folders (should only be one). The first one contains disks 0:0:0, 0:0:2, 0:0:3 (notice disk 0:0:1 is missing, that's the one that failed). In the other Physical Disks folder, there is this Disk 0:33 which is the replacement disk. Its state is READY. I assigned it as a Global Hot Spare thinking that would put it where it belongs but no luck. Its only available task atm is 'Unassign Global Hot Spare".

Oh, and its amber light is still blinking :(

As always I am grateful for any/all assistance! Thanks!

-Dave

If anyone is reading this, I'd be grateful for any help. I still can't figure it out.

Thanks,

-Dave

Thanks for your reply, and tip on the screen shots.

In the first one, you can see 3 disks (supposed to be 4). One is missing (0:0:1) which is the failed drive. To recap, I ordered a brand new replacement with identical specs, inserted it into slot 1, and after a minute or two its amber light started to blink. I thought it was a bum disk, so I ordered yet another replacement, but I'm still seeing the same behavior. The RAID 5 array is not automatically rebuilding unlike prior situations.

In the second screenshot, you can see the replacement disk is sitting by itself, in another 'Physical Disks' folder, identified as disk 0:33 (?)

Any help is much much appreciated. Thx.

I think the screenshots would be helpful. You can't paste images. Click on the Insert/Edit Media icon in the middle of the bottom row of the editor window and upload/attach a saved image file.

Honestly, I've seen the disk 0:33 before (not on my servers), but because everything seems to work normally otherwise, I've never done a lot of troubleshooting with anyone.

As far as the rebuild not being automatic, that is perfectly normal. Assign it as a hot-spare, and as long as it rebuilds and everything shows healthy, the 0:33 thing doesn't seem to be a big deal. I would suggest you update the system firmware (iDRAC, BIOS, PERC, backplane, etc.) to possibly address the disk ID issue. You could post a controller log to see if the log can shed any light as to why it is getting such a strange ID.

I appreciate your help. I guess I'm still having trouble understanding this. I've had disk failures in the past on this server, and all I had to do was swap out the bad drive with a replacement and the rebuild would just start by itself. Literally no further action required, no OMSA, nothing.

Some more detail in case it helps:

Prior to this issue, there was no disk 0:33. In OMSA, disk 1 appeared in the list as 0:0:1 along with the other 3 drives. When disk 1 failed, the LCD display showed "E1810 hard drive 1 fault". In OMSA, the disk was gone, as if it did not exist. The disk itself had a flashing amber status light. The activity led was not lit. I believe this all points to the disk indeed failing?

So as you know I replaced the drive... When I insert the new drive, its green activity LED blinks/flashes for ~15 seconds, then stays on solid. After about a minute or so, its status LED starts amber flashing, the activity LED remains green solid, and the LCD displays "E1810 hard drive fault". However in OMSA, the disk 0:33 appears, healthy, but separate from the other 3 disks.

So as you can see, it seems to be conflicting information. For now, I have assigned 0:33 as a Global Hot Spare, but I'm not convinced that is actually a 'member' of that group of disks, since it is listed separately in OMSA. And of course the "hard drive fault" indication is a huge concern... I have tried 2 replacement disks, both brand new, and both have behaved the same.

I hope this additional detail might help? I apologize if I'm belaboring it, but I am very concerned because this is a our primary production server. Again, I am very grateful for any/all help.

Thanks, -Dave

Hello,

I had today exactly the same issue on my PE2950 server with PERC 6i.

Disk 0:0:1 failed and replaced with new one promoted to HS that is shown as 0:33. Rebuild finished but the new one still blinking amber. Message backplane degraded appeared in OMSA.

There are some notes about log clearing using DSET and I did it.

DSET log clear didn't solve the issue, amber still blink and backplane degraded still exists.

I shutdown server unplug AC connector for a minute and plug it again, start the server and everything was just fine. Disk shown as  0:33 became 0:0:1 again, according to physical position.

Conclusion:

1. log clear using DSET
2. shutdown, unplug the AC for minute and start the server again

This worked for me

Good luck