RAID Card failed, lost Array, need a little guidance - please?

Using TestDisk to repair the filesystem
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DoorGuy500
Posts: 4
Joined: 13 May 2017, 18:49

RAID Card failed, lost Array, need a little guidance - please?

#1 Post by DoorGuy500 »

Hello I'm running Windows Server 2012 and had a 3 HDD RAID 5 running with 2 Seagate and 1 Hitachi, each 2TB (at least I think is was RAID array, might've been JBOD). Long story short, the server reported a disk error on another RAID array I had in the system. But could not locate the HDD with the error. Looking deeper, the card the was mis-reading the disks. So the card was going or had gone south. 3 cards later, I 9with help from much smarter folks) discovered the MotherBoard had given up as well. I scrambled to get the data off the larger failed array and was using this smaller storage to hold data in the meantime. When I replaced the Motherboard and array card, the durn thing did not recognize the smaller storage pool and formatted it before I realized I had data on the drive. I've gone through several renditions of rebuilding the array and running TestDisk (current version Apr 2017) and could never get much to show up. I've finally got something, but am not sure what.
TestDisk Results 2.JPG
TestDisk Results 2.JPG (87.46 KiB) Viewed 2297 times
And each Line item shows
TestDisk Results 3.JPG
TestDisk Results 3.JPG (40.84 KiB) Viewed 2297 times
Except for the ones with the funky long names, they show
TestDisk Results 4.JPG
TestDisk Results 4.JPG (42.37 KiB) Viewed 2297 times
What is MS Data? And since this should be 3 2TB disks, what am I looking at? What should my next command be?
Any help is greatly appreciated!
Thank you!

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cgrenier
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Re: RAID Card failed, lost Array, need a little guidance - please?

#2 Post by cgrenier »

You searches for partitions inside a partition (F:). It's totally useless.
Without the testdisk.log file content, it's harder to understand the situation.
It looks like you have a 6TB F: filesystem, probably inside a Raid 0 with 3 disks of 6TB (3*2TB) and not a Raid 5 of 3 disks of 2 TB ((3-1)*2=4 TB).

DoorGuy500
Posts: 4
Joined: 13 May 2017, 18:49

Re: RAID Card failed, lost Array, need a little guidance - please?

#3 Post by DoorGuy500 »

The analysis took 3 days to get this far. So if I understand you correctly, I need to start over, disconnect the RAID array I have in the system, then allow the TestDisk program to run with only the 3 2TB drives (and the OS SSD) set up? But when I run the program, with all the disks in the chassis, the 3-2TB drives are one drive because of the RAID, hence the F: drive.
Does this sound like the way I need to proceed? Should I expect it to take another 3 days to run? And where would I locate the log for review?

Thank you!
John

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cgrenier
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Re: RAID Card failed, lost Array, need a little guidance - please?

#4 Post by cgrenier »

You wrote that the filesystem has been reformated.
You really need to know if the correct configuration is a Raid 0 or a Raid 5 before doing anything else...

DoorGuy500
Posts: 4
Joined: 13 May 2017, 18:49

Re: RAID Card failed, lost Array, need a little guidance - please?

#5 Post by DoorGuy500 »

I really do not remember. I think it was (is) RAID 5.
Will the program corrupt the date, if it is there, so that re-running it would not be an option?

DoorGuy500
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Joined: 13 May 2017, 18:49

Re: RAID Card failed, lost Array, need a little guidance - please?

#6 Post by DoorGuy500 »

When I remove the drive letter, then the computer recognizes 3 drives independent of one another. So it will not 'see' the RAID. This was a software RAID in Windows server 2008 then upgraded to Windows Server 2012. If I attach it to the RAID card, won't the algorithm change, and hence the data is lost? Or is there maybe a way to still retrieve the information? Please?

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cgrenier
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Re: RAID Card failed, lost Array, need a little guidance - please?

#7 Post by cgrenier »

In Raid 5, a "disk" of 4TB should be seen. Retry TestDisk when it's done.

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