Hi All

Been having some issues with my RAID array, so before I post a more detailed explanation, I was curious as to if there was any software out there that can check the integrity of my RAID and/or for any health and errors.

Thanks in advance!

Is this mobo RAID? A dedicated controller card RAID?

Either way, whomever made the RAID chip should offer some monitoring software. I've used Highpoint, Promise, and 3ware controllers and all of them have a web-based utility that offers health and status checks of the array. nVidia has MediaShield software which is their RAID software. Not sure what Intel has or what AMD gives with their onboad mobo RAID chipsets, but I'm quite sure they have RAID health/status utilities as well.

Thanks for the reply. Its an onboard intel based chipset on a P35. I installed intels storage manager console which reports back my health and status of the RAID members, however I was looking for something with a little bit more functionality (maybe a 3rd party app) to go through the entire array to make sure that the data and the data's checksum are in sync.

Does anything exist?

Hmm sorry, no 3rd party apps like that I know of.

It might be worth explaining the issue(s) your having with your array. Or, maybe wait until you get a few more replies as someone else might know of a 3rd party app.

Windows chkdsk with the /f /r options will scan the array for readable sectors, and will check the entire file system for corruption, and fix any errors that it can.

The only other method is to copy the data off, break apart the array, and then check the drives one at a time with a 3rd party app like Spinrite.

I used to think RAID was the greatest thing since sliced bread but now I HATE it!!!! Here's why:

-Stupid RAID controllers didn't let me know one of my drives was in fact not mirroring my data for over a year!

-When you take the drives out of the array (say one failed or you want to move computers) I had a near disaster as the drives were not readable in any other computer. By some miracle I found a piece of software that made them readable...last ditch effort.

-If you delete a file accidentially, it's instantly gone from both drives, so RAID doesn't give me much piece of mind.

-In event of fire/theft RAID doesn't help you

So that's why I'm now anti-RAID. Instead, I have a little server running with a spare drive equal in size on my network. I run backup software to copy over new data from my workstation once a week or so. I also back-up to yet another spare drive which I keep at my parents house. I do this about quarterly in case of fire/theft.

^oh thats nothing compared to the performance gain
i see your point tho... thats why backing up your data on a single drive is so important imo.

anyways thanks for the posts and all the information.. an excellent resource this has been. i will definately try the windows error checking util.

ill post my problem (at least the one i was having) later on today...

cheers!

shtweps--

The Intel Matrix Storage Console will let you perform a Verify operation (right-click on the volume) for Raid0,1,5,10 or a Verify and Repair for Raid1,5,10(again, if you right-click the volume)

This will check the integrity of the data on the disks in the volume. In the case of the Verify and Repair operation, it will reset parity/ mirrored data if a discrepancy is found.

Is this not what you're looking for?

This is only one step. There are 3 steps to checking the integrity of data on a RAID:

1. The ability of all hard drive sectors to adequately store and retrieve data. This is a hardware-level verification. Spinrite or the hard drive manufacturer's disk tools are necessary to make this check. You can use also use Windows utilities like HDTune and/or chkdsk /r but it's best to run a DOS-based utility on the raw drive. Some RAID controllers can do this as a background preventative maintenance task, and call it "Media Patrol" or "Surface Scan".

2. Checking that the RAID volume is, in fact, redundant at all block/stripe levels. This is what the Intel utility's "verify" option does. This, for example, makes sure all data is mirrored to the other drive in a RAID 1, or makes sure that all parity blocks are correct in a RAID 5. This does not check the file system. Some RAID controllers can do this as a background preventative maintenance task, and call it "Redundancy Check".

3. Verifying that the file system structures like the MFT are consistent, without any lost clusters or indexes. Windows chkdsk, Linux fsck, etc. are the tools to do this.