I need help with 3 disk Raid 0 error...:(

[CrashDDL]

Hi,

Yesterday I have reinstalled my operation system on my RevoDrive and installed the new 12GB Ram I just received in the mail the other day. Before I started I have backed up most of my data but there is still some important stuff I have that is at risk at the moment. I have as data storage 3X2TB WD disks in Raid 0. I know it is asking for trouble but I just got them 10 days ago and I had no chance yet to order another 3 to make it Raid 10. After the reinstall I thought everything was cool but apparently by BIOS got reset to default. I assume was a CMOS type of reset. After it happened I have set everything to what it was before but now 2 disks are Raid member disks and 1 is non-member. It is a hardware raid, my controller is ICH10R, I used 128K and in windows disk management it shows me Disk 1 as "unallocated" with 5589.92GB partition and keep offering to initialize and I also have Disk 2 ( E: ) as "RAW" with 5589.92GB healthy primary partition with is un-accessible unless I would format it. I have not done any of them so theoretically the data is still there.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated. I am sure you can imagine this was not my Christmas day plan...

 

[sub mesa]

You can still recover all your data. I would suggest you buy new HDDs first and do a raw copy of each disk; then you can 'experiment' with your controller and re-create the RAID0 array. If this is done properly, it would get you back your data on the RAID. It's possible there will be some corruption/problems though.

As for backup, a RAID0+1 or 1+0 is not a backup. If you do want to protect your data, then by all means keep using RAID0; but do make sure you have a full backup; for example on another RAID0 in another physical system. Backups are best kept on non-RAID systems, though.

Redundant RAID is not the same as a true backup, and can only protect against limited dangers.

 

[CrashDDL]

Thanks for getting back to me so quick. Could you elaborate on what steps should I take once the new drives arrive to be on my way to recovery? I ordered 3 new identical 2TB disks...

 

[sub mesa]

They need to be the exact same size, or bigger, but not a fraction smaller!

SOURCE = your existing 3 disks with data you want to recover
TARGET = new 3 disks without data on it

What you should do is:
1) copy each SOURCE disk to a new TARGET disk; after this procedure you have 2 arrays which contain exactly the same data.
2) now you can experiment; and if you screw up you can repeat the procedure from 1) so you never lose the ability to recover your data. By recovering the TARGET disks instead, if you ever do something wrong, you won't destroy your data since it will also be on the SOURCE disks.
3) disconnect all the SOURCE disks to protect them from writes
4) enter the RAID utility and delete the 2 remaining 'RAID member' disks. Now all 3 TARGET disks should be 'non-member'. Now create a new RAID0 array on those disks. If the stripesize and disk order is the same, this would restore the RAID0 array and cause you to access its data again inside windows if you have the RAID drivers installed.

Hope this helps. The raw copying in step 1 would be best done in a Linux environment, for example Ubuntu livecd (does not require installation). All you need to do is make an exact copy from your three source disks to your new three target disks. You can skip this step, but then any mistake you make will be fatal!

 

[CrashDDL]

I couldn't wait till Thursday to give it a try since you made it sound so "easy"... Nothing was changed so all I had to do is follow step 4... Surprisingly after reboot the system only had 1 6TB partition but it was still unallocated... Is there something else I am supposed to do with it to be recognized?

I read an article about very similar advice and so I have downloaded a program called "Test Disk". The program recognized the partition and can see all the directories and files on it... At the moment I am wildly copying the files to other disks so everything is safe...

Going back to my question: "Is there something else I am supposed to do with it to be recognized?"
I am very interested about that because once I have everything saved I would very much like to fix the drive just to see how it is supposed to be done...

 

[sub mesa]

Could you post a screenshot of the Disk Management screen?