Now I done it...Raid 1 partitions gone! Help!

[TheJuggernaut]

Got a big problem. All my work, kids pics, music, videos

Practically everything but the OS was housed on 2 1.5tb Seagate HDs I had in a Raid 1 configuration. Well, I had 2 Samsung 840 SSDs that were acting funny so went into the bios to check things out.

Turns out the 2 SSDs were controlled by intel rapid storage whatever drivers and the 2 1.5tb drives were configured by marvell raid drivers. So in my infinite wisdom, I decided that's probably not the way they 'should' be configured, and while adding 2 additional 3 tb drives in another Raid 1 configuration...i decided to have all the drives be controlled by the same intel driver system.

So I got the SSD raid 1 configuration squared away, logged onto windows, opened intels rapid storage and it shows the two 1.5tb drives that were originally on the marvell drivers. It said to be able to see the Drives in windows disk mgmt...I had to initialize the drives...which I did, but it made no mention of formatting the drives...in fact, I seem to remember specifically selecting the option 'do not format' when I added the new raid volume.

So intel created the new simple raid 1 volume. I checked windows disk mgmt...and it shows 1.4tb of unused disk space - NO PARTITION! 🙁 I still couldnt' get into the drive to see any files because the volume still wasn't showing up as anything other than the 1.4tb of free space...so I had to create a new simple volume. While creating the new simple volume I think the Raid Volume, I specifically selected the 'DO NOT FORMAT' option while creating the volume hoping my data would magically reappear.


I'm considering trying to get the data back by going into the intel rapids storage management system, resetting the disks to non-raid, downloading the drivers for the marvell raid configuration, then using one of the drives to rebuild the raid 1 using one of my new 3tb blank drives.

Any other ideas on what to try? If I don't this stuff back...I'm literally up s*** creek without a paddle 🙁

 

[drtweak]

Wow. First off a lot of mistakes going on here.

First and for most. DO NOT USE RAID 1 AS A BACKUP SOLUTION! Hoenstly I would just totally scrap the RAID 1 and just do regular backups to the other hard drive. Stuff like this happen ALL the time.

Also the thing is when you moved it to the other Controller to make a new RAID 1 you just wiped the drives out. With ANY RAID when you make a NEW RAID IT WIPES THEM OUT! It has to to rebuild them on that Controller. This is why I also tell people to never use Onboard RAID conrollers either. Getthing something like a good LSI RAID card is better because you can move them from RAID card to RAID card and not lose the RAID config (Considering you are moving them to a LSI RAID Card)

Also RAID 1 with SSD's is pointless. They will more than likely Fail at the same time vs one dieing out sooner than the other like normal Hard Drives.

Now if you ever have to initlize a drive. Everything is gone. What you can try now are a few things.

EASUS partition Recovery. Have it scan the drive and see if it can get the partition back.

Or use other File/Partition recovery programs from EASUS, Paragon, Mini Tools etc.

What ever you do STOP playing with the RAID! Leave everything as it is. Hook up ONLY 1 of your 1.5TB drives and then use the program to scan that one. DO NOT PLUG IN BOTH. If something happens to one drive you MAY be able to use the other.

With that said BACKUP BACKUP BACKUP. Your data needs to be in 3 DIFFERENCE locations. RAID does not count. ALL of my stuff is in at least 3 locations. The important stuff in in 4 locations. I have my orginal, my physical backup of each of my Drives/RAIDs, and Cloud Backup. Then for my importatnt stuff I have another USB backup drive that backups every night.

 

[kanewolf]

When the RAID controller "initialized" the volume it wiped out the marvel partition(s) and created new ones. You may be able to get your files back with Recuva -- https://www.piriform.com/recuva or other similar data recovery program.

This is why RAID should not be used as the only protection for data. Human error is MUCH more likely than disk failure. IF you get your data back, I wouldn't recommend the 3TB disks be in RAID. I would recommend you used them for two independent backup volumes.

 

[TheJuggernaut]

Thanks guys!!!! EaseUS did the trick, though I did have to pay $70 for the software to restore more than 1gb...worth every penny to get all that work and pictures back! Only thing I had to do was reorganize everything once it was restored, and I'll probably have to update all my shortcuts for quite some time.

I'm considering making some other changes you guys recommended.
Since the raids don't help all that much, I was considering changing my raid 1 ssds to a raid 0 to improve performance and then using one of the other 4 drives that has TBs of space available to act as a backup. Would going from a raid 1 to raid 0 make me lose all my data? Lastly, any recommendations on a program or provider to use for backing up crucial stuff offline. I've used google drive a lot but am limited to 15gb with that. Dropbox...never been impressed with. Same with amazon prime for photos. What do you guys recommend?

 

[kanewolf]

Amazon Glacier for off-site backup. Some of my coworkers like Carbonite.

Changing from RAID1 to RAID0 will lose all data.

 

[DR_Luke]

Thanks guys!!!! EaseUS did the trick, though I did have to pay $70 for the software to restore more than 1gb...worth every penny to get all that work and pictures back! Only thing I had to do was reorganize everything once it was restored, and I'll probably have to update all my shortcuts for quite some time.

Why would you have to reorganize everything? Did EaseUS not recover your file structure too? Perhaps you completely killed the MFT during your mishap, but I didn't read it that way. Anyway, out of curiosity, are you able to try R-Studio (r-tt.com) and compare the result. The demo is free, so it should be enough to show you the result, without having to pay for it.

Would going from a raid 1 to raid 0 make me lose all my data?

Yes, it most certainly would. RAID 1 duplicates each sector between the two drives, while RAID 0 writes data back and forth between the two drives, usually with a default stripe size of 64KB (128Sectors).

 

[drtweak]

You can use Macrium Reflect to image your OS SSD to one of the other data drives. Then make sure you make the Rescue DVD/USB drive. Then go in make the RAID 0 of SSD's if you wish and then boot off the USB/DVD and restore the image to the SSD. You may have to extend the partition sizes to make it fit.

Then if you have a backup you should be good.

This is what I do with my Media Server. I have 8 2TB drives (I don't like using over 2Tb as they tend to fail faster than smaller drives). I have 2 RAID 0's and then have a 4Tb backup drive that is only on when I am backing up.