RAID 0 Status Failed Bootable No

[7ksair]

Hi everyone.

Got a problem trying to transfer files from a old computer to a new one. The old computer was set up with a RAID 0 array with two 160GB hard drives (dells decision not me).

As it turns out I only found about RAID today, because when I went to transfer it I just ripped out the old hdd and tried to open them through an external case. Obviously this didnt work, but I was ignorant of the whole RAID thing until this morning.

So I put them back into the old comp and tried to boot and I get this error, RAID 0 status failed bootable no. Both HDDs are physically fine, so the data is still there, but obviously the RAID array itself corrupted in some way? Whats the best way to go about recovering the data?

All help appreciated.

 

[7ksair]

ISTM that there are 3 partitions.

FAT16 / Dell Utility - 47MiB
NTFS - 10GiB
NTFS - 289GiB

There is also a 32GiB FAT32 partition which appears to be a remnant from a previous build.

Does that sound right?

Yes that sounds correct, the 298 is the main one where all my stuff is (obvioisly) and the 10 is a dell 'recovery partition' that comes on most dell pcs and the 47 mib dell utilty makes sense as well. I guess you figured as much.

Not sure about that 32 gb, this pc was brand new when I got it abd I havent touched the hdds or their partitions until this weekend, so I cant offer up any explanation for that.

 

[fzabkar]

Drive #2 (13 images) appears to be the first drive in the array. Could we see sector 0? If this is the correct drive, then all I propose to do is to edit three partition entries using DMDE. I propose to make the 289GiB partiton bootable. Any changes can easily be reversed, as your original contents will be available in this thread.

 

[7ksair]

Drive #2 (13 images) appears to be the first drive in the array. Could we see sector 0? If this is the correct drive, then all I propose to do is to edit three partition entries using DMDE. I propose to make the 289GiB partiton bootable. Any changes can easily be reversed, as your original contents will be available in this thread.

http://imgur.com/cr489ZS

Heres sector 0 for the second drive.

 

[fzabkar]

That's the correct drive. Its partition table has a single entry corresponding to the 47MiB FAT16 / Dell Utility partition. The remaining two partitions are missing. These are the ones that we need to add.

This is the current partition table:

1B0 6D 00 00 00 00 62 7A 99 00 00 00 28 00 00 80 01
1C0 01 00 06 FE 3F 05 3F 00 00 00 47 78 01 00 00 00
1D0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
1E0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
1F0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 55 AA

You need to edit it as follows:

1B0 6D 00 00 00 00 62 7A 99 00 00 00 28 00 00 00 01
1C0 01 00 06 FE 3F 05 3F 00 00 00 47 78 01 00 00 1E
1D0 19 06 07 FE FF FF 00 80 01 00 00 00 40 01 80 00
1E0 C1 FF 07 FE FF FF 00 80 41 01 00 10 FF 23 00 00
1F0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 55 AA

Select Edit -> Edit Mode

Make the changes.

Select Edit -> Write Changes

The above changes will add the 10GB and 289GB NTFS partitions, and make the latter partition bootable.

Best of luck.

Useful resources:

ftp://ftp.symantec.com/public/english_us_canada/tools/pq/utilities/ptedit.zip
ftp://ftp.symantec.com/public/english_us_canada/tools/pq/utilities/PTEDIT32.zip
http://homepage2.nifty.com/cars/misc/chs2lba.html

 

[7ksair]

That's the correct drive. Its partition table has a single entry corresponding to the 47MiB FAT16 / Dell Utility partition. The remaining two partitions are missing. These are the ones that we need to add.

This is the current partition table:

1B0 6D 00 00 00 00 62 7A 99 00 00 00 28 00 00 80 01
1C0 01 00 06 FE 3F 05 3F 00 00 00 47 78 01 00 00 00
1D0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
1E0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00
1F0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 55 AA

You need to edit it as follows:

1B0 6D 00 00 00 00 62 7A 99 00 00 00 28 00 00 00 01
1C0 01 00 06 FE 3F 05 3F 00 00 00 47 78 01 00 00 1E
1D0 19 06 07 FE FF FF 00 80 01 00 00 00 40 01 80 00
1E0 C1 FF 07 FE FF FF 00 80 41 01 00 10 FF 23 00 00
1F0 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 55 AA

Select Edit -> Edit Mode

Make the changes.

Select Edit -> Write Changes

The above changes will add the 10GB and 289GB NTFS partitions, and make the latter partition bootable.

Best of luck.

Useful resources:

ftp://ftp.symantec.com/public/english_us_canada/tools/pq/utilities/ptedit.zip
ftp://ftp.symantec.com/public/english_us_canada/tools/pq/utilities/PTEDIT32.zip
http://homepage2.nifty.com/cars/misc/chs2lba.html

Thanks yet again for your help.
I have edited as you said, and the partitions are now appearing as they should. However its still not booting, any other suggestions? What else might test disk have changed?

 

[fzabkar]

Do you have the two drives in the original system and configured as a RAID array?

Can you see the actual files? Does the 289GB partition have your OS?

The original partition table had a bootable FAT16 Dell partition. I assumed that this was incorrect and switched the boot flag (80) to the third partition. Maybe Dell needs to boot the first partition before booting the main OS.

Let me know if your files are OK first before we do anything more.

 

[7ksair]

Do you have the two drives in the original system and configured as a RAID array?

Can you see the actual files? Does the 289GB partition have your OS?

The original partition table had a bootable FAT16 Dell partition. I assumed that this was incorrect and switched the boot flag (80) to the third partition. Maybe Dell needs to boot the first partition before booting the main OS.

Let me know if your files are OK first before we do anything more.

Yes the two drives are in the original system and in the correct ports.

The boot screen lists one as a "Member disk(0)" and the other as "non-raid", however.
EDIT: Altough it also describes both disks as being "controlled by the RAID BIOS - dont know if this is relevant but it seemed contradictory to me
I cant see the actual files. The only reason I say the partition looked ok because disk management in my healthy computer displays one as as RAW and the other as unalloacted which is what they ewre before

 

[7ksair]

Do you have the two drives in the original system and configured as a RAID array?

Can you see the actual files? Does the 289GB partition have your OS?

The original partition table had a bootable FAT16 Dell partition. I assumed that this was incorrect and switched the boot flag (80) to the third partition. Maybe Dell needs to boot the first partition before booting the main OS.

Let me know if your files are OK first before we do anything more.

I also looked into that FAT16 partition. Its meant to be for when you first get the comp - it boots from that partition to make you sign the dell EULA, but after the first boot, the bootflag is moved to the OS partition. So the boot flag is on the right partition.

 

[fzabkar]

The only thing I can think of is that the RAID metadata may have been messed up. AIUI, these metadata could be stored on the drives, or in NVRAM on the motherboard.

There is one thing you could try. I haven't used it, but DMDE has a RAID reconstruction feature.

Select Drive -> Construct RAID

Click on "+" to add your two drives

Choose RAID0:Stripe as your RAID type

Select an appropriate Stripe Size (you may need to experiment, but 128KB seems common)

The Delay option doesn't apply to RAID 0.

Now you're on your own.

If you can see your data, then you can experiment with a free RAID reconstruction utility such as mdadm (Linux). Mdadm creates and mounts a software RAID from your two drives.