[SOLVED] Reusing a hard drive from a Microsoft Storage Pool

[57bel]

Hey all,
I have a weird problem I have never run into before. I have two disks that were in a Microsoft storage pool (no parity) that I am trying to reuse. The system CPU died but the rest was fine. I am reinstalling these two drives in separate systems and am trying to wipe the old pool from them. One went fine with no problem using windows disk management, this second one not so much. I hook it up but it shows up as the size of the old pool. I can't seem to wipe the virtual disk from the physical one leaving it completely useless. I have tried disk management, chkdsk tool to repair, and using a boot drive to format it. Chkdsk and the boot drive do not recognize it. Disk management locks it only allowing to view properties. Kind of at my wits end here but its a 2tb NVMe so I would really like to fix it. It shows up in Bios as a WD 2tb, but device manager and chkdisk just show it as a Micro soft storage space device. If anyone has dealt with this before or has a solution let me know.
Thanks for reading,
57bel

 

[57bel]

Hey all,
I have a weird problem I have never run into before. I have two disks that were in a Microsoft storage pool (no parity) that I am trying to reuse. The system CPU died but the rest was fine. I am reinstalling these two drives in separate systems and am trying to wipe the old pool from them. One went fine with no problem using windows disk management, this second one not so much. I hook it up but it shows up as the size of the old pool. I can't seem to wipe the virtual disk from the physical one leaving it completely useless. I have tried disk management, chkdsk tool to repair, and using a boot drive to format it. Chkdsk and the boot drive do not recognize it. Disk management locks it only allowing to view properties. Kind of at my wits end here but its a 2tb NVMe so I would really like to fix it. It shows up in Bios as a WD 2tb, but device manager and chkdisk just show it as a Micro soft storage space device. If anyone has dealt with this before or has a solution let me know.
Thanks for reading,
57bel

 

[USAFRet]

Commandline function diskpart, and the /clean command should do the trick.

 

[57bel]

Commandline function diskpart, and the /clean command should do the trick.

Using disk part it only recognizes the old virtual drive. Its a 2tb drive, but it comes up as the old 3.7 tb pool. Diskmanagement wont let me clear the virtual disk (The one made by windows storage spaces). Is it possible to use detach VHD without knowing the drive letter? Would it be possible to use the physical disk number? Sorry for double post as well was not sure were it fits best.

 

[USAFRet]

Using disk part it only recognizes the old virtual drive. Its a 2tb drive, but it comes up as the old 3.7 tb pool. Diskmanagement wont let me clear the virtual disk (The one made by windows storage spaces). Is it possible to use detach VHD without knowing the drive letter? Would it be possible to use the physical disk number? Sorry for double post as well was not sure were it fits best.

Yes, the actual drive number, select that, and clean.

 

[57bel]

Yes, the actual drive number, select that, and clean.

So it still shows the virtual disk as a 3717 gb disk after cleaning with disk part. I could not find the actual physical number. I need to somehow erase that virtual disk. Here is a screen shot of disk part:

https://imgur.com/a/RwGjLHs

View: https://imgur.com/a/RwGjLHs
. Here's a screen shot of disk management :

https://imgur.com/a/sUAdn9c

View: https://imgur.com/a/sUAdn9c
. Thanks for replying, this sort of thing is not my usual wheel house.

 

[fzabkar]

You could try to invalidate sector 0 using a freeware disc editor such as DMDE:

https://dmde.com/

Reset GPT+MBR Signatures (GPT Off)​

 

[USAFRet]

. Thanks for replying, this sort of thing is not my usual wheel house.

Strange.

Possible /clean all.
(this will take some time)

 

[57bel]

Hey fzabkar,
Thanks for the help! DMDE seems like a great tool! I was unable to invalidate sector 0, as it gives an error saying device which does not exist was specified

Strange.

Possible /clean all.
(this will take some time)

Hello,
I am reading online this only cleans all the selected disk. This is correct right? I have a 10tb raid array I would not want to erase. Should I disconnect all drives except boot and the one I wish to reset?
Thanks again! You have been super helpful!

 

[USAFRet]

Hey fzabkar,
Thanks for the help! DMDE seems like a great tool! I was unable to invalidate sector 0, as it gives an error saying device which does not exist was specified

Hello,
I am reading online this only cleans all the selected disk. This is correct right? I have a 10tb raid array I would not want to erase. Should I disconnect all drives except boot and the one I wish to reset?
Thanks again! You have been super helpful!

Yes, /clean all only works with the selected drive.

/clean just blanks out the partition table.
/clean all overwrites all the data on the drive.
https://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/52129-disk-clean-clean-all-diskpart-command.html

 

[57bel]

Yes, /clean all only works with the selected drive.

/clean just blanks out the partition table.
/clean all overwrites all the data on the drive.
https://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/52129-disk-clean-clean-all-diskpart-command.html

So its giving me error disk is write protected. That's why nothing is working on it. On disk management>properties I have enabled R/W. Its still being seen as the data pool. Under storage spaces there is no option to remove it, since it doesn't recognize it. Until that virtual disk is removed I think its stuck. Not going to lie, I think it might be bricked. DMDE won't let me touch it since the device it says it is isn't what it actually is. Disk management and disk part are in the same boat. Its so weird the 2tb drive is saying its 3.7 tb. Maybe if I put the pool back together it will recognize it, and from there I can take it apart using storage pools?

 

[57bel]

heres the screen shot sorry forgot:

https://imgur.com/a/Jkj7met

View: https://imgur.com/a/Jkj7met

 

[fzabkar]

It appears that the drive's partition table still has the metadata corresponding to a 4TB partition. Maybe you could fool the OS by enabling RAID mode for this one drive in BIOS. Then DMDE might be able to work on it.

 

[57bel]

It appears that the drive's partition table still has the metadata corresponding to a 4TB partition. Maybe you could fool the OS by enabling RAID mode for this one drive in BIOS. Then DMDE might be able to work on it.

No dice Tried enabling RAID. Tried to put old drive in tp recreate storage pool, but since it was already cleaned I guess it won't work. At this point I think I need to take it to someone more experienced. Any last Hail Marys? Thanks everyone for the help!

 

[USAFRet]

Any last Hail Marys?

DBAN

 

[fzabkar]

Try accessing your HDD from a bootable USB drive. This will circumvent Windows.

Alternatively, Windows may see it differently if you put it inside a USB enclosure.

 

[57bel]

Try accessing your HDD from a bootable USB drive. This will circumvent Windows.

Alternatively, Windows may see it differently if you put it inside a USB enclosure.

Hello fzbkar,
I tried circumventing using a windows 10 bootable, a Parrot distro, and an Ubuntu one. Windows seems to have encrypted it to be read only. I will try getting a usb adapter, might be a few weeks before it arrives. I took it to a shop and they told me it is bricked . Hopefully with it being read as a FAT it works. Will let you know when I can attempt. Thanks for the help!
-57bel

 

[57bel]

DBAN

Hello USAFret,
DBAN did not work. Very sad day for NVMes everywhere. Thanks for the help!
-57bel