Pro/Forums - View Single Post - Help with 4100 Cracked Raid

frankb3910 · 10-23-2006, 08:46 AM

Hello - thank you everyone for your responses over the weekend! This is fascinating stuff. Let me first point out that the raid is still operating in degraded mode (in other words, it acted exactly as a raid-5 configuration should after losing one member.) There has been no loss of data, and in addition we have complete backup copies.

So yes, the main goal was to install a new drive and simply rebuild the raid to full redundancy.

Here is the result of the info log t command as suggested by rpmurray:

10/21/2006 11:59:31 41 D SYS | Intf: 0, dev: 0: Model: QUANTUM FIREBALLP AS60.0
10/21/2006 11:59:31 41 D SYS | Firmware Rev: A1Y.1300 Serial #: 196103937962
10/21/2006 11:59:31 41 D SYS | Intf: 1, dev: 0: Model: QUANTUM FIREBALLP AS60.0
10/21/2006 11:59:31 41 D SYS | Firmware Rev: A1Y.1300 Serial #: 196103934228
10/21/2006 11:59:31 41 D SYS | Intf: 2, dev: 0: Model: QUANTUM FIREBALLP AS60.0
10/21/2006 11:59:31 41 D SYS | Firmware Rev: A1Y.1500 Serial #: 196104536529
10/21/2006 11:59:31 41 D SYS | Intf: 3, dev: 0: Model: QUANTUM FIREBALLP AS60.0
10/21/2006 11:59:31 41 D SYS | Firmware Rev: A1Y.1300 Serial #: 196102535993

So yes it does look like the replacement drive is of a newer Firmware Rev (A1Y.1500 instead of .1300).

What I do not understand is that I thought hard drive capacity was a simple caluclation of bits and bytes, in other words if the geometry of the drives are the same, the formatted capacity should also be the same.

I am wondering: Does anyone know what a "nocore" format actually does, compared to the regular automatic formatting that the snap server does? And how would I know if this command actually worked, because in the log file, after comparing the automated format and the "nocore" format, I did not notice ANY difference in the log files.

I was under the impression that this "nocore" format would free up more space compared to the regular automated formatting, because it is spelled out in the field service guide as the solution to this exact problem, the replacement drive not formatting to it's full capacity. I wonder what it actually does (or is supposed to do) that would make the formatted capacity different.

I realize that I can switch the drives around and rebuild this thing from scratch, I am just dreading that becuase of the time involved in moving all of the data around!

Thanks a bunch to all of you. By the way we did upgrade the RAM from the 128MB it came with, to 256MB (based on suggestions from other threads). I have not noticed any specific improvement as of yet.

I have another empty 4100 that I am about to upgrade ram and install 160-GB drives to see what will happen. I realize we will not see the full 160GB in this model snap.

Are there any hard drive experts out there that can shed light on why the formatted capacity of these drives would be different?

10-23-2006, 08:46 AM	#11
frankb3910 Cooling Neophyte Join Date: May 2006 Location: Chicago, IL Posts: 14	Re: Help with 4100 Cracked Raid - Trying to replace 1 Drive Hello - thank you everyone for your responses over the weekend! This is fascinating stuff. Let me first point out that the raid is still operating in degraded mode (in other words, it acted exactly as a raid-5 configuration should after losing one member.) There has been no loss of data, and in addition we have complete backup copies. So yes, the main goal was to install a new drive and simply rebuild the raid to full redundancy. Here is the result of the info log t command as suggested by rpmurray: 10/21/2006 11:59:31 41 D SYS \| Intf: 0, dev: 0: Model: QUANTUM FIREBALLP AS60.0 10/21/2006 11:59:31 41 D SYS \| Firmware Rev: A1Y.1300 Serial #: 196103937962 10/21/2006 11:59:31 41 D SYS \| Intf: 1, dev: 0: Model: QUANTUM FIREBALLP AS60.0 10/21/2006 11:59:31 41 D SYS \| Firmware Rev: A1Y.1300 Serial #: 196103934228 10/21/2006 11:59:31 41 D SYS \| Intf: 2, dev: 0: Model: QUANTUM FIREBALLP AS60.0 10/21/2006 11:59:31 41 D SYS \| Firmware Rev: A1Y.1500 Serial #: 196104536529 10/21/2006 11:59:31 41 D SYS \| Intf: 3, dev: 0: Model: QUANTUM FIREBALLP AS60.0 10/21/2006 11:59:31 41 D SYS \| Firmware Rev: A1Y.1300 Serial #: 196102535993 So yes it does look like the replacement drive is of a newer Firmware Rev (A1Y.1500 instead of .1300). What I do not understand is that I thought hard drive capacity was a simple caluclation of bits and bytes, in other words if the geometry of the drives are the same, the formatted capacity should also be the same. I am wondering: Does anyone know what a "nocore" format actually does, compared to the regular automatic formatting that the snap server does? And how would I know if this command actually worked, because in the log file, after comparing the automated format and the "nocore" format, I did not notice ANY difference in the log files. I was under the impression that this "nocore" format would free up more space compared to the regular automated formatting, because it is spelled out in the field service guide as the solution to this exact problem, the replacement drive not formatting to it's full capacity. I wonder what it actually does (or is supposed to do) that would make the formatted capacity different. I realize that I can switch the drives around and rebuild this thing from scratch, I am just dreading that becuase of the time involved in moving all of the data around! Thanks a bunch to all of you. By the way we did upgrade the RAM from the 128MB it came with, to 256MB (based on suggestions from other threads). I have not noticed any specific improvement as of yet. I have another empty 4100 that I am about to upgrade ram and install 160-GB drives to see what will happen. I realize we will not see the full 160GB in this model snap. Are there any hard drive experts out there that can shed light on why the formatted capacity of these drives would be different?