Raid Recovery

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Beichen Poque

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Aug 3, 2024, 3:46:09 PM8/3/24

to diasmoochitic

UFS Explorer RAID Recovery is great for responding to data loss challenges and is suitable for both commercial use in computer service centers and for home use. To recover lost data, you usually only need to connect the storage device to the computer and perform a few steps with the software. Support for almost any type of storage, including complex RAID storage allows you to solve most of these incidents.

If data has been lost from the NAS or RAID device, it should be turned off immediately. Then carefully remove the disks and connect them to the computer for data recovery. Data recovery requires simultaneous access to all drives on which the storage volume is created, so you need to connect all drives at once. Please note: if a disk has failed before and has not been used for some time, such a disk (usually!) should not be connected for data recovery.

If the condition of some disk is unsatisfactory or there is a risk of its degradation during operation, the program allows you to quickly and efficiently create an image of such a disk thanks to the presence of a professional-level disk imager tool. This tool allows you to efficiently handle data reading problems and allows you to quickly and accurately transfer data from the original device to the image. If some blocks cannot be read, the program saves a map of such blocks for the possibility of further diagnostics or adaptive data reconstruction.

The program works with disk images or virtual disks as efficiently as with original disks. Therefore, if you have disk images, it is recommended to use them. Due to the wide support of various formats, the program allows you to use images created by other (third-party) software.

If possible, the program automatically constructs data volumes both from individual disks and from RAID disk sets. Some technologies, such as Drobo BeyondRAID or LVM Thin Provisioning, require explicit assembly of volumes with the help of special tools available in the program. Additional tools also allow you to assemble volumes that for some reason are not assembled automatically.

Once the volume becomes available, the program automatically provides access to the files on it, without any scanning or analysis, just like the OS does. If you need to search for lost data or reconstruct the volume structure after damage, the software supports several types of quick and deep analysis (scanning) to search for lost data.

The utility effectively works with various linear storage devices, including internal as well as external hard disk drives, USB flash drives, memory cards and many others, thus serving as an essential data recovery tool for handling most typical cases of data loss, like accidental deletion of files, storage formatting, malware attack, hardware or software malfunction, etc.

UFS Explorer RAID Recovery is an efficient solution for restoring data from RAID of different complexity, both software and hardware, and various RAID-based storages, like DAS and NAS. Moreover, the software makes it possible to perform data recovery from systems that apply specific RAID configurations, like Drobo BeyondRAID, Synology Hybrid RAID and Btrfs-RAID.

The software is enhanced with wide support of modern storage technologies employed in different environments. It allows processing composite volumes, including LVM, MS Storage Spaces, Dynamic Disks, Apple Software RAID and APFS-based Fusion Drive, etc. which significantly expands the list of target devices it can be applied to.

The application gives the possibility to recover data from storages that have damaged sectors or other hardware issues with maximum efficiency. Not only it offers highly configurable disk reading and imaging procedures but also generates a map of bad blocks during the imaging process. In addition, virtual bad blocks can be defined dynamically on disk images by recognizing a given pattern or by reading bad sectors maps created by other compatible solutions.

UFS Explorer RAID Recovery effectively deals with disk images and virtual disks created by major virtualization software, like VMware, Microsoft Hyper-V, VirtualBox, QEMU, XEN, etc. and successfully copes with data recovery from such storages as though they were ordinary physical devices.

A set of tools integrated in the software allow effectively solving practically any case of logical data loss, including the most severe ones. The program will either simply read file system metadata or conduct its detailed analysis and predict the allocation of files based on the file system specifics, allocation of other files or file content analysis to produce the best possible data recovery result.

RAID Recovery for Windows works for NTFS-formatted RAID-0 or RAID-5 configurations. It supports both, hardware RAIDs managed by the motherboard or a controller card, and software RAIDs managed by Windows (dynamic disk arrays).

Remove the drives from the RAID controller and attach them locally to your machine. Make sure the drives are all recognized by Windows Disk Management. If you are trying to recover a RAID-5, it is Ok to attach one drive less than the total number of drives in that RAID. RAID Recovery for Windows also works with images of your drives.

Install RAID Recovery for Windows to your computer and start the program. A wizard will guide you through the recovery. A couple of minutes later, an Explorer-like window will show all recoverable files and folders. Now you can copy your data over to another disk. You can also view many file types before copying them, e.g., pictures, documents, etc.

RAID Recovery for Windows is easy to use. It automatically finds all parameters needed for the recovery, such as RAID start sector, block size, rotation, and drive order. No data recovery background required. No need to buy any other software.

Generally, when an RAID array is created using one HPE Smart Array controller, if the hard drives frorm one such controller is installed in another server in the same slots, then the HPE Smart Array controller in the receipient server would automatically rebuild it the RAID array and the data would be still valid.

When the HPE ProLiant MicroServer Gen8 Server's QuickSpecs, page 17 is reviewed it could be found that the HPE Smart Array P222 SAS Controller is an option storage controller and if you have one as spare you may install it in the server and connect the hard drive cables to it and see if the RAID array is still intact. If there are any other HPE Smart Array Controller, then you may use it as well.

So the only way to recover data - is to either insert those drives into any of HP server (as probably most should be with some soft of HPE smart array controller ). This should work and with older gen servers and newer ones ?

>> You mentioned that you used an integrated RAID controller. If your RAID controller card is still functional and it's a standard PCIe card, you might be able to remove it from the Microserver and install it in another compatible PC. This could allow you to access your RAID array and recover data. However, it's essential to make sure the replacement system supports the specific RAID controller you were using.

>> If the hardware RAID controller is not functioning, you might be able to recover data by connecting the individual hard drives to a standard PC. You can use a Linux-based system or RAID recovery software to access the data. This won't maintain the RAID structure, but it can allow you to recover the data from the individual drives.

>> If you are not comfortable with the technical aspects of data recovery or if the data is critically important, you might want to consider professional data recovery services. These services have the expertise and tools to recover data from failed RAID arrays, but they can be expensive.

>> As you mentioned, inserting the drives into another HPE server with a compatible RAID controller is an option if you have access to one. This is generally a reliable way to recover data if the hardware is compatible.

>> If you can't access another HP server, you may consider purchasing a third-party RAID controller that is compatible with your hard drives. Some of these controllers may work on non-HP servers, but compatibility can be an issue. Make sure to research and confirm compatibility before purchasing.

I have multiple TB of irreplaceable data on the device which is the reason I configured it as RAID 10. Any ideas on how to proceed to get access to the data on the device. The message scares me that if I do somethig I will lose the current data. Any suggestions?

When drive 3 failed, were you able to still see your data using the mirrored 1&2 disks? Was it after you inserted the new drive, you could not see your data when the NAS could not find a RAID configuration to rebuild?

This would be the first device I have seen that could not be shutdown from the console and hold its configuration state at shutdown. If this is true this would be a very dangerous device to use and definately not be a candidate for ultimate reliability in a residential context.

This would mean the EX4 would be at high risk for catastrophic loss due to a power disruption if its raid is operating in a degraded configuration. It looks that a routine RMA for one of these disks could be up to 4-5 days. I have the device behind a ups but a ups is usually used to provide time to either transition to an alternate power source, standby generators in the case of most of the data centers I have designed, or to provide a graceful shutdown if it looks like power restoration will take longer than the rated power of the ups.

I hope that you are incorrect in that the device is unable to take a shutdown command from the dashboard in a degraded state without dropping its configuration information. If so it is poorly designed and very dangerous to use without significant caveats. Most residential users do not have access to alternate power sources and this winter snow storms in the Midwest and Northeast have provided numerous opportunities to test my ups and perform graceful shutdowns of my other equipment. I would be surprised if most residential users have the EX4 behind a ups, thinking at worse they would lose any data transmissions in progress when the device shuts down, not suffer a catastrophic failure of the device.