iSCSI unallocated disk after reboot

[lymond01]

I'm using the Microsoft iSCSI initiator on Windows 2003 Server
connecting to an iSCSI target on Ubuntu. We had to reboot the iSCSI
target, and of course the drive letter for it on the 2003 server
disappeared (like removing the disk). I went into Disk Administrator
to check on the drive and it asked me to Initialize the disk again. I
did that (which may have been my mistake) and now the disk is
"unallocated" only allowing me to repartition it.

I doubt the data is gone, but is there a way to restore the situation
to the way it was before so the drive just shows up as the F: drive
again? Should I recreate the iSCSI connection from scratch?

Thanks for any tips.

[Kenny Speer]

Once you "initialize" the disk, you've essentially rendered it unusable
until you partition it. That was a mistake.

The only way I know how to recover this disk is to use a 3rd party
partition manager and recreate your partitions exactly as they were
previously.

You're data should be accessible at this point if the partitions are
exactly the same.

Good luck.

[lymond01]

Turns out that unexpected iSCSI disconnects have the effect of yanking
a live drive -- multiple results could occur. In our case, the
partition table was corrupted and Windows saw the iSCSI target as a
fresh drive (or at least unreadable so it just wanted to format it).
Using Active Partition Recovery (http://www.partition-recovery.com/)
fixed the drive in a couple seconds. Back to normal.

So, the order things should happen:

1) Use MS iSCSI initiator and log off the iSCSI target, or simply down
the Windows host server.
2) THEN do whatever you need to do with the iSCSI target.

[Edwin vMierlo [MVP]]

> Turns out that unexpected iSCSI disconnects have the effect of yanking
> a live drive -- multiple results could occur.

That is what I would expect, did you expect anything else ?