DHSinclair,
If you can only get a partial boot before things start to look strange, it's probably a FUBAR'ed boot sector. If it was a failed disk, the SCSI controller (depending of
brand and model) would go into rebuild mode, and w2k would not boot at all.
Can you get a command prompt?
If yes, try the command [fix boot]. This should restore the backed up boot
sector. [fix mbr] restores the backed up mbr. [-? p] lists all options pagewise.
Is there an F-key you can press before w2k starts booting that takes you to the
SCSI controller menu (rebuild option)?
Have you tried doing a 'repair installation' from the 2k install CD?
Another, more time consuming, option is to hook up a DVD writer to the system, run e.g. a WinME boot disk, and then Ghost.exe from a System Works Pro 2003 CD (it's in the
Support>ghost folder), and then write the whole shebang directly to DVD(s). Afterwards, the data can be extracted with Ghost Explorer, even if the images are compressed.
If nothing else works, there's a nice little util that I use myself (I do some data recovery from time to time). Email me off the list, no reason to lose all your data,
as your system can be made to work again.
Best,
Soren
DHSinclair wrote:
No. I do NOT know that I have 2 failed drives. That was my posit at this
point.
Certainly, if I do have 2/3 dead, I would expect to be dead in the water
completely.
Kiss my last install and all my data goodbye!
Am I close?
I suspect only one failed drive ATM, but can not yet prove this. Once I
can get that far, I do know how to recover. I am not yet there, I
believe. And, why I am consulted with the IT Pros of the List.
All I have is the RAID alarm, and w2kserver OS that will not complete a
boot to its login prompt.
It will get to an F8 prompt. I tried an F8 boot but got another BSOD. I
may try again and look for a "last known....." prompt to choose. Barring
that, considering the RAID, and my lack of knowledge, I feel I only have
the power to do more harm than good.
I do have my lan client's now pointed back to the ESET Barn; so future
vdefs should continue to arrive auto-magically. (They do. This client is
now +2 above the server!)
Thank you.
Duncan
At 18:00 09/27/2008 -0400, you wrote:
Wait, you had two drives fail at once? Well, with your setup, you
could only survive losing one drive at a time.
DHSinclair wrote:
Ben,
Was running in RAID 5 (?); 2 data drives and a parity drive. With the
previous OS install and with the first 2 drive failures, the alarm
set and I got a msg at the w2k desktop that the RAID was operating in
a degraded mode, but still fully operational. Adaptec SM Pro
confirmed which drive was inop. The previous glitches cleared up as
soon as I got replacement drives and told SM Pro to "rebuild" the
RAID. This time I can not get to SM Pro. Just my luck.
This time, I walked in to a frozen desktop, mouse cursor changed to
an UParrow/DWN arrow (never seen this before), a stuck messenger svc
window about one of my clients not able to contact the server, and an
inop START button - even from kbd commands.
I suspect that my 1st mistake was to press the RESET button to
reboot. I am not learning "server" well at all. Thanks for the view
of no virus......... I will proceed to try and find out which, or,
how many of the drives are toast! I have been expecting the oldest
of the 3 to fail sometime this year!
Thank you.
Duncan
