Critical Error - Raid 1?

[Gunsmith65]

I have two western digital 500GB hard drives set up in a raid 1. When I rebooted my computer after installing some windows updates I got a critical error message before windows booted and right after the ASUS MB splash screen. Then it said there was a problem with the raid 1 setup. It then continued and loaded windows normally. I can find nothing wrong otherwise.

How do I find out if one of the HDs is bad? I assume that is the problem.

 

[Gunsmith65]

Does anyone know how to check which drive is the one that is not booting up?

 

[KurrentEweser]

When was the raid array built? Before or after installing Windows?

 

[Gunsmith65]

The raid was built after Vista install. It originally booted with no problems evident. That lasted for about 3 weeks. Then the critical error for Raid 1 started showing up.

This is a newly built system. The only thing reused was the case and DVD. Everything else is 6 weeks old....if that even makes a difference.

 

[KurrentEweser]

If you don't get a raid functional message before Windows boots then you'll have to rebuild the array. Be sure to install the raid controller driver. Windows prefers the raid array be built first before the OS is installed.

 

[Gunsmith65]

The array was already working for three weeks....or more. The critical error comes during the raid functional message.

What I did was unplug one HD and try a reboot. The system booted with critical error.

Then I plugged that one and unplugged the other. No boot at all. No recognision. I assume that is the bad drive.

Make sense?

 

[KurrentEweser]

I would disable the raid and run diagnostics from a bootable utility cd on each drive to find the possible faulty one. The drive that gave you the critical error may have been caused by an incomplete array. Run tests to find any bad clusters. Then try booting to that drive again while the is raid disabled. There should be backup copies of the registry so you should in good shape. If you can boot normally with one good drive, then you should be able to rebuild the array. If the other drive proves to be bad just replace it and rebuilt the array. If you feel the other drive is still good then zero it out and then rebuild the array.


This should come in handy.

Ultimate Boot CD - Overview

 

[Gunsmith65]

I am mostly answering this thread because it may help someone in the future.

I have another thread for rebuilding the array since the RMA is already complete and I have the new drive. I know which disk was good (the one the system has been booting from). I just don't know how to rebuild the array in Vista.

I don't know how to post a link to the other thread for future help to others but it refers to Raid 1 rebuild.

Thanks for the link to the bootable CD. Thats awesome.

GS

 

[KurrentEweser]

Personally I prefer imaging the drive with the raid driver preinstalled and then build the raid 1 array using the bios raid utility. Then restore the image from a boot cd. I don't trust the idea of building an array from within Vista.

 

[Gunsmith65]

The raid array was originally built/installed during installation of Vista. All I want to do is image the replacement hard drive.

My earlier statement was incorrect. The raid was installed and built during Vista install.