5.8.2 Storage Troubleshooting

Learn how to properly troubleshoot storage devices and RAID arrays.

Storage devices will inevitably fail someday. However, its our job as IT technicians to make sure that their failures leave the smallest impact on our business.

Mean Time Before Failure

This is a metric used to measure the estimated lifespan of a brand new storage drive. Since all storage devices are prone to failure, especially hard disks, make it a habit to regularly back up your storage devices.

Troubleshooting Hard Disks

Clicking Noise: your drive is COOKED. It subtly foreshadows imminent demise. Make sure to backup and replace the failing drive.

Boot Failures: Many possible causes, including:

• OS trying to boot to the wrong disk
• Incorrect boot order
• Error regarding booting from a bootable drive
• Boot drive has been disconnected from the system
• MBR partition has been overwritten or corrupted, so the OS doesn't know where to look for the OS files to load them
• Damaged/corrupted OS files.

Troubleshooting RAID Arrays

RAID Array Not Found: OS can't find the RAID array. Most likely caused by a missing device driver for the RAID controller installed on the motherboard. If downloading/updating the driver doesn't fix the issue, you'll need to replace the RAID controller, rebuild the RAID array, then restore the lost data from a backup.

(Software) RAID Array Not Found:* This is a more serious issue. It indicates that the RAID array provided to the software by the OS is missing. Either the OS is tweaking or the storage devices themselves are failing.

RAID Array Stops Working: Many possible causes, including:

• Failure of the RAID controller responsible for the array
• One or more drives in the RAID array have failed

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