Today, the local Power Company turned off our service to perform some repairs.  Of course, they didn't tell us that they were gonna do that.  I have a small UPC that supports my Home Office PC, UnRAID, printer, DSL modem, wireless router, ...  I had my UPC set to power down the PC in the event of loss of commercial power and that worked fine.  I came back to my office after about 30 minutes of power outage and the UnRAID server, printer... were amazingly still noisily humming along.  Since the PC had been shut down, I forced the UnRAID server to shut down.  It now has no life.  When I hit the power button, the fans whirr but I get no POST and no boot and it does not show up on my wired network when I query Vista.

 

I have tried switching USB drives ( I had a backup) and I have tried the -ma process with no luck.  The server is a MD-1500 with the P5B-VM-DO MoBo (Tom Built it), etc.  was v.4.4 (tried 4.4.2 when doing -ma) with 11 data drives plus parity.

 

I fear a hardware issue but am hoping one of you smart folk will have a spiffy process that I can invoke to save the day.  Please help!  If it is hardware, I am assuming it is the MoBo but would sure like some input on what to do next.

 

Dan

Today, the local Power Company turned off our service to perform some repairs.  Of course, they didn't tell us that they were gonna do that.  I have a small UPC that supports my Home Office PC, UnRAID, printer, DSL modem, wireless router, ...  I had my UPC set to power down the PC in the event of loss of commercial power and that worked fine.  I came back to my office after about 30 minutes of power outage and the UnRAID server, printer... were amazingly still noisily humming along.  Since the PC had been shut down, I forced the UnRAID server to shut down.  It now has no life.  When I hit the power button, the fans whirr but I get no POST and no boot and it does not show up on my wired network when I query Vista.

 

I have tried switching USB drives ( I had a backup) and I have tried the -ma process with no luck.  The server is a MD-1500 with the P5B-VM-DO MoBo (Tom Built it), etc.  was v.4.4 (tried 4.4.2 when doing -ma) with 11 data drives plus parity.

 

I fear a hardware issue but am hoping one of you smart folk will have a spiffy process that I can invoke to save the day.  Please help!  If it is hardware, I am assuming it is the MoBo but would sure like some input on what to do next.

 

Dan

I'll bet your BIOS is set to start up in the same state as when it lost power... In other words, it is probably waiting for you to press the power button.   Of course, you may not have one. (I know I did not on my MD1200 Tom built for me)

 

You might need to "press" the power button, or at least short the two pins that would connect to a switch to tell it to turn on.   

(If you have a power button, Ignore everything I said)

 

Edit:

I just re-read your post... You said you pressed the power button... Sorry.

 

I'd re-seat the cables, boards, ram as a first step.  The POST should tell you something, or beep at you...  Perhaps the boot order reverted to one of the hard disks instead of the flash drive.  (I know if I change from my 1st to my 2nd flash drive I need to explicitly select it in the BIOS before it will boot)

 

Joe L.

Joe,

 

Thanks for the reply.  I tried all that you suggested and even did the Clear RTC.  Nothing seems to help.  I cannot even get into BIOS when boot-monitor stays asleep, so I assume I have a hardware issue.

 

I have a couple of old Mobos in the closet with RAM, CPU, etc.  If noboby else comes up with a suggestion, I think I will install an A8N-SLI Premium board with Athlon 64 4000+ CPU, 2x1GB, and I have an nVIDIA 7950 GT KO vid card I can try this afternoon.  I checked the compatibility list and it seems this board, et al should be acceptable.  It will be a PITA with all the cabling but I need to regain access to my 11 data drives.

 

Dan

Joe,

 

Thanks for the reply.  I tried all that you suggested and even did the Clear RTC.  Nothing seems to help.  I cannot even get into BIOS when boot-monitor stays asleep, so I assume I have a hardware issue.

 

I have a couple of old Mobos in the closet with RAM, CPU, etc.  If noboby else comes up with a suggestion, I think I will install an A8N-SLI Premium board with Athlon 64 4000+ CPU, 2x1GB, and I have an nVIDIA 7950 GT KO vid card I can try this afternoon.  I checked the compatibility list and it seems this board, et al should be acceptable.  It will be a PITA with all the cabling but I need to regain access to my 11 data drives.

 

Dan

Did you try a new battery for the cmos memory?  (If it is an older motherboard, perhaps the extended off time could have finally discharged it to where the MB cannot boot.)  Perhaps you can even borrow a battery from one of the other motherboards.  (Make sure you install it with the correct polarity)

Did you try a different power supply.  You can unplug the existing supply (from the MB only) and try a substitute pretty quickly... It is a lot faster than re-doing all the cabling to the hard-disks.  It the MB boots, then you can swap the supply and re-do all the connectors to the disks.

 

Yes, if you cannot see anything when it boots (and the monitor is working) you have a hardware issue.  Fortunately, your data is still there... just harder to get to without a MB that will boot.

 

Un-plug your memory strips entirely, the MB POST should beep at you indicating that it finds no memory.  If it gets that far, then the MB and power supply are probably OK.  If not, swap in the spare motherboard.

 

Joe L.

When this occurs after a power outage you've usually got yourself a bad power supply or mobo.

 

I would personally try swapping a new power supply first since that's alot easier than a motherboard.

OK, thanks for the very good suggestions.

 

I changed the CMOS battery--no change.

 

I removed both sticks of memory and got 3 BIOS beeps -- sounded like one long, two short (DAH DIT DIT) but could have been three short.

 

I have a spare 500 Watt Seasonic PSU in the closet so I unhooked the 24 pin and 4 pin connectors from the mobo from the current PSU and connected the Seasonic 24pin and 4 pin plugs to the mobo -- no change.

 

There is one weird thing happening.  When I clear RTC RAM and hit the power button, the fans start up normally/smoothly.  Since I see nothing, I force the machine to shut down by holding down the power button for several seconds.  In subsequent starts, the fans start to wind up but about 1-2 seconds into wind up, it appears that the power disappears for about 1-2 seconds and then power returns and fans whirr as expected--It's like the machine resets about 2 seconds after power switch is hit to turn it on.??  I still can't see anything on the monitor.

 

What do you suggest next?

 

FOUND THE PROBLEM-- MEMORY WAS BAD.  I HAVE MACHINE RUNNING NOW ON 1 STICK OF 1GB MEMORY I HAD LYING AROUND.

 

NEW ISSUE.  AS A PART OF TRYING ALL SORTS OF THINGS, I FLASHED THE FLASH DRIVE WITH THE SAME INFO I HAD ON MY BACKUP DRIVE WHICH I HAD NOT USED WITH MY CURRENT DISK CONFIGURATION (I HAD CHANGED THE PARITY DRIVE TO A LARGER ONE AND ADDED ONE OR TWO DATA DISKS SINCE THE BACKUP OS HAD BEEN USED).  NOW ON THE MAIN PAGE OF THE SERVER, IT SEEMS THE SERVER IS CONFUSED ABOUT THIS--THE ARRAY IS STOPPED--IT SHOWS OLD AND NEW PARITY DRIVE INFO AND SHOWS 2 DATA DISKS AS NEW.  IF I HIT THE RESTORE BUTTON, WILL UNRAID FIGURE OUT THE CORRECT CONFIGURATION AND KEEP MY DATA?  OR IS THERE SOMETHING ELSE I SHOULD DO AT THIS POINT?

Time for the Trust My Array procedure.

FOUND THE PROBLEM-- MEMORY WAS BAD.  I HAVE MACHINE RUNNING NOW ON 1 STICK OF 1GB MEMORY I HAD LYING AROUND.

 

NEW ISSUE.  AS A PART OF TRYING ALL SORTS OF THINGS, I FLASHED THE FLASH DRIVE WITH THE SAME INFO I HAD ON MY BACKUP DRIVE WHICH I HAD NOT USED WITH MY CURRENT DISK CONFIGURATION (I HAD CHANGED THE PARITY DRIVE TO A LARGER ONE AND ADDED ONE OR TWO DATA DISKS SINCE THE BACKUP OS HAD BEEN USED).  NOW ON THE MAIN PAGE OF THE SERVER, IT SEEMS THE SERVER IS CONFUSED ABOUT THIS--IT SHOWS OLD AND NEW PARITY DRIVE INFO AND SHOWS 2 DATA DISKS AS NEW.  IF I HIT THE RESTORE BUTTON, WILL UNRAID FIGURE OUT THE CORRECT CONFIGURATION AND KEEP MY DATA?  OR IS THERE SOMETHING ELSE I SHOULD DO AT THIS POINT?

You are saying that since the power failure you:

 

1. switched to a different flash drive that does not know about your newer disks you had added, or a larger parity drive you had added since it was last used.

 

If I have this right, then yes... you should be able to do as you said.   But... if the parity calculations on the parity disk are correct for the all the data drives you have, you are a candidate for the "Trust-My-Parity" procedure.  This involves an extra step performed BETWEEN pressing "restore" and then "Starting" the array.   

 

It is described here: http://lime-technology.com/wiki/index.php/Make_unRAID_Trust_the_Parity_Drive,_Avoid_Rebuilding_Parity_Unnecessarily

 

Joe L.

OK, I did the Trust My Array procedure.  Currently all drives seem to be shown corrrectly, are postpended with a green bubble, the main page says "starting", and all drives say "mounting".  Lots of flashing activity LEDs.  Sound OK?

 

This is one scary thing to do!

OK, I did the Trust My Array procedure.  Currently all drives seem to be shown corrrectly, are postpended with a green bubble, the main page says "starting", and all drives say "mounting".  Lots of flashing activity LEDs.  Sound OK?

 

This is one scary thing to do!

Press "Refresh" on your browser.  It should show all the drives being read, and your parity being verified. (by now they are all mounted)

UPDATE:

 

Now array shows "started" all drives appear to have correct data fills.  I can access the data

 

IT WORKED!

 

THANKS to ALL for the help!

 

Dan

This is one scary thing to do!

 

  Yes, it is!

 

But all the red warning messages are there to make sure that this is the RIGHT fix for your problem, that your system qualifies for this fix.  If it is, then this is actually a very safe, simple, and quick procedure.  But we don't want anyone carelessly pressing the Restore button, unless it IS the right action.  If for example, you were missing a disk, then this procedure would invalidate the parity disk, and could very well lead to the data loss of an entire drive!