Hi all,

 

I am hoping someone can point me in the right direction.

 

My server has 12 x 1.5TB WD EADS drives up and running with a 2 TB WD EADS parity drive.

 

I have added 2 x WD20EARS with pins 7&8 jumpered - and the array does not come online says that there are drives missing, etc.

 

However when I put in one drive (I've tried both separately) the array comes online and recognises that a new drive has been added, and do I wish to clear it, etc.

 

Do I need to clear each drive as I introduce it, or should I be able to add two new drives and clear them at the same time?

 

Any help would be greatly appreciated!!

 

Many thanks,

 

Sammy.

There was a similar report here some time ago... Was traced down to a buggy 2-port SATA card which worked well with one disk at a time but did funny things when 2 disks were attached.  Where are you plugging in those 2 new disks?

 

Another guy here had a EARS disk with buggy firmware or somethig, and it didn't work well with the jumper. He did RMA and the replacement worked well.

 

How's your power supply?  That can cause problems.  Also, check the power cables, and the SATA cables.

 

Can you post your syslog captured at the time when you're having the problem?  http://tower/log/syslog (substitute 'tower' with your server name)

 

Thanks for the reply  Just realised I got my EADS and EARS mixed up!!!  I've fixed that up now - does that make a difference to your response.  Geez, I am showing my noobness!

 

The other important thing to mention was that the two drives were successfully connected and working without the jumper to pins 7&8.  I was told to clear the drives, and install the jumper.

 

I removed the drives, re-synced parity, and then tried to add the two jumpered drives, and that is when the fun began.

 

Thanks again.

 

Regards,

 

Sammy.

I had issues with the 1.5TB versions of the EARS drives.  They worked fine when used without the jumper, but when I tried to install it with the jumper I couldn't even get the array to boot up.  I tried to perform a preclear but the server would just hang and never finish booting.  I ended up performing a low level format on the drive with the jumper installed. 

 

I was able to get one drive formatted using the Windows version of the WD Lifeguard Diagnostics and an external SATA to USB drive bay but the 2nd drive wasn't even recognized.  I had to use the newer Acronis diagnostic software downloaded from the WD website and run it from a boot disc.  After that I was able to preclear both drives and get them up and running in the array. 

 

I would highly recommend trying to install only one drive at a time and not two at once.  It's going to take you longer to complete the setup but you'll probably have better luck getting it going.