Repair Utility for xServe RAID?

We have an xServe with an attached RAID consisting of four 350 GB drives. The drives are set up as a RAID. Due to storms/hot weather (air conditioning failed) the server restarted and the RAID powered down. The xServe is fine but the RAID is not functioning. From RAID Admin the drives all show up and are OK but the array is not showing up. Is there any disk repair utility that would be useful on a RAID?
xServe RAID Mac OS X (10.4.6)
xServe RAID Mac OS X (10.4.6)

The fact that it's showing up as spares is a significant problem. The host won't recognize it until the RAID recognizes the array. There is no separate utility to help you with this, other than RAID Admin.
What firmware version is on the array? If it's 1.5, there's a "recognize array" option that you should try. If it's an older version, I'd tell you it would be nice if you could have gone back in time and upgraded the firmware. Since that's not possible, you should call AppleCare (assuming you have got APS&S for Xserve RAID, or the machine is < 1 year old) and inquire about your options.

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Maximum size for Xserve RAID modules

What is the maximum storage size for an Xserve RAID module?
Years ago, an Xserve RAID was out of my price range. Now, I'm looking into getting one on eBay and playing around with it.
I have been making Mirrored RAIDS with Western Digital 3 TB My Books.
Can I put 3 TB drives in an Xserve RAID? It probably depends on the controller firmware or something.
Thanks for thinking about this.
Doc

Short answer is no, you can't.
The XServe RAID has IDE drives mounted in a carrier. The maximum size drive shipped by Apple, supported under 1.5.1 firmware on the controllers is 750GB, though finding these on the used market is farily difficult. Aside from that, any IDE drive can be put in the carriers. If your unit has 'blank' slots, these are indeed just blank slots - you will need to get carriers / drive modules if you want disks in the slot if that makes sense.
People on the Internet, myself included, have experimented down the route of using IDE to SATA bridges in the carriers with 2.5" SATA drives which are more freely available. This way you can utilise cheap drives in your drive modules, or even SSDs (which offer little benefit I have found). Some users have had success with 1TB 2.5" SATA drives in this method, but not with anything bigger it seems. Myself, I've had suceess with 500GB SATA and 256GB SSD with this hacky method.
Hope that helps.

How to find drivers for XSERVE-RAID module bought 2 years ago?

Hello,
2 years ago, we puchased a Xserve raid module. About 3 months later, they came up with the Primse Vtrack. Now we are looking to add drives to our old X-Serve-Raid module and we can't find anywhere to buy them. Any idea? it is currently loaded with Hitachi Deskstar 250GB Drives (from teh sticker on the drives)

I believe they are still available at a massively overinflated price as Apple Service parts. Over here in the UK the only places I have found them is on eBay and on http://www.scrumpymacs.co.uk/ (Scrumpy Macs) - email them if you can't find them on the site. They sell drives with ATA drives, or just the bare caddies.
I've recently had to increase storage on a budget so purchased 10 caddies, then 10x500 GB drives for them from a 3rd party supplier which are the same drive used in 'legit' drive modules.
Hope that helps

HD for Xserve Raid

what harddrive is compatible with xserve raid other than Hitachi HDS 722525 VLAT 80?

Hi there, will Western Digital WD1600AAJB 160gb ATA-100 and Western Digital WD320AAJB 320gb ATA-100 work as a replacement for HITACHI HDS722525 VLAT80?
Found a review for both HD's.
http://reviews.cnet.com/internal-hard-drives/ hitachi-deskstar-7k250-hds722525vlat80/4507-9998_7-30548324.html?tag=mncol;subn av
http://reviews.cnet.com/internal-hard-drives/wd-caviar-blue-wd1600aajb/4507-9998 _7-32493985.html?tag=mncol;subnav
Tnx,
neliemae

Newbie here...Need help for XServe RAID w/ XSAN in Vid Editing environment

We're establishing an XSAN environment for video editing work flow. We're not new to SAN technology or video editing, but we are new to Xserve RAIDs, XSAN technology, and marrying them together in a production environment.
We have an XServe RAID at 14x750GB configuration. 1 Xserve metadata server, 1 Xserve Quicktime server, and 4 editing stations (2 MacPro's, 2 G5's) that are in the fiber channel fabric. Each machine has dual channel 4GB cards.
My PLEA for help concerns any advice this community can offer on RAID configuration, and XSAN configuration to achieve maximum performance. Settings, configurations, etc.
XServe, XServe RAID, XSAN, MacPro, G5 Mac OS X (10.4.9)

Were on the same boat but more like a life jacket
We only need the Fibre for back-up.
We have a single Avid Adrenaline on MacPro.
One Xserve that basically acts as a server for fonts, audioclips, photocatalog and minor back-up via gigabit ethernet.
Three G5s/MacPro/PC with 2/4GB FC installed.
One 10.5 TB Xserve RAID.
Last but not least a QLogic 1400 SAN box for Fibre.
Nothing is installed yet as were waiting on our Apple rep for some answers with Xsan.
Were not serving anything as far as external network and everything stays within the confines of our studio.
My question is that are we missing anything other than maybe getting more ports on the SAN.
We can live with a few workstations in the fabric.
Thanks in advance
XServe Mac OS X (10.4.6) OSX Server

Where to buy new drives for Xserve RAID

I have been looking all over to buy NEW drives for my RAID. Can anyone direct me where to go to buy new drives with the slot attachment? 500GB or 750GB
Forgive my lack of specific/correct terminology - I am a newbie when it comes to the RAID.
Thanks in advance!
Brian

I think the fine print says DVD Player support requires 10.3 or higher. But you can still play DVDs in the original drive you have, and are looking to add a drive in the empty bay, right?
Also, Patchburn is available for 10.2 to add native burning support, or you can maybe find an old version of Toast (5 ?) for 10.2 that should allow you to burn to the drive.
http://patchburn.de/download.html
I agree with the suggestion to upgrade to 10.3 or 10.4, if you can, but you should be able to make this drive work in 10.2 (and still use the original for OS 9 and DVD Player) and decide to do the other upgrades later on if you want.
http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Pioneer/DVR112/

Iostat for XServe RAID?

I notice that iostat doesn't show the RAID array as a disk. It would be nice to have a little command-line utility to do what iostat does. Anything out there?

Go to Aja's site and download the AJA Kona System Test application -- it will let you test a variety of disk patterns to optimize your RAID for the video type you'll be using.

Command-line shutdown for Xserve RAID?

We have had serveral A/C failures that have left our computer room extremely hot (104 degrees a week ago). We will be getting a temperature sensor that can trigger a shutdown event for the servers. However, I don't know how to issue a remote command (like, ssh host shutdown) to get the RAID to actually power off so it won't cook itself.
Any ideas?

I suppose I should have said automated command-line shutdown. Yes, what you say is true. However, I need to have a script that runs when a room over-temp alarm occurs that will shutdown all running machines, in the absence of any people. Also, the network the RAID is on is not connected to the outside world, so I can not see it when I'm not at work.

How to low-format disks in XServer RAID

I am new to the macworld and have been assigned a mission to low-format 2 XServer RAID with 28x400Gb Hitachi Deskstar disks. I need to low-format it because the customer is about to sell the servers, and are therefore obliged by law/or insurancecompany to make sure that no data can be restored.
I have tried to extract the disks and run them in a PC with a software called KillDisks, which writes zeros to the disk 10-fold times. However the PC will not accept the disk, im getting errors that states that no sectors can be read. Also, in BIOS the disk are supposedly 126 Gb...when in fact its capacity is 400 Gb.
Sounds like the Apple firmware is not compatible.
So, my question is...can I perform this task from inside the XServer, via some webinterface or perhaps the remote adminapplication?

I see you point but I mostly meant the need to extract/take apart the drives.
The job was to make the data (reasonably) "unrecoverable"?
(The KillDrive application can maybe even "destroy" drives for Xserve RAID use?)
Maybe not relevant here but the Xserve RAID woun't "buy"/just work with "any" drive/firmware.
He shouldn't even have to "reformat" raid-sets as you can write zeroes to each whole raid-set volume from the Disk Utility using the "security option" (will take a lot of time though - but probably much less time than doing it for each drive individually - if JBOD or otherwise).
Maybe even possibly started from OS X install DVD (if servers are "wiped"). Don't know if FC drivers are present on the DVD, but think they are.
(Also a "Mirror Door" G4 or Xserve G4 can probably "format" (really initialize) these drives and can at least hold up to 4 drives at a time.)
And you can manage (but not erase drives/volumes on) the Xserve RAID from any computer (if you know the IP) using the Java RAID_Admin.jar file that is "extractable" from The OS X version file (.app) "package". And it can be run on (most?) OSes that can run Java. Certainly from Windows with Java installed.
And you don't buy a couple of old preowned used Xserve RAIDs and spend a huge amount to restore data if you don't think/know it's REALLY worth the while.

Does Xserve Raid 3.5 TB supports HD uncompress?

Does exist any configuration for Xserve Raid 3.5TB 7 drives, that supports HD Uncompress 720p 10 bit video formats?
Will I get that only with 14 drives?
Can I get that with 8 drives? 4 drives in each controller.
Thanks
G5 Mac OS X (10.4.6) Final Cut Pro 5.1.1, Aja Kona LH

What's the data rate -- how many frames per second?
A common list is on the Xsan page:
http://www.apple.com/xsan/videoworkflow.html
I'd say if you're at 24 or 30 FPS:
720p 24fps 46MBps
720p 30fps 50MBps
You would be okay with 7 drives in half an Xserve RAID. If you need more than that, you'd need 14 drives.
If you're doing 1080i uncompressed, definitely you need all 14 drives striped in a RAID 50.

Mac Pro + XServer RAID + FCP2 + Configuration

Hello all. This is my first post here.
I will soon buy a MacPro por video editing on Final Cut Pro 2 and I was wondering if you could help sort out if the configuration I've chosen is the best.
I'll show you the configurations I thought first:
*Mac Pro*
- Two 3.0GHz Quad-Core Intel Xeon
- 4GB (4 x 1GB)
- Mac Pro RAID Card
- 2 x 500gb HDD
- ATI Radeon X1900 XT
- 20" Apple Cinema Display + 23" Apple Cinema HD Display
- Dual-channel 4Gb Fibre Channel PCIe
*XServer RAID*
- 2000GB ADM (4x500GB Ultra ATA)
- Cache Battery Back-up Modules
- Dual-channel 4Gb Fibre Channel PCIe
My idea:
A) The MAC Pro I'll be used for 3D rendering and video editing. I'll configure the 2x500GB with RAID1 (mirroring) for a fail safe env, leaving my with 500GB of available space
B) XServer RAID will be connected directly to the Mac Pro (for now) via the fiber optic cards and we'll provided additional storage.
C) For projects stored on the XServer RAID (videos for example) I must be able to access and edit directly with FCP2 without having to pass it to the Mac Pro
D) I was thinking of using RAID5 for XServer RAID configuration leaving me with 2.64 x 500GB (as described on support faqs) = 1.3 TB of disk space with a reasonable fail safe environment (RAID5 with 3 drives allows one drive to fail and offers a good recovery rate).
OK. My questions:
1) Is my MacPro config enough for FCP2 + 3D Rendering ?
2) Can I use the XServer RAID directly with Mac Pro or do I need aditional software / hardware?
3) Can I connect the fiber optic from one board to the other without using the router? (on google the answers I found were very vague...)
4) Is the RAID5 the best choice (in terms of performance vs data recovery) for video editing. The RAID5 specs states that random writes to disk are slower that other RAID configs. Is RAID 50 (5+0) a better choice?
5) I opted for the 4 HDD config on XServer but I could change to a 7 HDD config for a similar total space.
I'm sorry for the long post, but I can't find anywhere suitable information about this questions.
Hope to hear from you.
Thanks in advance!

We have a ton of Xserve's and Xserve RAID's at my work. As of right now they're all directly connected to our servers with Fibre Channel cables (NOT fiber optic, totally different animal.) We finally just bought our first Fibre Channel switch to hookup five 10.5TB RAIDS and a huge tape loader for backups. The RAID's work perfectly when directly connected and are very fast. The only reason that you would need a Fibre Channel switch is if you want multiple machines to be able to access the array without using network shares.
I really don't think that just four drives will give you the performance that you're looking for. In order to get good performance out of a RAID5 you NEED as many spindles as you can get. If you're stuck to a budget if would probably go to smaller drives but get more of them. I think you've already discovered this but if you want to do a RAID5+0, you'll need to populate drives on both sides of the RAID as they are physically seperated.
As far as I know, you can only get Xserve RAID Drive Modules from Apple as they do some pretty intensive testing on every drive before they ship. You can't even buy empty modules, you can buy blanks but they don't include the required electronics.

XServe RAID disks not showing up in Disk Utility

I have a new (to me) xServe RAID box and I'm stuck, the stays lights are green the fiber link light is green on the RAID and not lit on the PCI card but shows up as green in the fiber link section of the settings tool but the RAID array doesn't show up in Disk Utility so I can't format the drives.
I set up the disks as Enhanced JBOD using RAIDadmin and I've deleted and created it a couple of times, I'm just not sure what else I should try, I've read the manual but. Can't find any suggestions of what's going wrong.
Thanks

Port 1: Link Established
2Gps
Point to point
Status light green
In the system Profiler I'm not sure what you're asking for, I'm running 10.5.8 standard not server.
the fibre channel shows link established 2Gps and cable type copper but nothing else, the disks & RAID controller don't show up anywhere I've looked.
RAID Admin shows the JBOD disks as online and lists the LUNs etc.
System looks fine, only error is missing second power supply.

How to connect multiple Xserve Raid for Best Performance

I like to get an idea how to connect multiple Xserve Raid to get the best performance for FCP to do multiple stream HD.

Again, for storage (and retrieval), FireWire 400 should be fast enough. If you are encoding video directly to the external drive, then FireWire 800 would probably be beneficial. But as long as the processing of the video is taking place on the fast internal SATA drive, and then you are storing files on the external drive, FireWire 400 should be fine.
Instead of speculating about whether it will work well or not, you need to set it up and try your typical work flow. That is the only way you will know for sure if performance is acceptable or not.
For Time Machine, you should use a single 1.5TB drive. It is likely that by the time your backup needs comes close to exceeding that space, you will be able to buy a 3TB (or larger) single drive for the same cost. Also, I would not trust a RAID where the interaction between the two drives is through two USB cables and a hub. If your primary storage drive fails, you need your backup to be something that is simple and reliable.
Oh, and there should be no problem with the adapter, if you already have it and it works.
Edit: If those two external drives came formatted for Windows, make sure you have use Disk Utility Partition tab to repartition and reformat the drive. When you select the drive in the Disk Utility sidebar, at the bottom of the screen +Partition Map Scheme+ should say *GUID Partition Table*. When you select the volume under the drive in the sidebar, Format should say *Mac OS Extended (Journaled)*.

Suggested methods for full backup of XServe RAID data

I know this is only peripherally related to the discussion topic, but since every other suggestion posted here is followed by the disclaimer that you should make a full backup of your data before proceeding with any major operations on your RAID arrays, I'd like to know what more experienced admins do in order to create a full backup for reasonably fast recovery in case of substantial data loss during maintenance/repair.
Our current "backup" availability is incremental optical disc archival (our data is mostly "write-once"), but this isn't entirely practical for recovery since it's over a terabyte of data. Since the connected server has a free hot-swappable SCSI drive bay as well as an interface for external SCSI devices, not to mention the fiber channel and ethernet interfaces, the options that I'd consider in order would be:
1. A handful of 150-500 Gb SCSI hard drives, rotated out of the hot-swappable bay
2. An external tape drive attached to the SCI interface (with appropriate tape size, maybe the LTO-2 with 200Gb native capacity?)
3. Some other external SCSI storage device
4. Larger optical disc archival (I hear there are technologies arriving in the near future)
5. Network-based option; remote seems impractical due to sheer size, but perhaps local?
The idea is to make a full backup (long-term solutions are superior of course) of 1-2 Tb of data on the XServe RAID before attempting major surgery. Suggestions for common, accepted, tested, efficient methods for accomplishing this would be greatly appreciated. I apologize if this thread isn't on-topic enough for some of you.
-Brian

Brian,
Tape IMO is kinda yucky (to steal a term from your average 3 year old). It's fairly slow to back up to, it's very slow to restore, and it's actually not that reliable by itself (I worked with a large enterprise customer who said their backups were successful about 70% of the time (!!!)).
That said, tape has the advantage that you can offsite it and archive it very cheaply, and the media are fairly cheap, so you can make lots of backups, so if one fails, you probably can restore the data from another tape.
Disks are more expensive initially, but end up being pretty reliable, and you get a lot more flexibility (plus, they're fast).
An emerging "best of both worlds" backup strategy is what's called disk to disk to tape, where you typically back up to another large "disk," for example a second Xserve RAID. Data is then backed up from the second disk to tape, which is taken offsite... thus tape is used for what it's best at (offsite archival). Restore can be from disk in most cases, which is 10-20x faster than restoring from tape. People use software packages like Netvault's Bakbone or Atempo's Time Navigator, which can handle the whole process, and it works quite well. The backup disks (e.g. the RAID) can be onsite, or can be at a backup site a couple KM away, attached via optical (this is preferable, for DR reasons).
For cases where a second Xserve RAID is prohibitively expensive, cheaper (and slower) RAID 5 enclosures like Wiebetech's RAIDtech can provide a large (say, 1.6 TB) RAID 5 volume, accessible over FW800 or SATA (not sure if they have a SATA-based one yet).

Xserve RAID won't RAID in disk utility

I have a XServe RAID that won't RAID in disk utility. The XServe is fully populated and there are two arrays created. Both of those arrays show up in disk utility and will only be partitioned with an Apple Partition Map. If I try to partition them GUID, that partition fails (system formatter failed). Once, I partition them APM, two volumes show up on the desktop. Then, I try to create a software RAID with those two volumes and I can not get the volumes to RAID together. The error message in disk utility says (RAID can not be modified). I have checked the system log and it says something about a socket error or that it can not bind. Does anyone have any ideas on why I can not create this RAID?
My end goal is to have 2 hardware RAID 5's and put a striped RAID set on top of that to have one large volume for Final Cut video editing.
I'm using a Mac Pro with Atto Celerity 42ES fibre card.
Thanks

This may be a little too late, but maybe it will help. I'm not sure why this happens. I reinstalled my server, and I could not access the drives, even though they showed up in disk utility (as a blank file).
Here is what I did to fix it:
1. Open up Disk Utility
2. Make a disk image of the drive you want to mount, save this somewhere accessible (i saved it on another one of my RAID drives)
3. Erase the disk, it should then mount and be accessible
4. Restore the image onto the drive.
Cheers!

Repair Utility for xServe RAID?

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