XServe G4 Mirror Rebuild

Hi
One of the mirrored drives on our Xserve has failed which I'm currently rebuilding. Even though SMART Status is OK, does this fail indicate the drive may be on the way out?
We have an issue with Retrospect which causes it to unmount this drive once or twice a month during overnight backup which we can't seem to resolve. I'm trying to work out if the failed mirror is the cause of the unmount, or if it's the unmounting which caused the mirror fail.
Would appreciate any suggestions =0)

Rostron-
The drive is probably on its way out. If you are able to rebuild the RAID with a new drive and your Retrospect problems go away then that would certainly be a cause and effect thing and implicate the drive.
Luck-
-DaddyPaycheck

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  • Software RAID failing constantly

    Dear all,
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    Configuration
    1. The drives are 1TB Hitachi 3200rpm SATA I/II, 32 MB Cache drives
    2. The 'old' enclosure is an Icecube G2 SuperS 800/400/USB2/eSata 3.5" Enclosure
    3. The 'new' enclosure is an OWC Mercury Elite-AL, Quad Interface eSata/FW 400/FW 800/USB 2/USB 1
    4. The Mac Mini only has one FW800 port and I connect the 2 drives up in serial.
    <hr />
    Here is the behaviour I'm seeing now.
    I'll start with both drives off and turn both on.
    1. Both drives mount in Disk Util
    2. 20 seconds later a message comes up about rebuilding slices for "disk1 ... ?" and "disk (null)" and disk util crashed 2 seconds later (thus why didn't catch all of the message)
    3. I turn to the terminal:
    bsmith@kanga ~ $ diskutil list
    /dev/disk0
    #: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER
    0: GUIDpartitionscheme *298.1 Gi disk0
    1: EFI 200.0 Mi disk0s1
    2: Apple_HFS Mini 297.8 Gi disk0s2
    /dev/disk1
    #: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER
    0: GUIDpartitionscheme *931.5 Gi disk1
    1: EFI 200.0 Mi disk1s1
    2: Apple_RAID 931.2 Gi disk1s2
    3: Apple_Boot Boot OSX 128.0 Mi disk1s3
    /dev/disk2
    #: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER
    0: GUIDpartitionscheme *931.5 Gi disk2
    1: EFI 200.0 Mi disk2s1
    2: Apple_RAID 931.2 Gi disk2s2
    3: Apple_Boot Boot OSX 128.0 Mi disk2s3
    /dev/disk3
    #: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER
    0: Apple_HFS terra *931.2 Gi disk3
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    bsmith@kanga ~ $ sudo diskutil listRAID
    Password:
    RAID SETS
    ===============================================================================
    Name: terra
    Unique ID: 2AC46C49-5F0B-4BD5-B1FE-C322A6F51DD9
    Type: Mirror
    Status: Degraded
    Size: 999860895744 B
    Rebuild: automatic
    Device Node: disk3
    Apple RAID Version: 2
    # Device Node UUID Status
    0 disk1s2 A12D748F-0779-4217-8C75-B31D9AE45B4E 0% (Rebuilding)
    1 disk2s2 CF03D24E-AB5D-4F86-A7B1-26A1F4589CB7 Online
    ===============================================================================
    bsmith@kanga ~ $
    Run it again 10 seconds later:
    bsmith@kanga ~ $ diskutil list
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    bsmith@kanga ~ $ sudo diskutil listRAID
    It just hangs.
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    bsmith@kanga ~ $ diskutil list
    /dev/disk0
    #: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER
    0: GUIDpartitionscheme *298.1 Gi disk0
    1: EFI 200.0 Mi disk0s1
    2: Apple_HFS Mini 297.8 Gi disk0s2
    /dev/disk1
    #: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER
    0: GUIDpartitionscheme *0.0 B disk1
    1: EFI 200.0 Mi disk1s1
    2: Apple_RAID 931.2 Gi disk1s2
    3: Apple_Boot Boot OSX 128.0 Mi disk1s3
    /dev/disk2
    #: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER
    0: GUIDpartitionscheme *931.5 Gi disk2
    /dev/disk3
    #: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER
    0: Apple_HFS terra *931.2 Gi disk3
    bsmith@kanga ~ $
    bsmith@kanga ~ $ sudo diskutil listRAID
    RAID SETS
    ===============================================================================
    Name: terra
    Unique ID: 2AC46C49-5F0B-4BD5-B1FE-C322A6F51DD9
    Type: Mirror
    Status: Degraded
    Size: 319728959488 B
    Rebuild: automatic
    Device Node: disk3
    Apple RAID Version: 2
    # Device Node UUID Status
    0 disk1s2 A12D748F-0779-4217-8C75-B31D9AE45B4E 0% (Rebuilding)
    1 -none- CF03D24E-AB5D-4F86-A7B1-26A1F4589CB7 Online
    ===============================================================================
    bsmith@kanga ~ $
    I don't know alot about this output, though its weird that disk2 is still in the list but only shows the GUIDpartitionscheme. And its interesting that disk1 is also in the list but shows 0.0B against the GUIDpartitionscheme for it.
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    bsmith@kanga ~ $ diskutil list
    /dev/disk0
    #: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER
    0: GUIDpartitionscheme *298.1 Gi disk0
    1: EFI 200.0 Mi disk0s1
    2: Apple_HFS Mini 297.8 Gi disk0s2
    bsmith@kanga ~ $ sudo diskutil listRAID
    Password:
    No RAID sets found
    As expected I guess.
    6. Now I'll turn both drives back on and confirm I get back to the same state I was in before after both drives were turned on.
    This time I get the Hardware Growler message that both drives have mounted followed by the RAID drive about 20 seconds later.
    bsmith@kanga ~ $ diskutil list
    /dev/disk0
    #: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER
    0: GUIDpartitionscheme *298.1 Gi disk0
    1: EFI 200.0 Mi disk0s1
    2: Apple_HFS Mini 297.8 Gi disk0s2
    /dev/disk1
    #: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER
    0: GUIDpartitionscheme *931.5 Gi disk1
    1: EFI 200.0 Mi disk1s1
    2: Apple_RAID 931.2 Gi disk1s2
    3: Apple_Boot Boot OSX 128.0 Mi disk1s3
    /dev/disk2
    #: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER
    0: GUIDpartitionscheme *931.5 Gi disk2
    1: EFI 200.0 Mi disk2s1
    2: Apple_RAID 931.2 Gi disk2s2
    3: Apple_Boot Boot OSX 128.0 Mi disk2s3
    /dev/disk3
    #: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER
    0: Apple_HFS terra *931.2 Gi disk3
    bsmith@kanga ~ $
    bsmith@kanga ~ $ sudo diskutil listRAID
    RAID SETS
    ===============================================================================
    Name: terra
    Unique ID: 2AC46C49-5F0B-4BD5-B1FE-C322A6F51DD9
    Type: Mirror
    Status: Degraded
    Size: 999860895744 B
    Rebuild: automatic
    Device Node: disk3
    Apple RAID Version: 2
    # Device Node UUID Status
    0 disk1s2 A12D748F-0779-4217-8C75-B31D9AE45B4E 0% (Rebuilding)
    1 disk2s2 CF03D24E-AB5D-4F86-A7B1-26A1F4589CB7 Online
    ===============================================================================
    bsmith@kanga ~ $
    Now let me run the commands again:
    MMM, the exact same result is returned - it didn't hang this time.
    It's 21:44, I'll leave this a while and see if the rebuilding continues.
    Its 13 mins later and this time the commands are just hanging. Before I went away at 21:44 the lights on the front of the drives where flashing showing something was happening. They had stopped by the time I returned.
    7. Now I turn off the 'new' drive and run the terminal commands again. When I turn it off I'm told by Hardware Growler that the new drive ("OWC") and the RAID disk ("terra") have both unmounted. Last time (when the 'old' drive was turned off) Growler told me all 3 drives unmounted. The diskutil commands now show.
    bsmith@kanga ~ $ diskutil list
    /dev/disk0
    #: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER
    0: GUIDpartitionscheme *298.1 Gi disk0
    1: EFI 200.0 Mi disk0s1
    2: Apple_HFS Mini 297.8 Gi disk0s2
    /dev/disk1
    #: TYPE NAME SIZE IDENTIFIER
    0: GUIDpartitionscheme *931.5 Gi disk1
    It hangs at this point and hasn't completed yet.
    bsmith@kanga ~ $ sudo diskutil listRAID
    Password:
    RAID SETS
    ===============================================================================
    Name: terra
    Unique ID: 2AC46C49-5F0B-4BD5-B1FE-C322A6F51DD9
    Type: Mirror
    Status: Offline
    Size: 999860895744 B
    Rebuild: automatic
    Apple RAID Version: 2
    # Device Node UUID Status
    0 disk1s2 A12D748F-0779-4217-8C75-B31D9AE45B4E Failed
    0 -none- CF03D24E-AB5D-4F86-A7B1-26A1F4589CB7 Missing/Damaged
    ===============================================================================
    bsmith@kanga ~ $
    So HELP PLEASE!. Does the above provide enough information to suggest to someone with more knowledge than me about this, what is going on and what can I do to fix this? Let me know if there are any more tests I can run.
    I have a backup of the data so can erase and recreate the RAID drive. But what would stop this happening again? Could it have been TechTools Pro 5 which was running when the problem first happened that caused some permanent damage?
    Any and all help appreciated.
    Thank you,
    Brooke

    Thanks ridogi and Antonio for your replies,
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    {quote}
    The Desktop Mac User:
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    {quote}
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    {quote}
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    {quote}
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    Hi Eric,
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    TechNet article:
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    Extend a simple or spanned volume
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    I’m glad to be of help to you!
    *** This response contains a reference to a third party World Wide Web site. Microsoft is providing this information as a convenience to you. Microsoft does not control
    these sites and has not tested any software or information found on these sites; therefore, Microsoft cannot make any representations regarding the quality, safety, or suitability of any software or information found there. There are inherent dangers in the
    use of any software found on the Internet, and Microsoft cautions you to make sure that you completely understand the risk before retrieving any software from the Internet. ***
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