Need help with Iomega Storcnter Model NHDD4

[spatecc]

Hi everyone. I am starting to post the most challenging cases we have, with the intent to get help to resolve the issues and let the history record in the board for upcoming generations. I will post the case with all the details, and document all the steps taken until conclusion. Sorry about my english, I am not a native speaker.

Case: Presumibly RAID 0 4x250Gb WD SATA disks from Iomega Storcenter Model NHDD4, presumibly with XFS filesystem. No further information about stripe sizes, parity, rotation, etc. The client refers the array was working fine, then suddenly shuts up and since then he have no access, and after the failure of the second disk he brings it to us.

Actions taken:

- We image the 4 disks with minor problems (bad sectors) in one of them.
- We know about many problems with the Iomega Storcenter models. We have 2 of the same model so we exchange the controller board with no results. In the past Iomega was helpfull and borrow us one unit to try the exchange but the kind person we know there is no more available.
- We try UFS explorer to try to rebuild the array. We can see all four disks, and we can see small XFS partitions and unknown partitions in two of them, while we can see the other two disks without any partition info.

Partial conclusions:

- We don´t know the RAID parameters and the usual tools we have didnt recognize XFS file system.
- I want to ask you everyone about ideas or procedures to solve this problem before give it up.

Any ideas will be greatly appreciated.

Francisco Maya
http://equipoelectronico.com

[ppumkin]

and we can see small XFS partitions and unknown partitions in two of them

Possible 16kb blocksize partition that is unidentified? Does it have a sparc processor? I did not check specs of that iomega drive. i might be wrong.

[spatecc]

and we can see small XFS partitions and unknown partitions in two of them

Possible 16kb blocksize partition that is unidentified? Does it have a sparc processor? I did not check specs of that iomega drive. i might be wrong.

I think not. The case doesnt contain any processor, if you need I can take a photo but is very simple: A little controller card and data cables.

Here is two screen captures:

First one from UFS showing the disks and the partitions:


RAID0-UFS-OHL by Spatecc, on Flickr

And another showing R-Studio scan in progress. With this program I was able to recover many xls, doc, jpg, etc. without name:


RAID-RS-lho by Spatecc, on Flickr

I hope it helps.

[DR-Kiev]

Hi everyone. I am starting to post the most challenging cases we have, with the intent to get help to resolve the issues and let the history record in the board for upcoming generations. I will post the case with all the details, and document all the steps taken until conclusion. Sorry about my english, I am not a native speaker.

Case: Presumibly RAID 0 4x250Gb WD SATA disks from Iomega Storcenter Model NHDD4, presumibly with XFS filesystem. No further information about stripe sizes, parity, rotation, etc. The client refers the array was working fine, then suddenly shuts up and since then he have no access, and after the failure of the second disk he brings it to us.

Actions taken:

- We image the 4 disks with minor problems (bad sectors) in one of them.
- We know about many problems with the Iomega Storcenter models. We have 2 of the same model so we exchange the controller board with no results. In the past Iomega was helpfull and borrow us one unit to try the exchange but the kind person we know there is no more available.
- We try UFS explorer to try to rebuild the array. We can see all four disks, and we can see small XFS partitions and unknown partitions in two of them, while we can see the other two disks without any partition info.

Partial conclusions:

- We don´t know the RAID parameters and the usual tools we have didnt recognize XFS file system.
- I want to ask you everyone about ideas or procedures to solve this problem before give it up.

Any ideas will be greatly appreciated.

Francisco Maya
http://equipoelectronico.com

I think it could be done, if you need PM me. Iomega has non standart block size ( it could be onle 4 ir 8 sectors) .

And you should to build it from some offset .

[spatecc]

Hi everyone. Sorry for the wait.

This case was succesfully recovered with the kind help of one member of this forum.

The data was recovered (at 100%), using at first WinHex to examine the data structures in each disk, and then making a custom xml in UFS Explorer.

I am really grateful to all. I understand a little better now the dynamics of the forum. I think it maybe seems tough at first but also I think this happens when you gather people from around the world and with different leves of experience.

I want to learn always, and I want to invite everyone to follow the advices from the most experimented forum users. I think if they say something to you (and that sounds rude or weird, or is not what you want to ear), always is in the best interest to all users.

Thank you all.