Intel Storage Manager RAID problems

Hello all,

I think I need some assistance in relation to my RAID system.

I am using a powerful laptop running windows 7. I have three 500 GB discs installed – two of them as a RAID 1 configuration, the third as a spare for nothing in particular – I had a spare disk so I installed it. This disc can be ignored.

The RAID is operating under the Intel Matrix Storage Manager.

A few days ago I started to get a Smart event on one of the discs and so decided to replace the two discs acting as the RAID. I purchased exactly the same brand and type so there would be no compatibility problems.

I removed one of the old discs and installed a new one. Immediately on boot up the Matrix Storage Manager recognised that one of the discs had been replaced and started to rebuild the RAID. So far so good.

When the rebuild was complete, and after extensive testing to make sure it was operating correctly I removed the second old disk and replaced it with the second new one. Once again the system recognised the fact and started to rebuild the RAID from the first new disc. This is where the woes stared. It takes about 5 hours to rebuild the RAID. So I went to bed and left the computer to get on with it.

This morning it was clear that things had gone wrong as the Matrix Storage Manager was reporting that the second disk had failed. I thought it might be a faulty disc but as there is a facility to reset the disc to normal I did so and the rebuild started again. Another fail. After trying this at least 5 times with similar results, I decide to take out the second new disk and replace it with one of the old ones that I believed to be good. This time after completing only 15% of the rebuild both discs reported as failed. This looked like a disaster but the Storage Manager pops up at boot time and allows recovery of the discs. As I type it’s busy rebuilding the RAID (30% complete). I have no confidence in it achieving success.

So I don’t think the new disc is faulty, should I try reinstalling the Matrix Storage Manager? If the rebuild fails the operating systems continues to work off the healthy disc, so it should be possible to reinstall at that time.

Any alternative thoughts will be appreciated.

And just so you know I have full backups.

 

So yesterday evening I closed down the computer when the rebuild was at about 46% and restarted it this morning.

I don't think I will ever understand the way in which computers in general torment me.

The rebuild completed successfully. Amazing. So I removed the old disk and replace the second new one and started the rebuild again.

It worked OK.

I have no idea why. But all is now well - until next time!