SAS Raid Card starts and then freezes

[Siddhartha Jain]

Server: IBM x366
RAID card: IBM ServeRAID 8i (Adaptec OEM)

During bootup, the RAID card's firmware would boot, do a self test and
declare that the RAID controller has started. After this I got the
message "Controller kernel stopped <<Press any key to continue>>".

Opened the box, disconnected the SAS controller cables to the hard
disks, re-seated the RAID card and the RAID card came up again but now
Windows 2003 refuses to boot complaining about missing system files.

The hardware support engineer said that the card must've got unseated
but I don't buy that. If the card was unseated, how did the RAID card
firmware bootup, do self tests and declare that the controller has
started? Also, if it was just unseated then why is the OS corrupted
after the RAID card came up again?

- Siddhartha

 

[Peter]

Server: IBM x366

RAID card: IBM ServeRAID 8i (Adaptec OEM)

During bootup, the RAID card's firmware would boot, do a self test and
declare that the RAID controller has started. After this I got the
message "Controller kernel stopped <<Press any key to continue>>".

Opened the box, disconnected the SAS controller cables to the hard
disks, re-seated the RAID card and the RAID card came up again but now
Windows 2003 refuses to boot complaining about missing system files.

The hardware support engineer said that the card must've got unseated
but I don't buy that. If the card was unseated, how did the RAID card
firmware bootup, do self tests and declare that the controller has
started? Also, if it was just unseated then why is the OS corrupted
after the RAID card came up again?

Maybe card disfunction occured when server was still running and corruption
happened at that time.
Reconfigure RAID again (just to be sure), reinstall OS and test.

 

[Folkert Rienstra]

Server: IBM x366
RAID card: IBM ServeRAID 8i (Adaptec OEM)

During bootup, the RAID card's firmware would boot, do a self test and
declare that the RAID controller has started. After this I got the
message "Controller kernel stopped <<Press any key to continue>>".

Opened the box, disconnected the SAS controller cables to the hard
disks, re-seated the RAID card and the RAID card came up again but now
Windows 2003 refuses to boot complaining about missing system files.

The hardware support engineer said that the card must've got unseated
but I don't buy that.

If the card was unseated, how did the RAID card firmware bootup,
do self tests and declare that the controller has started?

Sounds unlikely but unfortunately happens in practice. I've seen symp-
toms that unmistakenly looked like a failed (or corrupted) drive (no boot,
but directories seen OK, work in DOS but not in Windows, that kind of
weird stuff) and see all that go away after a reseat of the controller.

Also, if it was just unseated then why is the OS corrupted
after the RAID card came up again?

Because some tranfers managed OK and others didn't.