RAID error appears intermittently on WinXP after SP3

MJOMJO Denmark New
edited May 2008 in Hardware
Hi there

I have got a wierd thing going on here? :confused:

In WinXP a popup appears from time to time saying that I have a Critical Raid Error.
But here comes the strange part, the message only appears when defragging and first started to appear right after I installed SP3.
Has anyone seen this before?

I do not think that there is anything wrong with the array.
Because the message only appears when defragging, and everyting else runs smooth.
No crashes or anything else, not while gaming either.
I am using Perfectdisk 2008 to defrag and I have installed the chipset/RAID drives again after installing SP3.

It is this error message BTW, only I am using XP.
raiderrornq3.jpg
(Borrowed the picture ;) )

Comments

  • kryystkryyst Ontario, Canada
    edited May 2008
    Reboot using your raid tools for your raid card and check the raid integrity outside of windows. It's been my experience that those messages usually do mean there is something wrong with the raid. It may not be anything physically wrong, but even if windows thinks there is something wrong it's likely doing something wrong that will eventually corrupt it.

    Actually before you do any integrity checks I'd suggest backing up your data first. Then run them because if there is something wrong, it'll want to correct the raid and that could mean data loss.

    What kind of raid are you running?
  • MJOMJO Denmark New
    edited May 2008
    kryyst wrote:
    Reboot using your raid tools for your raid card and check the raid integrity outside of windows. It's been my experience that those messages usually do mean there is something wrong with the raid. It may not be anything physically wrong, but even if windows thinks there is something wrong it's likely doing something wrong that will eventually corrupt it.

    Actually before you do any integrity checks I'd suggest backing up your data first. Then run them because if there is something wrong, it'll want to correct the raid and that could mean data loss.

    What kind of raid are you running?

    Thanks for the reply.

    I have just been testing the two drives using Seatools for DOS.
    It "only" took a little over 4 hours in total (time well spent). ;)
    And they both passed with flying colors.

    Unfortunately I am using the raid on the motherboard, nvidia Raid in this case.
    That means that I do not have any tools for testing the array, actually the nvidia software isn't giving much feedback at all.

    But I will start making a backup of my important data.
    Then I can delete the array and build a new one, maybe that will solve the problem?
    It is odd though that it all started when I installed SP3.:confused:
  • kryystkryyst Ontario, Canada
    edited May 2008
    Could be a coincidence could be yet another SP3 glitch. Though, if you don't mind me asking why are you running in raid mode? It's generally more trouble then it's worth unless you need it. Those drives could be put to much better use if used as per normal.
  • MJOMJO Denmark New
    edited May 2008
    Well basically it is because i wanted to try it out.
    I have never tried using a RAID-array before, and I must say that the speed is quite impressive.

    But how could they be put to better use?
    Please elaborate, it is always interesting to hear different oppinions. ;)

    And as stated before I will make a working backup and then try making the array from scratch.
    Then I will run the machine with SP2 for a while and see if the error reappears.
    If everything is running fine I will try to install SP3.
    If the error comes back, well then we have yet another bug. :D
  • kryystkryyst Ontario, Canada
    edited May 2008
    You may notice a some speed increase, but it's likely negligible in reality unless this is being used as a server and having multiple people access it at once.

    Better uses. Use them separately and get back the hard drive space. If you want redundancy just use one drive for backups and you can even use something like acronis to mirror your OS to it off hours.

    Basically when it comes down to it on a home machine, the speed increase of a RAID isn't significant and the redundancy raid offers is only important if you need an always live environment and even then your still doing backups of your data to another system for when the raid fails.
  • MJOMJO Denmark New
    edited May 2008
    I think I have found the problem.
    It is crappy sata-cables, they have been giving me headaches before, but not like this.
    The last time they were acting up I could not boot into windows, after a little wiggling around with the cables it all worked again.
    But I have not seen these "Critical errors" before.
    I am defragtmenting right now, and no error messages.

    Hmm can anyone recommend some good sata-cables?
    These bundled cables from Abit apparently sucks. ;)
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