SCSI HDD low level formatting

[Subyland]

It seems that at the moment I have a bad streak of problem with my PC...
I am trying to find a place which can do a low level formatting on a SCSI HDD for a reasonable price. Has anyone got any suggestion ?

 

[jpskiller]

It seems that at the moment I have a bad streak of problem with my PC...
I am trying to find a place which can do a low level formatting on a SCSI HDD for a reasonable price. Has anyone got any suggestion ?

most SCSI Cards have this function in the bios of the card

 

[GSMGuy]

Low level formatting CAN kill a drive - is there any reason why it has to be done?

Quote...

Warning: You should never attempt to do a low-level format on an IDE/ATA or SCSI hard disk. Do not try to use BIOS-based low-level formatting tools on these newer drives. It's unlikely that you will damage anything if you try to do this (since the drive controller is programmed to ignore any such LLF attempts), but at best you will be wasting your time. A modern disk can usually be restored to "like-new" condition by using a zero-fill utility

from http://www.pcguide.com/ref/hdd/geom/formatLow-c.html

Mike

 

[Subyland]

reason for doing it is that the disk was in a Raid array before and unless it is formatted I cannot use it again on my PC as it reads the "old" raid info and confuses the raid controller.

 

[Shude]

reason for doing it is that the disk was in a Raid array before and unless it is formatted I cannot use it again on my PC as it reads the "old" raid info and confuses the raid controller.

Could you not just repartition it?

 

[ceejay]

Most SCSI array controllers have setup utilities in their BIOS; you should be able use this to simply delete the existing partition and create a new one to suit.

 

[Subyland]

I cannot plug the HDD in as it is. If I do so the controller reads the old raid info that is on the disk and thinks it belongs to an existing array, creating chaos along the way.

 

[Tigger]

I cannot plug the HDD in as it is. If I do so the controller reads the old raid info that is on the disk and thinks it belongs to an existing array, creating chaos along the way.

You should still be able to go into the controller setup and delete the raid array allowing you to set up the disk as you want it.

It would help if you gave some info on the machine and the raid interface.

 

[Subyland]

The controller is an Adaptec Raid 3410S. I currently have got: one raid 0 array and one raid 0/1 array. The disc used to belong to the raid 0/1 array. One of the 4 discs of the 0/1 array is playing up and needs replacing; i want to use the spare I have. From talking to the Adaptec Support guy, plugging in the spare HDD which used to belong to the raid 0/1 array will confuse the controller and create chaos, putting all my data at risk as well. Hence the request to low-level format the spare HDD before connecting it.

 

[ceejay]

I think the safest option here would be to disconnect all drives except the one you want to delete the partition/array information on. You can then safely use the Adaptec BIOS utility to delete the information and probably low level format as well.

Having done that, you can then re-connect all drives and add the wiped drive into your array.

 

[Subyland]

Sounds like a good idea...will give it a try. Just hope that it is not going to confuse the controller...thanks

 

[Subyland]

Done Ceejay's idea which seems to have worked. But got an even bigger problem now. I have replaced the motherboard and impossible to reload Windows as the PC does not "see" any HDD despite the Raid controller seeing all the HDDs and the arrays !!!

 

[Spinal]

Out of curiosity, this doesn't happen to be one of the Compaq/HP servers? It sounds alot like your goign through the woes of setting one of these up; if so, get yourself a "SmartStart" disk from Compaq's website. (Make sure the version you download supports the Raid controller you want to use).

You might also need to get a driver disk to allow windows to "see" the raid array (the infamous press F8 to load third party drivers... or some-key while windows setup loads).

Finally, once yu have everything you want to:
- Boot computer to the RAID controller setup (smartstart for a compaq)
- Organise all your physical drivers into one or more logical drives
- Reboot in windows setup, load drivers for your hardware if necessary before it fully starts
- Install windows to your selected logical drive
- Reboot and cross your fingers

Michele

 

[Subyland]

Hi Michele,

no it's not a Compaq or HP server. I have installed the RAID card on another system in the past without any problem.
All the drives and arrays are done, the card specific driver is also loaded but when I should get to the screen asking me to choose the drive on which to install windows it tells me instead that there are no HDDs present and that therefore windows cannot be installed !!!! And I haven't got a clue why !!
I have tried both PCI 64 bit slots, removed all other PCI cards, enabled/disabled PnP in the BIOS but still no result. Could it be an IRQ conflict ??

 

[fredfloggle]

Done Ceejay's idea which seems to have worked. But got an even bigger problem now. I have replaced the motherboard and impossible to reload Windows as the PC does not "see" any HDD despite the Raid controller seeing all the HDDs and the arrays !!!

Does boot fall over at NTDLR or NT Detect by any chance ? Remember that XP is looking for a hardware ID that matches the installed condition .

Interesting , some ghost images created from OEM versions of XP don't have the hardware checking enabled .

Got a bit excited there -

Have you fdisked and marked the current partition as active ? , then you need to format at high level