WHS Protects Users from Dying Hard Drives
Microsoft has published a Knowledge Base article (KB950193) for users running Power Pack 1 (PP1).
If you remove a hard drive incorrectly by NOT using the Remove a Hard Drive Wizard before physically removing a hard drive OR a hard drive experiences a physical failure THEN some files may be unrecoverable on Windows Home Server BUT only if the shared folders has Folder Duplication enabled.
This would show via a health notification in the console reporting that a hard drive is missing.
To avoid this issue make sure that you use the Remove a Hard Drive Wizard before physically removing any hard drives from your Home Server, which is available on the Server Storage tab within the Windows Home Server Console.
But, what about if a hard drive fails?
Well that is not going to be a problem either, as a small update has been made available on the Windows Update/Microsoft Update site which will resolve the problem. To receive it make sure that Windows Home Server is set to install updates automatically, which can be set from within the Console – Settings –General page, Windows Update section – On (recommended).
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I had a drive fail between pp1 and the fix. I did my best to turn duplication off on each folder (since it said that I did not have enough space to remove the drive without doing so, which I don’t think was accurate either) and removed the drive. I don’t know exactly how well this worked. I have replaced the drive and have duplication on and the fix installed. Is there a check of the files that can be done to see if anything was lost or corrupted? So far nothing is obvious.
Thanks
i am really upset with WHS. I just had a drive fail – last night and now it is telling there are file conflicts.
File duplication was on and server updates itself.
So why has this happened and what can I do?
I think I have lost files and that means for me the WHS is a total waste of time and money…
I am really confused.
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So this happened to me So did i lose all my files forever ??What the hell good is File duplication if it causes you to lose everything.. is there anyway to recover from this ?
Team: this is terrible. My drive failed, and I cannot unmount the drive because of the file conflicts. All these reports are about how WHS protects you – accept when you use the protection… Problem is – I STILL cannot find anything which says how to REMOVE the drive when the console refuses due to file conflicts. When I look at the file conflicts – there are none.
I actually had this same problem, file corruption due to a failing hard drive (or controller)
was able to copy the duplicate file from c:\fs\(then select one of the drives here – its trial and error really, one of them has the corrupted file, the other has the duplicate (non corrupted) file)
then crucially copy the non corrupted duplicated to a new location in the main shares. then move this file back into where it should be and voila file now readable and no longer corrupted.