[gentoo-user] P4P800 - Intel ICH5R - data recovery?

[gentoo-user] P4P800 - Intel ICH5R - data recovery?

[José Pedro Saraiva]

Hi,

I know this isn't a gentoo related question so forgive me, but I trust
on the gentoo mailing list to give me a hand...

I have a Asus P4P800 motherboard that recently became useless (plain
broken, don't know why, no boot, no BIOS, nothing). I had 2x120 GB
SATA hard drives connected with RAID 0 using the intel ICH5R chipset
included in the board.

Is my data completely lost, now that the motherboard is broken? Is
there a way to recover it? If  I install another motherboard with the
same RAID chipset will my data be recoverable or is it a lost cause?


Thanks in advance,
José Pedro

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Re: [gentoo-user] P4P800 - Intel ICH5R - data recovery?

[Colin]

On Jul 19, 2005, at 5:16 PM, José Pedro Saraiva wrote:

> Hi,
>
> I know this isn't a gentoo related question so forgive me, but I trust
> on the gentoo mailing list to give me a hand...
>
> I have a Asus P4P800 motherboard that recently became useless (plain
> broken, don't know why, no boot, no BIOS, nothing). I had 2x120 GB
> SATA hard drives connected with RAID 0 using the intel ICH5R chipset
> included in the board.
>
> Is my data completely lost, now that the motherboard is broken? Is
> there a way to recover it? If  I install another motherboard with the
> same RAID chipset will my data be recoverable or is it a lost cause?

Didn't make a backup, did you?  That's OK, neither do I. ^_^U

First, see if the motherboard can be saved.  If the BIOS is fried,  
usually the boot block will kick in.  Drop in a floppy drive  
(optionally, an ISA video card as well; strangely, an AGP video card  
worked with my LANParty's BIOS).  Google your BIOS maker's name and  
the words "boot block" for specific directions on what to put on a  
floppy disk.  Then, start your computer with the floppy in the A:  
drive, and if the boot block survived (it's usually not updated when  
flashing the BIOS), it'll automatically reflash itself from the  
floppy and then restart, loading the new BIOS and hopefully saving  
your ASCII.  :-)

Hopefully your RAID BIOS (and CMOS) is a separate chip from the  
system BIOS that shouldn't have been affected by the above ordeal.   
If it isn't working, then read on.

If you remember your stripe size, then you should be able to plug  
your drives into any ICH5R-based motherboard and get your data back.   
Theoretically, you could plug your drives into any RAID whose BIOS  
does not write to the disks when creating an array and then recreate  
the array in the BIOS with the same stripe size.  I don't know if  
software RAID can rebuild your array, but that seems like your best  
bet, lest you have a friend with a lot of SATA RAID controllers (s) 
he's willing to lend out.

If all else fails and your data is priceless, grab a couple grand and  
look into professional data recovery, because unless you can find a  
super-geek, that will probably be your best bet.
--
Colin

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Re: [gentoo-user] P4P800 - Intel ICH5R - data recovery?

[José Pedro Saraiva]

Thanks for the reply Colin =)

> If you remember your stripe size, then you should be able to plug
> your drives into any ICH5R-based motherboard and get your data back.
> Theoretically, you could plug your drives into any RAID whose BIOS
> does not write to the disks when creating an array and then recreate
> the array in the BIOS with the same stripe size.  I don't know if
> software RAID can rebuild your array, but that seems like your best
> bet, lest you have a friend with a lot of SATA RAID controllers (s)
> he's willing to lend out.

I already ordered another ICH5R motherboard (similar to my P4P800 but
a new model, since my old one is not available anymore) to try that
out. I'm almost sure that my stripe size is 64KB (default). If so,
plugging my hard drives into the new board and creating a new array
with the same stripe size will give me access to my data? Or is there
the risk of loosing it all? Do you know if the ICH5R writes to the
disks when creating the array?

> If all else fails and your data is priceless, grab a couple grand and
> look into professional data recovery, because unless you can find a
> super-geek, that will probably be your best bet.

Unfortunately I cannot afford such a service, even though my data is
crucial to me, they're just too expensive for my pocket. :-(

José Pedro

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Re: [gentoo-user] P4P800 - Intel ICH5R - data recovery?

[Colin]

On Jul 19, 2005, at 7:37 PM, José Pedro Saraiva wrote:

> Thanks for the reply Colin =)
>
>
>> If you remember your stripe size, then you should be able to plug
>> your drives into any ICH5R-based motherboard and get your data back.
>> Theoretically, you could plug your drives into any RAID whose BIOS
>> does not write to the disks when creating an array and then recreate
>> the array in the BIOS with the same stripe size.  I don't know if
>> software RAID can rebuild your array, but that seems like your best
>> bet, lest you have a friend with a lot of SATA RAID controllers (s)
>> he's willing to lend out.
>>
>
> I already ordered another ICH5R motherboard (similar to my P4P800 but
> a new model, since my old one is not available anymore) to try that
> out. I'm almost sure that my stripe size is 64KB (default). If so,
> plugging my hard drives into the new board and creating a new array
> with the same stripe size will give me access to my data? Or is there
> the risk of loosing it all? Do you know if the ICH5R writes to the
> disks when creating the array?

No idea.  Google for some technical documents or fire off an email to  
Asus, Intel or your RAID controller's manufacturer.

Recreating an array could be risky.  SCSI drives usually have a write- 
protect jumper, but AFAIK, there's no way to implement that with  
SATA.  You could try pulling the data or power cable after  
configuring the array but before building it.  SATA should be hot- 
swappable if you're using the SATA power plug, so there probably  
won't be any damage to your disk or motherboard.  Hopefully that will  
write to the RAID BIOS but not the disk.  I wouldn't recommend doing  
this, though, but hey, you're not me. :-)
--
Colin
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Re: [gentoo-user] P4P800 - Intel ICH5R - data recovery?

[Patrick Rutkowski]

On Tuesday 19 July 2005 19:37, José Pedro Saraiva wrote:
> Thanks for the reply Colin =)
>
> > If you remember your stripe size, then you should be able to plug
> > your drives into any ICH5R-based motherboard and get your data back.
> > Theoretically, you could plug your drives into any RAID whose BIOS
> > does not write to the disks when creating an array and then recreate
> > the array in the BIOS with the same stripe size.  I don't know if
> > software RAID can rebuild your array, but that seems like your best
> > bet, lest you have a friend with a lot of SATA RAID controllers (s)
> > he's willing to lend out.
>
> I already ordered another ICH5R motherboard (similar to my P4P800 but
> a new model, since my old one is not available anymore) to try that
> out. I'm almost sure that my stripe size is 64KB (default). If so,
> plugging my hard drives into the new board and creating a new array
> with the same stripe size will give me access to my data? Or is there
> the risk of loosing it all? Do you know if the ICH5R writes to the
> disks when creating the array?
>
> > If all else fails and your data is priceless, grab a couple grand and
> > look into professional data recovery, because unless you can find a
> > super-geek, that will probably be your best bet.
>
> Unfortunately I cannot afford such a service, even though my data is
> crucial to me, they're just too expensive for my pocket. :-(
>
> José Pedro

My one BIG FAT WARNING to you would be to think for 30 seconds or more before 
pushing any buttons when redoing your disks.

Its very easy to accidentally format things when you don't know exactly what 
your doing... at least for me it is; I've done it :-p

Wishing the best of luck,
Patrick Rutkowski

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Re: [gentoo-user] P4P800 - Intel ICH5R - data recovery?

[José Pedro Saraiva]

On 7/20/05, Patrick Rutkowski <rutski89@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Tuesday 19 July 2005 19:37, José Pedro Saraiva wrote:
> > Thanks for the reply Colin =)
> >
> > > If you remember your stripe size, then you should be able to plug
> > > your drives into any ICH5R-based motherboard and get your data back.
> > > Theoretically, you could plug your drives into any RAID whose BIOS
> > > does not write to the disks when creating an array and then recreate
> > > the array in the BIOS with the same stripe size.  I don't know if
> > > software RAID can rebuild your array, but that seems like your best
> > > bet, lest you have a friend with a lot of SATA RAID controllers (s)
> > > he's willing to lend out.
> >
> > I already ordered another ICH5R motherboard (similar to my P4P800 but
> > a new model, since my old one is not available anymore) to try that
> > out. I'm almost sure that my stripe size is 64KB (default). If so,
> > plugging my hard drives into the new board and creating a new array
> > with the same stripe size will give me access to my data? Or is there
> > the risk of loosing it all? Do you know if the ICH5R writes to the
> > disks when creating the array?
> >
> > > If all else fails and your data is priceless, grab a couple grand and
> > > look into professional data recovery, because unless you can find a
> > > super-geek, that will probably be your best bet.
> >
> > Unfortunately I cannot afford such a service, even though my data is
> > crucial to me, they're just too expensive for my pocket. :-(
> >
> > José Pedro
> 
> My one BIG FAT WARNING to you would be to think for 30 seconds or more before
> pushing any buttons when redoing your disks.
> 
> Its very easy to accidentally format things when you don't know exactly what
> your doing... at least for me it is; I've done it :-p
> 
> Wishing the best of luck,
> Patrick Rutkowski
> 
It turns out everything is easier than we thought!
I contacted Intel for some support and here's what they told me:

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thank you for contacting Intel(R) Technical Support.

You should be able to just connect both drives to a motherboard with
either the Intel(R) 82801ER I/O controller hub (ICH5R), the Intel(R)
82801FR I/O controller hub (ICH6R) or the Intel(R) 82801GR I/O
controller hub (ICH7R) and everything should work fine.

Now, you just need to connect the drives. Do not create the RAID 0
volume again because this will cause the drives to be overwritten.

Before plugging in the drives, make sure that the onboard RAID
controller is enabled in the BIOS, or that Serial ATA features are set
to RAID. Either one of the above RAID controllers, once enabled at
BIOS level, should be able to detect the RAID structure on the drives.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Neat, huh? :D
Now I can blame Intel if anything goes wrong! :>

Regards,
José Pedro

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Re: [gentoo-user] P4P800 - Intel ICH5R - data recovery?

[Ryan Viljoen]

This has been a really interesting topic. I also have a P4P800 which I
suspect is also on its way out and was wondering the exact same thing
the other day. And I have no chance of backing up all my data there is
just to much of it.

Thanks Jose.

Cheers
Rav

On 7/21/05, José Pedro Saraiva <nocive@gmail.com> wrote:
> On 7/20/05, Patrick Rutkowski <rutski89@gmail.com> wrote:
> > On Tuesday 19 July 2005 19:37, José Pedro Saraiva wrote:
> > > Thanks for the reply Colin =)
> > >
> > > > If you remember your stripe size, then you should be able to plug
> > > > your drives into any ICH5R-based motherboard and get your data back.
> > > > Theoretically, you could plug your drives into any RAID whose BIOS
> > > > does not write to the disks when creating an array and then recreate
> > > > the array in the BIOS with the same stripe size.  I don't know if
> > > > software RAID can rebuild your array, but that seems like your best
> > > > bet, lest you have a friend with a lot of SATA RAID controllers (s)
> > > > he's willing to lend out.
> > >
> > > I already ordered another ICH5R motherboard (similar to my P4P800 but
> > > a new model, since my old one is not available anymore) to try that
> > > out. I'm almost sure that my stripe size is 64KB (default). If so,
> > > plugging my hard drives into the new board and creating a new array
> > > with the same stripe size will give me access to my data? Or is there
> > > the risk of loosing it all? Do you know if the ICH5R writes to the
> > > disks when creating the array?
> > >
> > > > If all else fails and your data is priceless, grab a couple grand and
> > > > look into professional data recovery, because unless you can find a
> > > > super-geek, that will probably be your best bet.
> > >
> > > Unfortunately I cannot afford such a service, even though my data is
> > > crucial to me, they're just too expensive for my pocket. :-(
> > >
> > > José Pedro
> >
> > My one BIG FAT WARNING to you would be to think for 30 seconds or more before
> > pushing any buttons when redoing your disks.
> >
> > Its very easy to accidentally format things when you don't know exactly what
> > your doing... at least for me it is; I've done it :-p
> >
> > Wishing the best of luck,
> > Patrick Rutkowski
> >
> It turns out everything is easier than we thought!
> I contacted Intel for some support and here's what they told me:
> 
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Thank you for contacting Intel(R) Technical Support.
> 
> You should be able to just connect both drives to a motherboard with
> either the Intel(R) 82801ER I/O controller hub (ICH5R), the Intel(R)
> 82801FR I/O controller hub (ICH6R) or the Intel(R) 82801GR I/O
> controller hub (ICH7R) and everything should work fine.
> 
> Now, you just need to connect the drives. Do not create the RAID 0
> volume again because this will cause the drives to be overwritten.
> 
> Before plugging in the drives, make sure that the onboard RAID
> controller is enabled in the BIOS, or that Serial ATA features are set
> to RAID. Either one of the above RAID controllers, once enabled at
> BIOS level, should be able to detect the RAID structure on the drives.
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> Neat, huh? :D
> Now I can blame Intel if anything goes wrong! :>
> 
> Regards,
> José Pedro
> 
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> gentoo-user@gentoo.org mailing list
> 
> 


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