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March 9th, 2021 12:00
PowerVault MD1400 - Physical Disks failing/foreign
We have a PowerVault MD1400 configured with 12 14TB Dell/WDC 3.5 inch drives - Product ID WUH721414AL5200 revision SS03. The MD1400 reports it's running firmware version 1.07. I'm trying to figure out why we've had five disks fail / become foreign in the past five months.
This enclosure is connected to a R740xd via PERC H840 controller on the external SAS ports.
In December 2020 the lights on two of the drives were off (no LED at all), and the tech who work on this enclosure wrote that iDRAC reported issues with the disks and they needed to be replaced.
On March 6th a third disk presented the blinking amber LED, was reseated, and then appeared online. The storage was available to the server after rebooting the server.
On March 8th while writing a Veeam backup to the storage, three disks reported as failed and presented the blinking amber LED. They were reseated and the amber LED became green. Two of these disks were those replaced in December 2020. They appeared in iDRAC as foreign, and we imported the foreign configuration. The virtual disk is available now as degraded, and the array is rebuilding.
I've been told that one or two additional drives were replaced prior to December 2020, but don't have records of that.
Are there any reported compatibility issues with these 14TB drives and the MD1400? Anyone else experiencing this level of failure with the MD1400?
DELL-Josh Cr
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March 9th, 2021 17:00
Hi JMS_NJ,
14TB drives should be fine. Are they Dell drives or third party drives? Which controller are you using? Is the controller and drive firmware up to date?
JMS_NJ
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March 10th, 2021 06:00
Yes, they are Dell-labeled (WDC) drives. The controller is a PERC H840. It has:
I found a Firmware version 51.13.2-3714 from November 2020 posted here: https://www.dell.com/support/home/en-us/drivers/driversdetails?driverid=26pxk
Then MD1400 Enclosure EMMs report Firmware Version 1.07. That *may* be up-to-date, but I see there's an 1.07A05 version posted here https://www.dell.com/support/home/en-us/drivers/driversdetails?driverid=xx44m
So I don't think I'm using the latest firmware for the controller, possibly am for the enclosure.
Do you have some guidance on how to install?
If the enclosure already has the latest firmware, will the installer report this and exit?
The Virtual Disk is also in the middle of rebuilding; do I need to wait until that's complete?
Thank you
Jonathan
DELL-Chris H
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March 10th, 2021 07:00
You certainly want to wait until the rebuild completes to run the firmware update. I would start with the enclosure update, followed with the controller.
JMS_NJ
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March 18th, 2021 08:00
Hi Chris,
The hardware was finally available today for the firmware update. I tried to update the MD1400 Enclosure's firmware, and the installer reported that I'm already running the latest version. I'll attempt the H840 controller update next.
JMS_NJ
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March 18th, 2021 09:00
The controller firmware update installed successfully. The updater applied version 51.13.2-3714 to both the embedded H740P and the H840 PCI adapters.
So far all storage is online and available. I've also written Veeam backup files to the storage, and that seems to be working.
Thank you.
DELL-Josh Cr
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March 29th, 2021 13:00
If it isn’t the same drives every time, I would look at replacing the cables, then the controller then the drive backplane.
JMS_NJ
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March 29th, 2021 13:00
After a week of running with the latest firmware, the storage went offline again this morning (Monday). I had just reviewed the disk status Saturday afternoon (around 36 hours ago), and all were green with no failure predicted.
This time two of the physical disks (out of 12) reported as failed. I re-seated the disks one at a time, rebooted, went into the H840 settings and imported the foreign configuration. Both disks are back online and green, and the virtual disk is in degraded status while the array is currently rebuilding.
It seems two or three disks drop offline at the same time in this enclosure around once every few weeks. I've confirmed these are Dell EMC branded drives, but aren't the original that were sold with the enclosure.
Can you suggest any reason this problem continues?
Thank you!