New User - Match drives with windows drive letter

[edkinfla]

New user, very pleased with software's abilities. Found HDS reference on board when googling hard disk monitor software.

My unusual setup and issue. DELL PE840 Server (8Gb memory, Single XEON 2.4 Ghz dual core) , LSI 9212 4i/4e controller. Internal, two WD2003FYYS on Mirror Array 1863.o Gb (OS: C Drive, Windows Storage Server 2008R2 install makes 60gb OS partition and remainder data partition - D: 1801.+ Gb).

External Box (TR4X) on LSI 9212 via 8088 cable: (4) WD20EURS AV drives configured as a single RAID10 array, GPT partition 3723.+ Gb.

Second Controller: Silicon Image SiI 3132 SoftRaid 5 Controller - connected to (2) SansDigital (TR4M+) 4 drive eSATA boxes.

Box 1: (4) WD1002FBYS Hard Drives 1st Array (2) Drives Mirrored; 2nd Array; (2) Drives Mirrored
Box 2: (2) WD20EVDS Hard Drives Mirrored 2Tb array; (2) WD10EVDS Hard Drives Mirrored 1Tb array

Purpose: Make consolidated use of collection of higher capacity drives for various storage needs on my Small business Server 2011 network.

1) The software finds and correctly reports the S.M.A.R.T. data on the drives but they are all mixed up with respect to how I have them identified in windows.

Will try to illustrate the problem

I labeled the various arrays as follows and their true associated drives:

ARRAY0 = WD2003FYYS/WD2003FYYS Single RAID1 2 Tb array; MBR; Identified In Windows Computer management as Disk 0; Basic Disk; Online; 1861.71 Gb - 100MB NTFS partition; DRV C: 60 Gb NTFS (Boot, Page, Crash, Primary Partition) ; DRV D: ARRAY0 1801.61 Gb NTFS (Primary Partition); Controller LSI-9212 Internal Connections SATA

ARRAY2 = (4) WD20EURS Drives Single RAID10 4Tb array; GPT; Identified In Windows Computer management as Disk 1; Basic Disk; Online; 3723.30 Gb - 3723.30 Gb NTFS Primary Partition; Controller LSI-9212 External connection (8088) to SansDigital 4 Drive box (TR4X)

ARRAY3 = (2) WD1002FBYS Drives Single RAID1 1Tb array; MBR; Identified In Windows Computer management as Disk 2; Basic Disk; Online; 931.51 Gb - 931.51 Gb NTFS Primary Partition; Controller Silicon Image SiI 3132 SoftRaid 5 Controller connected via eSATA cable to SansDigital 4 drive box (TR4M+)

ARRAY4 = (2) WD1002FBYS Drives Single RAID1 1Tb array; MBR; Identified In Windows Computer management as Disk 3; Basic Disk; Online; 931.51 Gb - 931.51 Gb NTFS Primary Partition; Controller Silicon Image SiI 3132 SoftRaid 5 Controller connected via eSATA cable to SansDigital 4 drive box (TR4M+)

ARRAY5 = (2) WD20EVDS Drives Single RAID1 2Tb array; MBR; Identified In Windows Computer management as Disk 4; Basic Disk; Online; 1863.01 Gb - 1863.01 Gb NTFS Primary Partition; Controller Silicon Image SiI 3132 SoftRaid 5 Controller connected via eSATA cable to SansDigital 4 drive box (TR4M+)

ARRAY6 = (2) WD10EVDS Drives Single RAID1 1Tb array; MBR; Identified In Windows Computer management as Disk 6; Basic Disk; Online; 931.51 Gb - 931.51 Gb NTFS Primary Partition; Controller Silicon Image SiI 3132 SoftRaid 5 Controller connected via eSATA cable to SansDigital 4 drive box (TR4M+)

Hard Disk Sentinel 4.40 Pro reports the following disk associations which is what I would like to correct, if possible.

Physical Disk Information - Disk: #0: WDC WD20EURS-63S48Y0 HDS: C: D: Array0 - Actual: F: Array2
Physical Disk Information - Disk: #1: WDC WD20EURS-63S48Y0 HDS: C: D: Array0 - Actual: F: Array2
Physical Disk Information - Disk: #2: WDC WD20EURS-63Z9B1 HDS: C: D: Array0 - Actual: F: Array2
Physical Disk Information - Disk: #3: WDC WD20EURS-63Z9B1 HDS: C: D: Array0 - Actual: F: Array2
Physical Disk Information - Disk: #4: WDC WD2003FYYS-02W0B0 HDS: F: Array2 - Actual: C: D: Array0
Physical Disk Information - Disk: #5: WDC WD2003FYYS-02W0B0 HDS: F: Array2 - Actual: C: D: Array0
Physical Disk Information - Disk: #6: WDC WD1002FBYS-01A6B0 HDS: G: Array3 - Actual: either G: Array3 or H: Array4
Physical Disk Information - Disk: #7: WDC WD20EVDS-63T3B0 HDS: G: Array3 - Actual: I: Array5
Physical Disk Information - Disk: #8: WDC WD1002FBYS-01A6B0 HDS: G: Array3 - Actual: either G: Array3 or H: Array4
Physical Disk Information - Disk: #9: WDC WD20EVDS-63T3B0 HDS: <none>: Array3 - Actual: I: Array5
Physical Disk Information - Disk: #10: WDC WD1002FBYS-01A6B0 HDS: <none>: Array3 - Actual: either G: Array3 or H: Array4
Physical Disk Information - Disk: #11: WDC WD10EVDS-63U8B0 HDS: <none>: Array3 - Actual: J: Array6
Physical Disk Information - Disk: #12: WDC WD1002FBYS-01A6B0 HDS: <none>: Array3 - Actual: either G: Array3 or H: Array4
Physical Disk Information - Disk: #13: WDC WD10EVDS-63U8B0 HDS: <none>: Array3 - Actual: J: Array6

Arrays three through 6 have no data yet so I can delete them and reconfigure if necessary. I am going to redo the two single mirrored arrays with the WD 1Tb re drives in the one box to a single RAID10 which will yield the same 2 TB total for the box.

It would appear that Windows based on the BIOS booting (the SiI controller shows first in the BIOS boot before the LSI) lists the drives as read by the BIOS. And I would guess that the SansDigital boxes actual pair drives in alternate slots. Top slot with 3rd down, 2nd down from top with bottom. This is apparent by the mixed box with the 2Tb and 1Tb EVDS drives as I loaded them 2tb, 2tb, 1tb, 1tb from the top.

Anyway, I couldn't find in the posts or KB's if there is a way to adjust the associations within HDS to match the drives with the correct windows partition labels?

If not I can continue to use my text based doc on the desktop should I need to refer to the correct info.

I also thought it ODD that after physical drive 8 HDS is not reporting the windows drive letter association, correctly or incorrectly.

Again, the software is reporting what I believe correctly ALL the appropriate physical drive monitoring details (what's important anyway). And this is what I want regardless. Good Job!
This will be a mandatory upgrade on my 50+ clients workstations, servers, etc.

Ed

[hdsentinel]

Thanks for your message and kind words, glad to hear that generally Hard Disk Sentinel seems useful

Yes, I completely understand what you mean.
Generally, as you can see, the most important is to access the status of the hard disks / SSDs, even with special configuration: even with special RAID controllers, external (single / multi bay) boxes and so.

The "problem" is that some of these special devices simply do not provide 100% accurate way to determine which physical hard disk is associated with which logical drive under Windows. Hard Disk Sentinel has numerous ways (and constantly improving) to detect the relation between the physical and logical drives, but with some configurations this is not really possible - or may need further testing and improvements.

Generally, I'd recommend to

- use Report menu -> Send test report to developer option now, using version Hard Disk Sentinel 4.40

- download and install the latest possible version which has lots of changes in this field:
www.hdsentinel.com/beta4/hdsentinel_pro_setup44012.zip
and use Report menu -> Send test report to developer option with that as well. I suspect there will be changes compared to what you can see now, so to keep track the possible change, it would be best to see both reports - as these would surely help development / adjustments in this area.

Personally I also recommend to use the Comment field in the main window (a line with "Click here to add comment ..." text). This is designed exactly to allow users to enter any information about the particular hard disk, for example its real location in the enclosure, its different logical drive and so.
So may be still better than having a doc file on the desktop