Degraded RAID 5, SanDisk 240GB SSD X3, Sager NP9280, Clevo D900F

I have 3/320 GB sata Hdd@7200 RPM in a raid 5 parity and one of my drives is now degraded after 8 years so I can't complain.

Intel Matrix storage manager says volume "0" is the degraded volume. Does anyone know exactly which HDD this is so I don't have to systematically unplug each one?

There's one to the left and 2 stacked on top of each other.

Thanks,
Charlie

 

The pair of disks is 0 and 1, as to the order *shrug*

 

The RAID menu lists the drives' serial numbers, which you can then match to the stickers. Come to think of it; Intel Matrix should also show the serials.

 

Intel Matrix should have a section to view hard drive and volume status. RST should also show drive status, in the "Management" section.

 

IMS does show the serials but I guess since it's in raid 5, it shows the same serial for all 3 HDD's, but I beleive I got it figured out. I'm going to be buying all solid state drives soon. Does anyone have a recommendation to a good SSD set up that works goos with my Sager Np9280? 1 more thing, does anyone know the max hdd size the D900F can take?

Edit...I was looking at the model numbers. They do have 3 different serial numbers.

 

Replaced all HDD with Ssd, rebuilt raid and every time I put my laptop in the bag and transport it, I get the degraded message and Intel matrix manager rebuilds it. Where would you guys look first?

I'm thinking the ribbon wire that connects the stacked drives but the connection feels good and snug there although, the tape itself could be the problem...who knows?

Also if I can get the Raid rebuilding problem fixed, I'm wanting to do the upgrade to the Nvidia GTX 680m. Im really just trying to get a few more years out of this notebook, it's been a really good one so far.

I can get the GPU itself at a pretty good price. Is the heatsink I have now good enough?, if not, does anyone have a part number for the GPU heatsink I need? By the way, I have already reflashed the bios to 1.009-1.004 to support the 680m

Thanks for any help!
Charlie

 

You have 2 HDDs and an SSD in raid 5?

 

No I now have 3/240gb (Same brand and model) SSD's in raid 5.

 

Is it always the same drive degraded, have you swapped them around to see if it's always the same port?

 

It doesn't really show any of the drives degraded, it says Raid "Volume 0" degraded. All 3 drives have normal status next to them. That's what has me confused. The next time it does this, I will try to post a picture of it.

I have switched them around trying to pin point the bad drive and never could so I just went ahead and bought all 3 thinking this would take care of it but still remains the same. Although, at least now it can be rebuilt. Before I did the swap, it stayed degraded even after rebuilding many times.

Thanks for the reply.
Charlie

 

I may have fixed the problem. When upgraded to Windows 7 and updated the EC and bios to 1.009/1.004, it screwed up a couple raid drivers. Jmicron... one was JMB38X MMS, and the other was simular to that. So I went and found the drivers then downloaded them. Then I turned off my machine took it for a walk in the laptop bag, fired it up and all was good. Hopefully this was my problem.

If anyone has done the GTX 680m upgrade on the np9280 (D900F), can you give me the specifics on how it went?

Thanks,
Charlie

 

That all the firmware got cleared up.

 

Sager np9280 D900F...core i7 975 3.33ghz, 12gb ram ddr3 @1333mhz. 3 x 240gb SanDisk ssd in raid...GTX 280m. Rapid storage manager running the raid.

I've been having problems "again" with degraded volumes in raid 5. I went out and bought 3 new ssd and still get the rebuilding crap every once in a while. I uninstalled Matrix Storage Manager and downloaded the Rapid storage manager thinking this might fix it but, I still get this on boot up every once in a while. It did seem to get better with Rapid storage manager but still getting it. I also put 3 new 4gb's of Ram in too (Corsair 4gb ddr3 1333mhz).

If anyone knows what I could try, please let me know.

Thanks,
Charlie

 

Why RAID 5? You could get two 512GB and use RAID 1 if you're really concerned about redundancy, and eliminate any concerns with RAID 5. I don't see any benefit to RAID 5 especially with SSD's (or RAID at all in a laptop).

That being said, unless you need real time backup of your data, a regular backup of your daily data to an external NAS or even hard drive is more robust than RAID 5, then you could have 1TB SSD for less cost even.

 

Your right I really need to do away with raid 5. I will do this and see how it goes. Thanks for the help!

 

Good luck. I understand the desire for backup and redundancy, especially when you were using hard drives, RAID 5 makes sense. But going with SSD's maybe not so much. Glad you've been able to keep your laptop so long, that's a testament to the durability of those old Clevo machines. Well, and probably that you took good care of yours too.

 

Yeah it doesn't look but about a year old. Only problem I have is the screen hinge covers on both ends broke off. Other than that, there's not a scratch on it. That just happened about a month ago.