[added 4tb drive now its missing]

Hi Tried resetting the Scanners settings but still reports as 1.64 TB, have opened a ticket thanks.

[added 4tb drive now its missing]

Hmm. If I had to make a rather wild guess, I'd... rather not. Could be Windows, could be the USB dock, could be.... But I would keep a figurative eye on that drive for a while.

 

Maybe give it a "probation period" and for now set DrivePool to only use it for duplicated data (or data you've got backed up elsewhere). And if you've got Stablebit Scanner (or would like to make use of its 30 day free trial!) I'd suggest having it regularly scan the drive in the background.

 

Thanks Shane for the suggestions, I only used a usb dock (being lazy) to check the drive in another pc I soon dismissed it and installed inside.

It is installed in a permanent bay in the server.

 

I have set it to use duplicated data so I don't lose any more data.  Can I specify specific folders that can only be used on that drive in Drivepool?

 

I have now bought Stablebit Scanner and it reports the drive as healthy however it only shows the 4 TB hdd size as 1.64 TB on the main page 

In whs 2011 dashboard it shows as 3.64 TB

 

 

Here's a few tips on using 4tb drives based on what I've had to go through.

 

1.  If Windows doesn't see the "new" (uninitialized drive) as 4tb (3.6 or whatever) then most likely the sata controller you are using does not support it properly.  This is usually a driver issue or controller.   As Drashna said beware the cheap dock external enclosures as many don't properly support 4tb drives.

2.  If you run into this issue consistently then you should think about getting a new controller, if feasible.  

3.  Assuming you DO see the drive as a 4tb drive you MUST initialize as GPT, not MBT.   GPT is capable of supporting dirves in the petabyte range I understand

4.  Let's assume you put the drive in and it saw it as 2tb and you initialized and formatted it and are stuck with just 2tb.  No problem.   Assuming you have no data on the drive! take the drive out, put it into another system that does see the drive as 4tb.   Once in the new system I would do the following:

 

a.  In the Windows Disc Management tool find the drive in the list and verify it sees the drive.   Be sure you have the right drive located!

b.  Right click the left column block next to the drive in the lower middle area (you'll see Disk 0, Disk 1, etc) and in the resulting popup look at the options available for Convert.      If it's GPT you will see "Convert to MBR" as an option.   Go ahead and convert to MBR.  You will now see two partitions on the drive.

c.  Repeat b above except this time convert back to GPT.    This process (as far as I understand it) will have effectively rebuilt the GUID partition table (GPT) correctly for the 4tb drive.

 

5.  Now go ahead and format the drive as NTFS.

6.  Verify the drive is working and you can copy data to and from the drive without issues.

7.  Move the drive back to your server and try again.

 

 

I followed this process on my server since my RAID controller will not present the drive to Windows as a legacy drive unless I initialize it elsewhere first.   However it works flawlessly once prepared.

 

Also keep in mind that you COULD get an external adapter that you KNOW works and do the same process on the server itself.  I used this adapter:  http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000UO6C5S/ref=wms_ohs_product?ie=UTF8&psc=1

 

Lastly verify that your controller will support a 4tb drive at all.   The process above is not necessarily a guarantee as I do not have the knowledge to state that it will work for all systems.   It just worked well for me.

 

Good luck!   And be sure to double and triple check things are working before committing, as Shane said.

 

Thanks SantiagoDraco I formatted the drive in a different pc as GPT ntfs.

 

From the server disc management if I click on the 4TB hdd on left hand side I get the option to convert to dynamic disc...          Convert to MBR Disk   is greyed out

If I check my other hdd's which are 2TB I get  convert to dynamic disc...          Convert to GPT Disk   is greyed out

 

So I presume although it is greyed out that at least it knows that the 4TB drive is in GPT

I didn't get a convert to MBR option.

 

Thanks once again for everyone's help, still not confident to add more 4TB WD red's yet 

[added 4tb drive now its missing]

Just to be on the safe side,

 

1) what was the OS on the other computer you tried to view the drive with?

 

Windows 7 Ultimate x64

 

2) is it WHS2011 or DrivePool that said the disk was missing?

 

WHS2011 said disc was missing.

 

3) does WHS2011's Disk Management also report the drive as RAW?

 

Didn't get that far -  I had viewed the 4tb hdd using usb in the windows 7 pc which saw it as raw, I then connected it using sata and as the pc started it saw disc errors which I left running and the disc was then readable with drivepool folders, however windows 7 reported it as being around 175gb used but I could not see all the files (hidden folders shown) I could see some files in my folders but not video files which I am missing (mkv)

 

Update I have put it back in the WHS2011  which recognizes it as the missing drive and reports 175gb (other) ----- It has now gone through duplicating, measuring, re-balance, and now its balancing

 

Tried rebooting and the disc is still present and working so not sure why it failed earlier, it is seen as  4tb so all is good for now- apart from losing the data.

 

 

[added 4tb drive now its missing]

Thanks for the reply, I presume I have messed up somehow as it seems that the partition table was changed after the reboot.

Should drivepool have seen the full size of the disc?

Would it be better to format the drive from within WHS2011 disc management?

Would it be better to partition the 4tb drive into 2 x 2tb?

Any thoughts on how to progress. Cheers Dave.

[added 4tb drive now its missing]

I replaced a 2tb drive with a 4tb one, drivepool saw it as 1.6tb so I removed it and formatted it in another pc using ntfs.

I then put it into the server and drivepool saw 3.64tb so I added it to the pool, after it had finished re-balancing all looked ok until I rebooted the server and it now says the drive is missing!  I have removed the drive to see whats on it in another pc but it is asking to format as it is in raw.

Seems data it transferred over during balancing is now missing as it can't see the drive.

Any help would be appreciated.