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My computer has become unbootable, and it holds a RAID-5 data disk Array (mdadm ) which I need to recover.

No OS will boot, nor USB, nor DVD, nor hard disk installed, except for the Ubuntu minimal installation CD ( DVD drive, CD+R ) which installs successfully but still my computer fails to reboot.

What is different on this minimal CD? It does gives me hope...

Is there a way to recover my data from the disks? I'm a bit reluctant to experiment on this..

My motherboard is a GA-81945GMP which I performed a CMOS/ Bios reset on but no result.

I already did a fresh install with just one hard disk and the Raid PCI slots disconnected. The Boot repair disk ( CD-R ) also fails to boot.

Zanna
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Whois_me
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  • Maybe this older question can help you: http://askubuntu.com/questions/277920/nas-raid-5-recovery-using-mdadm-volume-and-mount-issues-please-help – Flatron Jul 29 '14 at 10:37
  • This might also help you: http://serverfault.com/questions/347606/recover-raid-5-data-after-created-new-array-instead-of-re-using – Flatron Jul 29 '14 at 10:38
  • Thanks Flatron, for the already usefull links, I didn't manage to find them trough Google yet. – Whois_me Jul 29 '14 at 10:42
  • No problem, keep cool! As long you don't touch your RAID no data will be lost. I am sorry but I am not very experienced with RAID arrays so maybe someone with more knowlege can help you further. – Flatron Jul 29 '14 at 10:45
  • Is it a hardware RAID, a Fake RAID, or a Linux software RAID? – Run CMD Jul 29 '14 at 10:50
  • So you can boot the minimal install image, but not any other images? The only difference is that most other images have a graphical desktop, so perhaps there is some problem with the GPU driver. What exactly do you mean by "unbootable" - what error do you get? – bain Jul 29 '14 at 10:56
  • @ bain, no error just won't start, Can I boot into something else without the GPU driver? – Whois_me Jul 29 '14 at 11:10
  • @ bain, you gave me an idea, Clonezilla boots just fine so I need an operating system without a graphical desktop so at the moment I'm installing Ubuntu server; fingers crossed – Whois_me Jul 29 '14 at 19:43

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The worst enemy of RAID is faulty hardware on data transfer line. So if you really value the data on your RAID the first thing you should have done is plug those HDDs off the faulty machine. (From power lines too). Bad RAM can ruin metadata even on read access. (something too clever for it's own good may kick in, like disk checker)
Use USB live stick or another HDD to test your hardware, and only when you are sure all other equipment is fine you may plug your RAID back.

Barafu Albino
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  • thanks, good tips, I already plugged out those disk just to be sure. My trouble is: nothing boots, neither does a live OS – Whois_me Jul 29 '14 at 11:09
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    Then it has nothing to do with HDDs - repair or replace your PC and plug those disks back. As long as you have the same /etc/fstab line, they should just work. – Barafu Albino Jul 29 '14 at 11:15
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My OS works again. I had to transport it another PC and boot from there, with the help of the "boot repair disk"

Switched the grub line to "Text" mode instead of splash and finally I installed openSSH to it so I can login the OS remotely.

Thanks everybody for the kind help.

Whois_me
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