5.3 Given a scenario, troubleshoot & diagnose problems with storage drives & RAID arrays Flashcards
What to do if the system tries to boot from an incorrect device?
Check removable drives for interference & verify boot order
How to tell if a fixed disk is powering up?
Check LED on front panel or hear the hard disk spinning up
What to do if a fixed disk is not detected at boot?
Check if drive has a power connector attached & if it powers up
What to do if a hard drive is powering up but not detected?
Verify data cable connections, check for damage, & enable MOBO ports
What to suspect if power & cabling are fine but the computer doesn’t boot?
An issue with the storage drive’s boot sector & files
It is likely corrupted. The boot sector is a specific area on the storage device that contains essential information for the system to boot up.
What can cause boot sector corruption?
The boot sector is a specific area on the storage device that contains essential information for the system to boot up.
- Disk faults
- Power failure
- Incorrect OS installation
- Malware
Meaning of MBR?
Master Boot Record
Meaning of GPT?
GUID [Global Unique IDentifier] Partition Table
What are the 2 ways to format boot information?
- MBR
- GPT
Where is the MBR located & what does it contain?
In the first sector, with partition info & code to find the active boot sector
What does the GPT boot scheme do?
Identifies partitions & OS boot loaders across sectors
What errors may you see if boot records are damaged?
- “Boot device not found”
- “OS not found”
- “Invalid drive specification”
How to fix a boot problem caused by malware?
Use antivirus boot disk to scan & repair boot sector
If you don’t have the option of using a recovery disk created bythe anti-virs software, you can try to use the repair options that come with the OS setup disk
What happens when the firmware finds a boot device?
Boot sector code loads into memory, takes over from firmware, & loads OS flies
What are errors after the boot sector code is loaded usually due to?
Software or device driver issues
What time range are hard disks most likely to fail?
in the first few months of operation or after several years
Which type of hard drive is more reliable, HDDs or SSDs?
SSDs
But they also have a max exptected lifespan
What can cause damage or file corruption in fixed disks?
Sudden loss of power
Especially during a write operation
What may constant LED activity on a disk suggest?
Insufficient RAM, faulty software, or malware
What could cause a “Bootable device not found” error?
Faulty disk or file corruption
What does read/write failures on a disk indicate?
Bad sectors (HDD) or bad blocks (SSD)
A sector is the smallest unit of data that can be read from or written to the disk. A block is a larger unit of data compared to a sector in an HDD. When data is written to an SSD, it is written in blocks
Meaning of S.M.A.R.T?
Self-Monitoring, Analysis, & Reporting Technology
Meaning of IOPS?
Input/Output operations Per Second
What is S.M.A.R.T?
Self-diagnostic program for hard drives
What to do if you suspect a hard drive is failing?
- Use disk vendor or system diagnostic tests
- If true, backup data & replace the drive
What can slow read/write times on a hard drive indicate?
The drive might be failing, or system performance issues
System performance issued like app load, file fragmentation, or limited capacity
What happens to bad sectors (HDDs) or blocks (SSDs) detected by disk firmware?
A sector is the smallest unit of data that can be read from or written to the disk. A block is a larger unit of data compared to a sector in an HDD. When data is written to an SSD, it is written in blocks
They are marked as unavailable for use
How to recover data from a failing HDD?
Recovery utility
What’s required to recover data from a failing SSD?
Highly specialized tools
Purpose of RAID?
Protect data from disk failures by mirroring or using parity
How does RAID 0 differ from other RAID levels?
Has no redundancy
If a disk fails, the volume stops working
What to do if a disk in a RAID array fails?
Replace disk & rebuild array with RAID utility
Be cautions as removing a healthy disk by mistake could cause the array to fail
What if more disks fila than the RAID config. can tolerate?
Use the latest backup or file recovery solutions
Waht to do if the RAID controller fails?
A RAID controller is a hardware device or a specialized chip that manages the operation of a RAID array
Replace controller or move disks to another system
Verify the status using the RAID configuration utility
What does unusual noise from an HDD indicate?
Mechanical problems
