Drobo

Which disk is causing "Data Protection" run?

Drobo - End of Sale
#1

My Drobo 5N just went into a short “Data Protection” run. Looking at the events tab in the dashboard and the notices on my Mac, they mention the “Data Protection” happened but give clue as to why.

On the drive all lights were Green before and after, and did their flashing(Green+Yellow) during the repair. Same on Dashboard. Top level display is all Green.

Digging down into the detail page of drives, one drive says Warning and is Yellow. Despite no other info should I assume that this is the drive causing the issue?

Thanks

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#2

Does going to the status page in dashboard, picking drive information in the dropdown & then scrolling through the bays (or clicking them in the illustration) not tell you anything? that’s where I’d look.

#3

The top level of a disk list (on Dashboard or hardware) is always Green (except during fix). This is where the doc days I should see any indications of error.

Now if I go into the detail page of each individual disk, one is Yellow and says Warning, but give no indication what that warning is and isn’t mentioned during the repair. If I can’t get any better info this one is probably the one I will replace. But actual facts would be helpful. After all it decided something needed to be fixed it should at least tell my which one and why.

I’m a bit nervous, since my Drobo has been doing things it shouldn’t and not doing things it should

#4

Looks like it kicked off another quick unidentified “Data Protection” run earlier this morning.

The disk with the highest potential for being the cause is old and only 4TB and I have 5+ TB free space so believe I could just remove it (Wish Dashboard had an option to request it rather than just yank it out)

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#5

If any of the drives show “healed” in the drive information, that would be a clue.
Other possibilities:
1)
Pull a diagnostics file & instead of sending it to Drobo support, look through the human readable portions for clues, some of the .bin files also have readable stuff at the start if opened with a text editor (notepad works on Windows).
2)
Shut down the unit, remove the entire drive pack, keeping the drives in order, individually check their S.M.A.R.T. status using a utility from within your OS, the red flag would be pending or reallocated sectors. If you identify the culprit that way, you know which drive to replace after reinstating the pack & starting up.

1 Like
#6

Thanks @cyber_beardy.

I don’t remember seeing the “Healed” value before. Not sure if its new or I just missed it because I was looking for yellow/red. Its another 4TB one and I believe that was one of the originals I started with.

I’ve also pulled the diagnostics file and started browsing thru it. Looks like some of a Linux system’s log files. Hopefully it will point to the specific drive (For confirmation).

I’ve got on my next step(s). I’ve got a current full backup, so I can replace these 4TB drives one by one or do a reformat (Guarantee 64TB) and restore. The replace one by one may take less time. The rebuild will probably take almost a full day with no access during the process

But thanks for the assistance.

#7

“Healed” shows up with some firmware/dashboard combinations if a drive has been repaired (presumably sector remap).

Generally speaking I tend to run badblocks (from Linux) over any new or used drives I intend to use in a Drobo & then check the SMART data. Only using drives that are in 100% perfect order. If you’re planning a tear down & reset, that could be a detail to include. Certainly a reset & restore backup is likely to be faster than multiple rebuilds swapping multiple drives .