Centos – HP Proliant ML110 G6 using centOS – Hardware RAID fault alert

For a Debian Lenny install on top of a hardware RAID no special drivers are needed (unless your model of RAID controller is so brand new that the stable release doesn't have drivers for it). And the CD's that come with the server are completely useless when you install Linux.

The various lists indicate that Debian Lenny should install OK on that server. You might need to install the bnx2-firmware package for the ethernet cards. Probably best to first install the base system from a CD, download the bnx2-firmware package onto a USB stick and install it from there. Once that is in place, you can configure your network and from there on it's blue skies all the way.

You might want to check this regarding the RAID controller.

You've got something funky going on there, though I'm not exactly sure what it is.

The server should boot and operate normally with just 1 drive in it. All that should happen is the controller marks the array as degraded, but Operating Systems don't care (or even know) about this condition and should carry on as normal.

With regards to the rebuild, ordinarily I'd say look at the HP Array Diag Utility as that will give you some indication of rebuild progress. Since the Operating System sounds hosed at this point, the BIOS may have some rudimentary was of configuring arrays and displaying their status. Failing that, you should be able to boot off of a StartSmart CD which contains the HP Array Diag Utility. A 36GB drive should rebuild relatively quickly - I've seen a 36GB RAID1 on an ML370 rebuild in a morning.

Is it definitely the BIOS telling you drive C: isn't found? C: is a very Windows thing, and I'd be surprised that a BIOS would reference a very Windows-centric thing like that when other Operating Systems can be installed (it may well do, it just strikes me as odd).