Configure RAID for IBM X3630 X3

Yes, I have encountered this with low-end cards and buggy drivers. However, no, not on an up-to-date Adaptec rebranded card. Wow is all I can say. One thing to consider, maybe it is more a bug with the drive than the RAID controller.

I don't have a good answer, but since you seem to have exhausted most of your options other than replacing the card, (and replacing the drives did the trick) here's a few ideas you can consider for your troubleshooting:

• The WD drives were RE (RAID Edition) drives, right? The time limited error recovery is important, so if you don't have that and the drive is attempting to recover the sector, you are going to get a looooong pause from that drive. If the RAID controller is being patient and not dropping the drive you'll have a big problem on your hands.

• Check the SMART data on the drives you removed and see if there is anything interesting.

Another comment about the importance of time limited error recovery (TLER) feature, from NAS / RAID vendor support:

As I mention before, we always suggest customers to use enterprise level drives if they use the drives in RAID settings. Enterprise level drives have more consistent responding time so that the RAID will be safer.

what you can do is try to reinit the raid

1. power down host, remove both drives
2. power host up, go into raid controller setup and reset the config (the drives should be out, remember?)
3. power host down again, insert the two drives
4. power host up, go into raid controller bios, and create a new raid1 on the two drives, make sure you don't mix up their order, and very important - DO NOT LET THE NEW RAID INITIALISE - it will erase the disks
5. if you know which drive failed first, force it offline, if not, try the procedure, forcing offline each of the drives and trying to boot using the other in a degraded raid array

This should bring you to a host with one disk online, and the other offline, making the raid1 degraded, but usable enough to boot and back up the data