RE: Re: Will I ever learn !!

["Tony Butler" <tony@xxxxxxx>]

> or look into hardware profiles. Pretty much every Windows
> incarnation since Win95 has support for hardware profiles.
> Usually it is an easy way to have multiple configs for
> laptops, or desktops that mut exist with and without a
> network connection or transient hardware, but is also useful

Except they don't really work.  I had a problem a couple of years back
with a WinNT installation where two pieces of hardware were conflicting.
This was an AV editing PC, so lots of esoteric hardware - MPEG capture
cards, multichannel sound, SCSI card etc etc.
There simply were not enough IRQ's in the system to cope with all the
hardware & IRQ sharing was out of the question as it slowed things down
too much and/or crashed the system.
So I tried setting up hardware profiles - one with Kit X, the other with
kit Y on the same IRQ.
Didn't work. :(

> OS. I do not consider backup of an OS and applications
> necessary except as an emergency restore procedure since the
> chances are the original install disks will be available and
> although it might take some time, installing is a relatively
> simple process and allows you to easily dump those
> applications you don't really want/use any more.

True, except you lose all the configuration changes you made to the
original OS since it was first installed, lose all your cookies with
userid & passwords you will _never_ remember.
Favourites go too.
As do application config changes.......

For me, and I suspect a lot of others, we do not simply install software
and live with the defaults.
Even if it's just simple things like changing the 'Max Recently used
documents' for word, excel etc from 4 to 9, it will take time to
re-apply all these settings - provided you can remember them of course.
:)

When .Net apps start appearing, this should not be such an issue as
_everything_ to do with an app should live in the app directory & not
in
the registry or windows directory.........

> But in all these scenarios, the important thing that is the
> stuff likely to be lost is the data and none of them are
> likely to affect the data. Installing a dodgy sound card,
> whether or not it breaks your OS, will not delete all your
> word documents, nor change the scripts and configuration of

No, but it could clash with your RAID controller or something and cause
corruption because it interferes with the correct operation of the
drive.
Also, software/hardware crashing that hangs the system often results in
the need to hard power off the PC.
This is never good as the OS may be in mid-write and you end up with
cross linked files, corrupt FAT tables etc.
These can cause your files to be lost.

My data was effectively 'lost' when I installed XP because I couldn't
access the partition.  If I didn't know what I was doing, I might have
assumed it was gone forever and reformatted the drive.

> homeseer. RAID will offer good fault protection against data
> loss, but obviously data should have offline backups. RAID is

That was my point.  It _helps_ things but really you need 'proper'
backups.
Still, better than nothing :-)

> also a good protection against hard drive failure which is
> likely the most common form of data loss and seems to be the
> problem which started this conversation.

In my experience, it has been corruptions caused by crashes/dodgy
drivers etc, OS changes, or low level disk tools (eg defraggers) that
have resulted in lost data where even tools like Norton Utilities
couldn't recover the files.  I have only once had a hard drive failure
that resulted in data loss.

> Partition Magic or similar should be able to help here. Or

This is what allowed me to get to the data - the partition was marked as
hidden/unknown type.  I unhid it, PM displayed some odd error message,
but the D: drive returned.
Unfortunately, logging off & on again reset it back to being hidden.

> possibly whatever tools came with your hardware RAID system.
> You will be able to get the space back. I assume the problem
> has affected both drives, and since you have RAID you can
> play about with this and not have to worry too much about
> breaking everything. Turn RAID off before you play, and you
> can then recover from the other drive if things go pear
> shaped, or if it works out, rebuild the mirror on the off
> drive once you have the partition back.

Yeah, I'm 'getting around to it'.  Haven't bothered just yet as I had
enough space on the C: partition for everything.  That is now not the
case, so will do it 'soon'.
The odd thing is that the C: drive is still accessible even though it is
on the same set of disks!

> Incidentally, why are you using partitions anyway?

The C: drive is the 'PC', the D: drive is the 'Server'.
My server is not up and running ATM (due to laziness on my part & no
time to do it), so I stuck all my data on the D: drive, which is
accessed via mapped network drives.  Once the server is up and running
again, I just have to xfer all of the D drive to it and remap the
network drives - easy!

> I am going to try and get all my machines using RAID here,
> but need to save up a bit of cash first. What RAID system did
> you go for?

Oh this is just on the workhorse machine, so it's an abit mobo with
built in Highpoint EIDE raid controller.
Don't really need it though as XP/2k/NT support software raid.
Wasn't sure what OS would end up on it, so wanted hardware solution....

No need for ultra fast SCSI raids or anything as these days EIDE is
pretty damned quick & am not pushing machine to the limit anyway......

> I am hoping that a top end RAID server at work that has been
> sitting gathering dust for a while is about to be thrown out
> in which case it will end up in the boot of my car :).
> Support for around 20 hot swap devices IIRC. Then by making

Nice!  That's a serious bit of kit!

> > Indeed, if I'd had my thinking head on that day, I could
> have broken
> > the mirror, upgraded one disk, and when that was pants,
> re-established
> > the mirror and overwritten the kacky XP installation - DOH!
>
> Definitely worth remembering for next time :)

Yeah but will I bother?  Probably not as 'this should be a simple
upgrade' :-)

Tony