Question

Difficulty: MediumStorage Drives and RAID Array Issues

A system administrator receives a monitoring alert for a server utilizing a software RAID 1 array. Diagnostics show that Drive 1 has developed critical S.M.A.R.T. read errors and has been flagged as degraded, while Drive 0 remains fully operational. Which of the following steps should the administrator take to restore full array functionality and redundancy without risking data loss? (Select TWO.)

  1. Fail and remove the degraded drive from the logical RAID array configuration using the management utility.Answer
  2. B
    Re-initialize and format the active RAID 1 array to clear the bad sectors on the impaired drive.
  3. Install a new drive of equal or greater capacity and rebuild the RAID 1 array using the healthy drive as the source.Answer
  4. D
    Convert the RAID 1 array into a RAID 0 array to bypass the bad sectors on the failing drive.

Answer

The correct actions are to logically fail and remove the degraded drive from the software RAID configuration, then install a replacement drive of equal or greater capacity and rebuild the array from the operational mirror drive.
When a RAID 1 array enters a degraded state due to drive corruption, proper recovery requires logically detaching the faulty disk using RAID management commands to prevent system instability, followed by installing a compatible replacement drive and initiating a rebuild sync from the surviving mirror disk.

Step-by-Step Solution

1
Isolate the failing drive logically
Drive 1 is marked as failed/offline within the RAID controller software to prevent improper read/write attempts.
Detaching the failing disk logically ensures array stability while operating on the single healthy disk.
2
Physically replace the disk and rebuild redundancy
A new drive with matching or higher storage capacity is inserted, and a rebuild procedure is executed.
RAID 1 requires an operational target drive of at least equal capacity to synchronize data from the surviving source disk.

Key Concept

RAID 1 Degraded Array Recovery and Hot-Swap Procedures
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