My understanding is that one of the boot drives(2.5") have failed and needs to be replaced. I am not sure if there is a specific protocol to be followed in replacing it, what precautions to take etc. The other thing that I am not too sure about is does it need a 320GB drive or 500GB as I can’t seem to find that information in the specs. Any pointers to how to go about working on these issues will be greatly appreciated.
You just need to open my computer and look at c: and see if it is 320gb or 500gb. I have a 5100 and mine was “acting up” couple weeks ago, so I replaced my boot drive and it is doing fine now.
I did try some other drives I had on hand, but the box would not recognize them at all. It has to be an AV drive like whatever is in there now. Mine was WD3200BUCT
They are so cheap I would suggest you just go ahead and get two of em. When you shut down the box and take the cover off, you should see the drives on each side of the box and they have a sticker A or B. There are just 2 screws you need to remove to take the disc tray out, then 4 screws that old the disc to the caddy.
I “think” the raid rebuild will start itself when you put it all back together and power on. You can open the raid page from the monitor tab in the dashboard to watch. Obviously just replace the B drive at this time. IF you get 2 drives and want to replace A a couple weeks down the road, just repeat the process, or save the drive if you need it later.
You can use a 500gb drive if you have 320 or 500. It just has to be the same size or larger, but there is not much on the c: so 320 is plenty big.
BTW, is there a book on Server 2012 Essentials like MS has for the Standard edition? I have searched all over but can’t find any and was thinking of buying the Standard edition one just to get a deeper understanding of how this all works. Would that be helpful?
Well it is the same as Server 2012R2. The difference is the addition of the essentials role. I will check also but I am not sure if anyone has done a book that covers the role. You can find books for Home Server 2011. While not exactly the same as it is an older version of Essentials there are many similarities of how the dashboard, Remote Web Access, Client Backups, etc. work
As far as RAid, they are all similar with differences
