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how to reinstall WHS, without losing server data?? RRS feed

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    I have been using WHS for many months, it has worked great.  Now, it locks after ~10 minutes of use,  I suspect I downloaded something that caused this problem.  I have a TB plus of data stored and of course I don't want to lose it.  I haven't done anything yet.
    I have run Spybot which found nothing abnormal and installed Avast for WHS which has not reported any issues.  Of course, the system locks so I don't know if Avast finished the search.
    My system hardware is dual core processor w/ 4GB of DDR2 memory.  Two internal SATA HD's and two external SATA HD's.  As I said, WHS has worked great until a few days ago.  I suspect something from the internet as I was surfing the internet and have had this problem ever since.
    Sunday, January 10, 2010 2:22 PM

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    You need to use the server reinstallation option in setup. This will preserve the data in your shares and (since you're not doing this because of a failed system disk) should also preserve your backup database. You will lose users (which can be recreated and will be reconnected with their individual user folders) and you'll have to re-join your home computers to the server. You'll also lose any add-ins (which will be in the appropriate folder for reinstallation) and other customizations made outside of the console (which you'll have to do over again).

    Server reinstallation relies on setup being able to find your drives. That means that you will need to make very sure you know how your drives are actually configured: SATA drives may usually be configured as either SATA/AHCI/RAID (most motherboards and controllers offer more than one option here), or IDE/ATA/Legacy (phrasing differs, but the idea is the same: the drives will appear to be IDE to the operating system). If your drives are configured as legacy, then you're probably using the built in drivers in Windows, which will load automatically with no action required on your part. If your drives are configured to use one of the more advanced modes, you will need to put appropriate drivers (possibly more than one set) on other media and supply them at the hardware detection screen (where your drives are listed at the beginning of setup). And if your system drive needs a driver for setup to see it, you will need to prepare an "F6 floppy" per the instructions in your motherboard or other disk controller manual. In this case, you will almost certainly need to use an actual floppy disk, in an actual floppy drive, as you will need to supply this driver again at the start of text mode setup, when the "Press F6" prompt appears at the bottom of the screen.

    Assuming you have all your drives visible in setup, you should proceed to the point where you're asked what kind of installation you want to perform. Choose the reinstallation or recovery option (phrasing differs depending on what media you have), not the "new installation" option, and proceed through the rest of setup, leaving the DVD in the drive until you reach the welcome screen.
    I'm not on the WHS team, I just post a lot. :)
    Sunday, January 10, 2010 3:06 PM
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    You need to use the server reinstallation option in setup. This will preserve the data in your shares and (since you're not doing this because of a failed system disk) should also preserve your backup database. You will lose users (which can be recreated and will be reconnected with their individual user folders) and you'll have to re-join your home computers to the server. You'll also lose any add-ins (which will be in the appropriate folder for reinstallation) and other customizations made outside of the console (which you'll have to do over again).

    Server reinstallation relies on setup being able to find your drives. That means that you will need to make very sure you know how your drives are actually configured: SATA drives may usually be configured as either SATA/AHCI/RAID (most motherboards and controllers offer more than one option here), or IDE/ATA/Legacy (phrasing differs, but the idea is the same: the drives will appear to be IDE to the operating system). If your drives are configured as legacy, then you're probably using the built in drivers in Windows, which will load automatically with no action required on your part. If your drives are configured to use one of the more advanced modes, you will need to put appropriate drivers (possibly more than one set) on other media and supply them at the hardware detection screen (where your drives are listed at the beginning of setup). And if your system drive needs a driver for setup to see it, you will need to prepare an "F6 floppy" per the instructions in your motherboard or other disk controller manual. In this case, you will almost certainly need to use an actual floppy disk, in an actual floppy drive, as you will need to supply this driver again at the start of text mode setup, when the "Press F6" prompt appears at the bottom of the screen.

    Assuming you have all your drives visible in setup, you should proceed to the point where you're asked what kind of installation you want to perform. Choose the reinstallation or recovery option (phrasing differs depending on what media you have), not the "new installation" option, and proceed through the rest of setup, leaving the DVD in the drive until you reach the welcome screen.
    I'm not on the WHS team, I just post a lot. :)
    Sunday, January 10, 2010 3:06 PM
    Moderator
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    Pray my friend.  Pray very hard.  I tried this and messed something up.  I ended up with an installation of Windows Server 2003 with no WHS features.  My hard drives were full of data but not recognized in the OS.  I had to start from scratch and it sucked, BAD.
    Wednesday, January 13, 2010 10:49 PM
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    Same here. I lost 7 terabytes of data.
    Thursday, January 14, 2010 12:00 AM
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    I suspect something from the internet as I was surfing the internet and have had this problem ever since.

    Did you surf the internet on the whs? Not good. The risk of something you download surfing on a client would affect the server OS is not that common. If you installed any add-ins, do you remember what you installed?

    This could also be a hardware issue. Personally, I'd recommend you start checking your RAM modules using memtest86+ found here: http://www.memtest.org/
    Also, this could be temperature related errors.
    Thursday, January 14, 2010 9:20 AM