So I made sure to read up on the proper ways to do a server restore. And the process worked like a charm until it asked me to insert the Software Installation disk (second disk). Here is my setup and procedure. Help would be greatly appreciated. pardon the length of the message. When I write these, I like to be extremely detailed and precise.

EX490 running fine but system drive is showing sign of age with lots of bad sector. So I wanted to replace it. Read up on a lot of posts on here that someone had great success with dropping in a WD RED 1TB without needing to do anything special. So that is what I did.

1) Powered down ex490.
2) swapped out sys drive with new WD RED
3) connect ex490 via LAN to Window XP pro laptop in safe mode with networking and wireless off.
4) popped in server restore disk.
5) put ex490 in recovery mode. (now I have a Sandisk 5 pay external still attached to the esata this whole time. Since I am doing a server Recovery, i thought it needs to have all the pool drives at restore to , well, restore correctly)
6) recovery software found server and spent the next 20 mins doing its magic.
7) Recovery success the dialog says on the laptop. Click Next to reboot server.
ex490 reboots. Has "breathing" aqua lights. All lights has pattern of dimming and brightening effect. ALL lights are aqua.
9) dialog on laptop says now I need to insert the software installation disk to install the connector

Now at this point, the ex490 and the laptop are still linked via LAN. So I insert the second disk, I briefly see the status that says "downloading connector software from hpserver 0%"
and then boom. Error....some generic error like "there was an error and can't complete at this time. try again later"

So I thought maybe I need to unlink the laptop and server and just put server back on my broader network. So I did. Ex490 now on network via my LAN connector on router

Laptop on LAN and I fired up the software installation disk again. This time, it got to where it installed the connector, asked what I want to name my server, created the admin password. Then boom. Same generic error like above.

At this point, no amount of reboot of ex490 or laptop or direct connect again could get pass that error. Tried a Window 7 64 bit laptop and got same error. I can RDP in but the Console won't load and I don't see any of the shared folders.

When I thought "the heck with this", I swapped out the sys drive and rebooted with the old one that was running fine, thinking it should just just come right back up. I was wrong. Blink health light.

Where did i mess up????

_________________
EX470 w/ 2GB RAM + TR4M: 4.5TB
EX490 w/ e7500 + TR5M: 9TB

I assume the error was something like step 3 of 4 failed?
I usually have that issue if the drive was pre-formatted like testing on a desktop. Or one that was used as a system drive on the server.
So I usually pop it in my desktop and remove all partitions so it looks brand new to the server before I begin a recovery or reset.

The only odd item I see is xp in safe mode so that may have caused the first time to fail.
Safe mode disables a lot of drivers so one may have been needed.

Also no need to disable anything if you plug the utp cable directly into the laptop.

Last but most important is the data still there?
I would be concerned it is still intact and also would be concerned a third attempt will delete the data.
You may have lost what are called tombstones due to multiple unsuccessful attempts.
Because it sounds like the recover was complete but the connector failed.

I know you don't want to hear this but I would yank all pool drives.
Test them for data by connection to the laptop.
Turn on view hidden files and folders.
And see if you still have data.
If you do great. At least you can copy them back to the server one drive at a time.

I then would start over without any pool drives.
Connect the new system drive to the laptop run chkdsk to see if the drive is bad,then wipe it with disk management of drive c and d.
Put it back in the server
Start recovery or reset. At this point it will not matter.

Now the pain.
Once it is running and setup.
Create your share folders and assign a user to them for full access like yourself.
You may want to reboot at this point so you have full access rights to the folders.

connect a pool drive to the laptop then copy over your share files.
When the first drive is done add that drive to the pool and format.
Rinse and repeat for all the other drives.
The hard part will be having existing free space to start with

_________________
VGA/PS2 Keyboard/PS2 Mouse/Serial debug board
Popcorn C-200
Popcorn A-200
Dune HD Connect
Rasberry PI OSMC(KODI)
ReadyNAS RN316
Amazon FireStick
Amazon ECHO
AnyDvD
MyMovies

Thank you for the pointers! The reason I put it in safe mode was from some of the suggestions that it will eliminate firewall and anti-virus programs interfering with the restore process.

The data is prob still on those pool drives since I only did a restore. I do not have data on the system drive. So with the brand new RED 1TB, I simply popped it in and do a restore. It should be reading the data off the pool drives to rebuild the tombstones.

I am just baffled at the second part. I will take the RED out and format it, removing all partitions and retry without going into safe mode and see if the installation of the connector will succeed.

If not I will just say screw it and do a factory reset. A copy of my data is on a new synology ds1512+ so that's why I am willing to mess with the ex490.

I guess I just assumed if I stick the old sys drive back it, it would be non the wiser and fire back up as if nothing happened. So I am baffled at why it didn't. Hmmm


DCT

_________________
EX470 w/ 2GB RAM + TR4M: 4.5TB
EX490 w/ e7500 + TR5M: 9TB

Don't ya just hate it when a recovery goes bad, I have had it happen a time or two.
It sounds like ya got to the part where it wanted to go out on the internet and get updates and couldn't. Did you have the server and recovery pc direct connected?
That is what I do, direct connect and when the server gets to the point where it is PULSING, I switch it back to the lan reboot it and then start the software install. That way it has internet access.

Mine is a x510 (same hardware as yours) I have a 1tb red for system and two 2tb reds for the pool drives, no problems.

I would format that 1tb drive and try again, some times it just takes a couple tries.

P.S. I have found that at each step where it wants you to do something, like click ok or click reboot, I give it like 30 seconds to finish writing data, I have found if ya get speed clickin it can cause problems.
Good luck

_________________
[X510 CPU/RAM/All 2 TB Red's] [X510 CPU/Sync'ed Backup/All 2 TB Hitachi's]
[X510 /2 in box]
[X710 LIAN LI DIY W2016E] Stablebit Drivepool [EX-503 LIAN LI 5-bay USB3 External]
Fear the Cloud

Alright. So after about 5 times of trying to restore. I think I am about to give Factory Reset a try before I take this thing back in the backyard and go at it with a baseball bat Office Space style.

I have no trouble getting THROUGH the actual restore process (using the Server Recovery Disk). It found the server, lays the OS on it. The problem comes on the second half when I need to install the Connector.

I have tried leaving the ex490 direct connect to laptop. No dice. Half of the times, it can't find the server. Other half, it actually FOUND the server, downloads the software from HPserver and I can get as far as assigning the server a name and password. And then it craps out.

I tried putting the ex490 on LAN (once I get the pulsing aqua lights) so it can get to the internet and does whatever it needs. Again, sometimes, I get to assign the name and password. Other times, I can't find the server at all from my laptop that is now on the same network via LAN.

Each time it does crapped out, I can RDP into it using the password I just gave it. I can't bring up the Console becasue it says the Computer backup service isn't running. If i try to start that service manually, it just stops again.

Again, I didn't think the restore process touches any other pool drives. SO I am wonder why why can't I stick the ORIGINAL WORKING SYSTEM drive back in. With the original drive back in, it just won't boot, flashing health light with no drive lights.

I also have a EX470 and it is solid as a rock. I hate to abandon this thing. With the process upgrade, it can run circles around my new Synology DS1512+. But damn, I am spending more time trying to get this to work than actually using the thing lately.


DCT

_________________
EX470 w/ 2GB RAM + TR4M: 4.5TB
EX490 w/ e7500 + TR5M: 9TB

Before you started the recovery process did you verify or confirm the storage pool drives were in good working order. WHS is sensitive to hard drive issues and more so when performing recoveries which for me has always been a last resort as I have never found the process to be an enjoyable one. What use to take an hour or two now takes a rather long time because of updates that need to be downloaded and installed. The console issue you mention because the backup service is not running maybe the result of the storage pool drives being seen by the server or the server is still rebuilding the storage pool.

You may want to allow the server to run a bit to allow it time to finish anything it may be busy doing. Since you can make an RDP Connection to the server you can also check the task manager to see what the server might be doing but I would allow it to run its course for a 24 hr period to see if the situation improves. You may also want to disable for the time being the Twonky Media Server to keep it from hogging system resources. You can always turn it back on later but do this from Computer Management.

_________________
Exploring the possibilities!

Migrated from WHS2011 to WS2012E: HIGHLANDER

~ Norco 4220 Enclosure
~ Gigabyte GA-990FXA-UD5
~ AMD Phenom II X4 995 3.2 GHz
~ 8 GB Corsair Vengeance DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800)
~ 3 Supermicro AOC-SASLP-MV8

One other note when performing a restore or recovery.
Since there are several updates for whsv1
Some of them are the connector software and will need to be re-installed on the clients.
I think there are two. And I believe they come from HP not MS.
So just another reason to let the server settle in with updates and then install the connector software again.
Instead of possibly three times.

_________________
VGA/PS2 Keyboard/PS2 Mouse/Serial debug board
Popcorn C-200
Popcorn A-200
Dune HD Connect
Rasberry PI OSMC(KODI)
ReadyNAS RN316
Amazon FireStick
Amazon ECHO
AnyDvD
MyMovies

Well I gave this 2 more shots and I guess I just wasn't having much luck.

I know before I took on this adventurous project, I made sure the pool drives were in great shape. So after a while of trying the restore, I just had one of those f@#$ it moment and went with a factory reset, which was successful on the first try. Now I suspect maybe it WAS indeed a bad pool drive. But SMART and scans said all drives were healthy. Oh well.

The idea of the connetor update was probably worth a shot but I had already gone with the factory reset by then.

I was one of the few to jump on the EX470 wagon fast and hard. Got an EX490 and as I said before, the hardware upgrades on my 490 would run circles around my new DS1512+. I made hard sells to my friends to get the EX490. But man, in the last few years, they have had all sorts of trouble with disk issues that causes the server to just not boot or be responsive. And I would talk them through the restore process after reading through all the fine detailed advice and pointers from THIS awesome forum. And they all struggled with it. I thought it must had been operator error. But now that I went through one of these restore myself, I am not so sure anymore.

It does look like my days with the EX4xx are numbered. I have an aging 470 that I use as "off site" backup (it is in a different room lol, i know i know). I have a freshly factory reset 490 that is running smoothly with duplications turned off and serves as the primary backup to my DS1512+, and will do so until the 490 dies, at which point I will probably leave the WHS universe for good.

Many thanks to you all for the great tips and info. I might have jumped the gun on the factory reset but I just didn't want to spent more weekends on it.


DCT

_________________
EX470 w/ 2GB RAM + TR4M: 4.5TB
EX490 w/ e7500 + TR5M: 9TB

HomeServerSMART only verified the hardware of the hard drive is in good condition but the File System is another story and so if its not up to par then recoveries can be a real pain. Simply put a CHKDSK will correct or attempt to correct any issues with the file system or simply it will just inform you the drive is in good condition.

While there are times when a recovery is necessary its always my last resort and should I opt to perform one with WHSv1 I always take the time to verify the hard drives are in good working order both with HSS and CHKDSK. Fortunately all my WHSv1 server have 6 or less drives to worry about.

WHS2011 and WS2012 depending on how you set them up is more forgiving when it comes to drive issues particularly if you use Stablebit Drive Pool.

_________________
Exploring the possibilities!

Migrated from WHS2011 to WS2012E: HIGHLANDER

~ Norco 4220 Enclosure
~ Gigabyte GA-990FXA-UD5
~ AMD Phenom II X4 995 3.2 GHz
~ 8 GB Corsair Vengeance DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800)
~ 3 Supermicro AOC-SASLP-MV8

I hate to say it, but it really sound like you did a factory reset and not a recovery. That would explain why the reboot/pulsing/connector reinstall/ and no shares or data. It sounds like a reset.
Thank goodness you had a backup, I am with Comp1962, recovery has never really worked the couple times I tried it, so I do a non - pooled drive backups and factory reset then a data copy back.
Which sounds like where your at.
But again as Comp1962 said, I would be checking all those drives to make sure they are good before rebuilding the whole thing again. Might save ya some time.
If you reload/recopy and then find another bad drive, you will be right back where you started.

These systems are really awesome and trouble free, if:
You have the FREE Smart addin to keep and eye on the drives.
Keep them clean and dust bunny free.
And as you did, always have at least one backup, two is better.
Always have a spare drive handy when you need a replacement.
Big difference between reset and recovery.

I know it doesn't seem very friendly right now, but I would not give mine up for nothing.
Better luck your almost there....

_________________
[X510 CPU/RAM/All 2 TB Red's] [X510 CPU/Sync'ed Backup/All 2 TB Hitachi's]
[X510 /2 in box]
[X710 LIAN LI DIY W2016E] Stablebit Drivepool [EX-503 LIAN LI 5-bay USB3 External]
Fear the Cloud

HI...I've been trying to recover my EX490 today and after several attempts I've managed to successfully run the recover program, twice...the EX490 doesn't reboot though! The health light (far right) has stopped flashing aqua and violet and is now just flashing aqua. After the first time...I installed the WHS Connector but it wouldn't find the server (connected directly by ethernet) so I powered down and manually restarted the server and reached a flashing red health light. Hence I'm back, after several additional attempts, to the flashing blue health light after recovery and wondering if I leave it a few hours it might get round to rebooting? Any thoughts? Thanks.