Hi Nick,
What error is recorded in the mssql errorlog upon attempting to startup the databases following a reboot? Is there anything recorded in the system/app even logs?
|||The error log states Cannot find E:\%PATH to SAN%|||Hi
That error may due to SAN storage is not ready at start of Server booting.
Be sure that SAN storage is powered before start of Server.
Review /test SAN configuration.
Thanks
|||Lefthand Networks SANs are iSCSI, so you should check the start order of the services/drivers.
If SQL tries to start before the iSCSI service is running, you won't be able to access the disks.
Within Service Control Manager, you can add a dependency between SQL and iSCSI so that SQL won't start until iSCSI is up and running.
|||Nick,
We have seen this frequently on our SQL Server instances connected to our Lefthand SAN. In every instance of the problem, restarting the SQL Server instance/service after the boot had completed fixed the problem (rather than going through and manually attaching each database). As others have mentioned in replies, it is just a matter of the SAN Volumes not getting finished mounting before SQL Server tries to bring the databases online.
|||Have you found anyway to automate this? Generally @. server reboot the building is unnocupied. Do to the fact that this is connected to live traffic lights the server really cannot be restarted during normal work hours.
edit - the dependancies are already set. I do believe that it is starting the services in order but taking into effect drive spinup and initialization...i think the SQL service is beating it to the punch....anyway to make the SQL service start dead last?
|||No, I haven't tried to automate the restart of SQL Server after the failure.
If you're up to modifying registry settings, you could try to modify the service start order using ServiceGroupOrder settings to try and get SQL Server to start dead last. Here are some links that talk about it:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/115486
http://download.sysinternals.com/Files/WindowsInternals-Chapter4.pdf
