Possible to buy new usb key?

I have a long-standing friend with a medical practice who purchased a WD Sentinel DX4000. Unfortunately, he had his son set up the server and the password has been forgotten. Also, the son doesn’t remember where the USB key is, so they essentially own a very expensive door stop.
Does anyone know if they can provide proof of purchase with mode and serial numbers to HP that they can purchase a new USB key? As I understand from the literature that this is the ONLY way to reset the administrator password. They are very frustrated because they are stuck with no backup currently on 4 office machines and they contain critical files and records.
Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

from a pc on the lan open IE and surf to servername/connect if you run that wizard it will show the password hint and perhaps that will help.

How did they get data on the box if they did not know the password? I would recommend using a 3rd party radi recovery software if they have 3 or more drives in the box.

you create your own usb key with the downloaded iso. You want to do a recovery keeping data. It is supposed to work, though I have yet to actually try it as I keep backups

https://support.wdc.com/knowledgebase/answer.aspx?ID=16635

PS: Why would HP help you :slight_smile:

Perhaps I misread your post. The data is on the clients and you just want them backed up? If so you can just wipe and reload the server with the above link

Hi Gramps,
Thanks so much for the link. I’ll give it a try and you are right that their data has never been backed up before… The son just installed the server and left the rest to a busy surgeon (father) and an office staff that is not tech savvy. I usually fix their stuff (long standing friend) but health issues kept me from doing so.
It’s a 40 mile trip, so it may be a while before I can try your suggestion and report back?.
Thanks again,
Miaclockman

Have them ship you the box. You need to do this in your office as it is a time consuming process (sometimes)

That way you can fix it and break it several times to get the hang of it

Hi again, Gramps:

Since I didn’t initially set the box up in the office (and haven’t fully read the manual for initial setup), once I set it up wirelessly on my network at home, will I be able to change the configuration to his network in the office? I don’t want them to have to ship a very heavy box if I will have this problem. I am assuming that I WILL be able to reconfigure once recovered, but wanted to check since you seem to have very thorough knowledge on this device.
Thanks,
Jeff

No reason it should not move well. It is no different from a desktop in that sense. There is no domain and it uses DHCP out of the box… Does USPS have a box big enough for if it fits it ships? Whatever the cost to ship be less than the cost of you driving over and getting a hotel room :wink:

You could possibly do this from afar if they have an extra pc you could have access to and someone to plug in thumb drives

Gramps:

I finally got the Sentinel DX 4000 to my home and started the recovery process. I saw TWO Ethernet ports and thought that both had to be plugged into the network, so I disconnected my two network printers and used those connections. However, I didn’t realize that it would take 3million hours for the recovery process to format the drives. So, needing one of the printers, I disconnected one line. Then all of a sudden I got an error that the server could no longer recover since it was not connected to the network. Please start again.
HOWEVER, on the unit’s display, it still says “recovery started”. I attempted to restart the recovery software on my PC, but it said that it couldn’t find the server on the network AND it doesn’t show up on Windows Explorer (windows 7 pro).
I read in another post to change the registry settings, but the one that they show doesn’t exist. I’m guessing because it’s not installed on my PC - simply running from the Bluray drive.
Do I have to have TWO Ethernet ports connected? If not, I assume that I’ll have to start the recovery process over? Please help!
Thanks,
Jeff

Since it has failed you will have to start recovery over but you do not have to recreate the thumb drive. You only need one NIC and your PC must stay on and connected.

As someone said before in another post, you should be paid to work for WD!!! Thank you for your dedication and expertise! Thankfully, I started the server holding the reset button with the USB drive still inserted in the slot. The recover software immediately recognized the device and resumed the recovery process and was done in less than 2 hours. The next hurdle will be to drive up to Ft. Lauderdale and install it on site and put the backup software on all the office machines.

Last question: since I’m not familiar with the built-in backup software, do you recommend using it or buying a 3rd party product? I use Easus Todo Backup Workstation at home which gives the ability to set up the following:

  • Differential backups of documents and email weekly
  • Full backup of documents and email every month
  • Full System backup monthly which actually takes a “snapshot” of the entire computer so I can recover it if for some reason it crashes.

I don’t know if the W/D software is as flexible as that. In addition the Easus Todo product allows me to give the software permission to login to the workstation if it’s logged out and perform the backups without any user intervention.

Thanks again for your help - you are a lifesaver!

Jeff

The backup software is not very flexible. It just does a full image backup of up to 25 PC’s every night :slight_smile: You can restore files or folders or do full bare metal restore if a client pc hard drive crashes or gets hit with malware. You also have a calendar to pick the date you want to restore from. It is the finest backup solution I have ever seen for multiple PC’s Storagecraft makes one that is more flexible but is $100 a desktop and does not do Single Instance Storage of the backups.

You probably want to install this hotfix on the server before you start running the connector. You will also need to run windows updates on the clients after you install the connector.
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/2781274/a-hotfix-is-available-to-add-backup-support-for-uefi-based-computers-to-back-up-to-servers-that-are-running-windows-storage-server-2008-r2-essentials

Hi Gramps:

Hate to sound “thick”, but is this hotfix installed from a client computer? I don’t want anything associated or installed on my home network PCs, so can I wait until I get to the office in Ft. Lauderdale?
Also, they give instructions on how to UNINSTALL the hotfix, but not how to "INSTALL’. I’m assuming that this fix is installed on the server and not on each client computer. Please correct me if I’m wrong.
Sorry for all the questions, but this branch of networking is foreign to me. At home I have redundancy on my office PC internally (RAID 5) and the laptops back up to a WD My Book, so it’s a simple arrangement.
Thanks in advance,
Jeff

Also, when I clicked on the hotfix link, it shows TWO files, identically named, the only difference is the build number. There’s a warning that installing the wrong fix may damage the server. Should I contact Microsoft regarding this, or do you know the answer?

Sorry again for the million questions. I don’t want to screw up this guy’s server… they are a bit pricey

Jeff

never noticed that warning but it lies. They are both the same hotfix the second just has a bunch of language packs. Get the top one.
You have to remote desktop to the server to install it. From a client pc tap the windows key and type MSTSC and press enter
servername or ip
username is administrator and whatever the password is.
click ok/next on the yellow box that pops up