Foreign Physical Disk Refers to Native Physical Disk

What Caused the Problem?

The configuration information of a foreign disk group refers to a native physical disk as its member; however, the configuration information of the native physical disk indicates otherwise. Each foreign physical disk in the foreign disk group will report this problem in the Summary area. The Recovery Guru Details area provides specific information you will need as you follow the recovery steps.

Caution: Electronic discharge can damage sensitive components. Always use proper antistatic protection when handling components. Touching components without using a proper ground may damage the equipment.

Important Notes

To resolve this problem, you can either initialize the foreign physical disk in this storage array (erasing all data) or you can insert it into a different storage array to fix the problem (retaining the data). The recovery action that you select below should be the same for every one of the physical disks that are reporting this problem in the Summary area. The recovery action needs to be the same because the separate problems could involve physical disks from the same foreign disk group.
Do not click the Recheck button until instructed to do so. Otherwise, additional problems might be reported in the Summary area.
You can remove the physical disk while the storage array is receiving I/O.

Recovery Steps

If...	Then...
You want to retain the disk group data for the physical disk listed in the Details area	Important Notes: You must have an alternate storage array that is running the same revision of firmware or later than this storage array to proceed with this option. The alternate storage array can be the original source storage array of the disk group or any other storage array that meets the firmware requirements. You should save and print these Recovery Steps because some of the steps involve actions that you will take on the alternate storage array. If you have an appropriate alternate storage array, go to the Repair the Disk Group section, below.
You do NOT want to retain the disk group data for the physical disk listed in the Details area	Important Note: This option will erase all data contained on the physical disks! If you are sure you want to erase all data on these physical disks, go to the Initialize the Physical Disks section, below.

Repair the Disk Group

Refer to the Details area to find which physical disk slot is reporting the problem. In addition, refer to the Summary area to see if there are other physical disks that are reporting this same problem.

Remove all of the physical disks from this storage array that are reporting this problem.

Insert the physical disks into the alternate storage array.

Complete the following steps using the storage management software on the ALTERNATE storage array:

a	When all of the physical disks are spun up and recognized, a Contingent disk group should appear in the Disk Groups and Virtual Disks dialog. You may see more than one Contingent disk groups if the physical disks you just inserted were members of different disk groups. From the Support tab, click the Advanced Support Tasks link, click the Import Disk Group link, and then select the Contingent disk group.
b	Follow the instructions in the Import Disk Group dialog to properly import the disk group into the storage array. Note: You will need to use the FORCE option since this disk group is missing a physical disk.
c	After the storage array completes the import process, the disk group transitions to a Partially Complete Disk Group state since it is missing a physical disk. From the Support tab, click the Recovery From Failure link, and then select the "Partially Complete Disk Group" problem in the Summary area. Complete the Recovery Steps for this problem to transition the disk group to an Optimal state. Note: Choose the option in the Recovery Steps that explains how to replace the missing physical disk using the Replace Physical Disks dialog.
e	From the Support tab, click the Advanced Support Tasks link, and then click the Export Disk Group link.
f	Follow the instructions in the Export Disk Group dialog to properly export the disk group from the storage array.

If applicable, repeat step 4 for each additional disk group that appeared as a result of inserting the physical disks in step 3.

Remove the physical disks from the Exported Disk Group(s), and insert them back into this storage array.

Import any new disk groups that appear in the Logical view by using the Import Disk Group task.

Click Recheck to rerun the Recovery Guru. The failure should no longer appear in the Summary area. If the failure appears again, contact your technical support representative.

Initialize the Physical Disks

1	Refer to the Details area to find which physical disk slot is reporting the problem. In addition, refer to the Summary area to see if there are other physical disks that are reporting this same problem.
2	Open a Command Prompt, and type the following command: `SMcli -n <storageArray_name>;` where storageArray_name is the name of the storage array listed in the Details area. Note: If you receive an error from this command, change your working directory to the directory that contains the SMcli executable.
3	Execute the following command in order to initialize the physical disk: `start physicalDisk [enclosure_ID,slot_ID] initialize;` where enclosure_id is the enclosure ID for the enclosure where the physical disk resides and slot_ID is the slot position within the enclosure. This is the physical disk that is shown in the Details area. Note: The commands above are case-sensitive, and must be entered exactly as shown. When the initialization completes, the physical disk will be an Optimal, Unassigned physical disk.
4	Repeat steps 1 through 3 for each additional physical disk that is reporting this problem in the Summary area. When you have initialized all of the physical disks, go to step 5.
5	Click Recheck to rerun the Recovery Guru. The failure should no longer appear in the Summary area. If the failure appears again, contact your technical support representative.

Note: Additional information on this issue may be available. Please visit the Dell support website at support.dell.com and select your product model. Choose "troubleshooting" as your tool option, then search by this procedure title.