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I've got a DPM 2007 server with 4TB storage... and since it's DPM there are many, many volumes on the disks when you view disk manager.

I've copied over an ISO of Server 2008 R2 and run an upgrade install. When the server reboots the screen shows "Upgrading Windows..." and stays there for a long time. I left it for 16 hours. Then I rebooted it and it happily booted back into Storage Server 2003.

I remember that when I did an inplace upgrade of a Vista laptop to Win7 it "processed" disk 2 even though the OS was on disk 1. Although in that case user data was redirected to disk 2.

Plus this isn't (I don't think) a supported upgrade path - although the setup didn't complain.

So hivemind... Am I being impatient or am I trying an upgrade doomed to fail?

Thanks

Paul

Paul D'Ambra
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  • well, attempt number 2 is on 24 hours at "upgrading windows..." now and since I can build and recreate all the protection groups from scratch in less time than that I'm gonna say that supported or not this isn't a viable upgrade path (In this scenario:)). I'd still love to know if there is something going on in the background since I *could* set up per-server backups for a few days to let the upgrade complete but that would only be out of interest. – Paul D'Ambra Sep 17 '10 at 06:42

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I think I've got it... I've just rebooted and let it roll back to Server 2003. The DPM managed volumes didn't previously have drive letters but 22 of them now do A-z less X for boot, and A:(floppy),B:(reserved for floppy I think),C: (cd-rom).

I guess the windows upgrade is enumerating the drives and trying to add drive letters where there were none and there are more than 26 drives so it hangs.

Ho hum straight build it is.

Paul D'Ambra
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  • +1 Never 'upgrade' a windows server OS, always wipe and reload, replace or swing migrate ^^ – Oskar Duveborn Sep 17 '10 at 08:31
  • I have to admit I was loathe to upgrade but as it is the backup server I was interested in continuation of service. Having lived through 2 failed upgrades I now would have complete and utter heebie-jeebies every time I saw the server if I did manage to upgrade :) – Paul D'Ambra Sep 17 '10 at 09:04