Forum Crash

[VersysRider]

As most know by now the MSTA Forums has suffered from an irrecoverable crash. All data has been lost and now we start over. My hope is the original database will be recovered from my laptops hard drive, if this happens we will be able to import the data into this system.

You will need to register a new forum account! I apologize for the inconvenience.

It will take a few weeks to bring the forum up to speed. Please use what is available to it's fullest extent. Now is the time to make suggestions for new forums and layout improvements. I have changed the forum software to a previous version of vBulletin. This is a stable version with few updates, so less problems are expected.

Also, database back-ups are being handled differently. They are now stored in 3 different places. Hopefully this will keep the "perfect storm" scenario from occurring again.

[Woof]

Is it a problem with your laptop's hard drive?

If so, have you tried SpinRite http://www.grc.com/sr/spinrite.htm? I've had good luck with it.

[wingland]

Thanks for standing this back up so quickly! I like the new basic layout; I think simple is good for getting people engaged.

[ST1100]

Thanks Jon for recovering the site so quickly.

[stlthmsta]

Jon is the MAN!!......again. I couldn't post apicture and he sorts of the mess evey time. Thanks Dude!! :D

[bcd]

Jon, sorry you're having to go through this. I know how you feel, I've been there.

You do a great job. Hang in there.

[dlogston]

As most know by now the MSTA Forums has suffered from an irrecoverable crash.
Jay - am I safe in assuming that the member profiles are gone as well?

Doug L.

[VersysRider]

Jay - am I safe in assuming that the member profiles are gone as well?

Doug L.
Some of them were moved to ridemsta.com, so those are still there. The ones I hadn't moved are gone.

[OldButNotDead]

Great recovery Jon. Been there before, it ain't fun. Love the new look too.

[STDocLizard1]

Back in the saddle again................. just registered.

[Raycad]

Jon, I feel terribly sorry for you after this serious bad luck.... But all the hours and efforts you've invested to create, maintain and improve this forum won't be forgotten....

Ray

[RIDEMYST]

I'm back in! Ignore my password request I just didn't read the directions...duh! -JEP-

[RIDEMYST]

It just came to me, I guess we lost all of our photo archives too...?? :eek:
I have backups of all of the past STAR's but wow that's going to be a bunch of work! -JEP-

[dpippin]

Jon

I know you must be very busy putting the forum back together however I'd like to request you add one item.

Mark Forums Read

That way users can get rid of posts they don't want to read and it will be easier to navigate on the forum with the posts you're interested in.

thnks
Doug

[VersysRider]

Jon

I know you must be very busy putting the forum back together however I'd like to request you add one item.

Mark Forums Read

That way users can get rid of posts they don't want to read and it will be easier to navigate on the forum with the posts you're interested in.

thnks
Doug

Scroll to the bottom of the forum listings, you will see a link that says Mark Forums Read, right next to a link that says View Forum Leaders.

[dpippin]

Scroll to the bottom of the forum listings, you will see a link that says Mark Forums Read, right next to a link that says View Forum Leaders.

Jon

Thanks for the quick reply
FYI there is no link at the bottom as you described.
However after poking around a bit I found the "Mark Forums Read" in the drop down "Quick Link" box at the top of the form page.

Doug

[VersysRider]

Jon

Thanks for the quick reply
FYI there is no link at the bottom as you described.
However after poking around a bit I found the "Mark Forums Read" in the drop down "Quick Link" box at the top of the form page.

Doug
I assure you that there is a link. it's in the blue bar where the forum listings end....But the drop down works just the same.

[skyway_rider]

Thanks for all the hard work Jon!

[marconbass]

Thanks for all of your hard work on this Jon.
Once you get a "Members Only" area up and running, will I need to be reactivated for that again?

[VersysRider]

Thanks for all of your hard work on this Jon.
Once you get a "Members Only" area up and running, will I need to be reactivated for that again?
Yes, we lost all of that info too, at least on the forum end. It may be a bit before I tackle the member's only stuff though...

[DirtFlier]

Jay,

Wow...you got it back up and running so quickly! All of us computer illiterates really appreciate your hard work!

Tosh (aka DirtFlier)

[Brick]

Thank You so very much for the quick work! I can't imagine how much time you put into this! Thank You a thousand times!! (or more even!!) :)

[fz1grl]

Jon

Thanks for the quick reply
FYI there is no link at the bottom as you described.
However after poking around a bit I found the "Mark Forums Read" in the drop down "Quick Link" box at the top of the form page.

Doug

I know it's a moot point now that you've found the Quick Link box but what Jon was talking about is on the main MSTA Forum page just after the Admin Corner forums and before the Wha't Going On area..

There is usually several ways to do just about anything it's just finding one that we'll remember.

BTW Thanks Jon for all the hard work - You rock!!!!

[dpippin]

I know it's a moot point now that you've found the Quick Link box but what Jon was talking about is on the main MSTA Forum page just after the Admin Corner forums and before the Wha't Going On area..

There is usually several ways to do just about anything it's just finding one that we'll remember.

BTW Thanks Jon for all the hard work - You rock!!!!

Thanks for the explanation.
Navigating back to the main MSTA Forum page and scrolling down the page I can mark forums read.

It's a lot quicker to use the Quick Link while on the page you're using.
However the Mark Forums Read in the quick link box creates an error message.

http://i292.photobucket.com/albums/mm3/ldpippin/Etowah/oneMedium.jpg

http://s292.photobucket.com/albums/mm3/ldpippin/Etowah/

http://i292.photobucket.com/albums/mm3/ldpippin/Etowah/ErrormessageMedium.jpg

[Bufalojump]

Thanks for the hard work and dedication to getting us up and running. Sorry for all the misfortune last week.

We in Michigan suspect Ian Orr had something to do with the luck involved.

Regards,
Steve

[Brick]

So far this version of the Forum seems to be much simpler than the old one... I say that in this case Simple is GREAT! I know many who did not use it because it was NOT simple.

Thanks again and this is just my $.02 worth

[Landon]

Can we have a dual sport or off road section? I have always thought its hard to determine if any of the events offer dual sport rides. I don't know the best way to organize or show that they do, but we need something IMHO.

[GSRider2Up]

I'm going out on the limb here. I assume forum going down was some sort of drive failure. If so, almost all drives can be recovered at some level. Have we sent the failing drive(s) in to a reputable drive recovery firm? I think there is a good deal of data out there that is worth recovery.

[NinjaBob]

I'm going out on the limb here. I assume forum going down was some sort of drive failure. If so, almost all drives can be recovered at some level. Have we sent the failing drive(s) in to a reputable drive recovery firm? I think there is a good deal of data out there that is worth recovery.
I agree but that would take money and require approval by the EC. But the EC do not seem to be frequent forum users.

[GSRider2Up]

I agree but that would take money and require approval by the EC. But the EC do not seem to be frequent forum users.

I had already offered $25 towards a club collection to recover the data

[TN2Wheeler]

I had already offered $25 towards a club collection to recover the data

I'll do that too. If you can get EC support, I'll give $25 to help pay for data recovery.

[VersysRider]

It will cost upwards of $1000 to recover the data, from a drive that was part of my personal computer. There is also no guarantee that the data I need can be extracted. The hard drive was looked at and it suffered a mechanical failure partially due to heat. The media in the drive was damaged, so data recovery would be hit or miss.

My conclusion is the expense exceeds the real need to recover the data. Yes, I too wish we could recover it, but there was nothing critical to the day to day MSTA activities associated with the data we lost.

There are now 3 back-ups of the forum/website and other server software. One on the server, one on my laptop hard drive and one on an external hard drive. Hopefully that is enough to protect the data in the future.

Why do we not have a complete nightly server back-up? $1.50 per gigabyte per month is why. Currently the is about 135 GB of data on the drive, so current costs would be $202.50 per month for a back-up. This cost will only climb each month as more data is stored on the server.

[GSRider2Up]

It will cost upwards of $1000 to recover the data, from a drive that was part of my personal computer. There is also no guarantee that the data I need can be extracted. The hard drive was looked at and it suffered a mechanical failure partially due to heat. The media in the drive was damaged, so data recovery would be hit or miss.

My conclusion is the expense exceeds the real need to recover the data. Yes, I too wish we could recover it, but there was nothing critical to the day to day MSTA activities associated with the data we lost.

There are now 3 back-ups of the forum/website and other server software. One on the server, one on my laptop hard drive and one on an external hard drive. Hopefully that is enough to protect the data in the future.

Why do we not have a complete nightly server back-up? $1.50 per gigabyte per month is why. Currently the is about 135 GB of data on the drive, so current costs would be $202.50 per month for a back-up. This cost will only climb each month as more data is stored on the server.

- What about the drives on the server?
- Many data recovery companies offer free diagnostics and will tell us what data can be recovered and what it might cost.

[roadPilot]

Hit me up if you need anything, Jon.

[stevegrab]

It will cost upwards of $1000 to recover the data, from a drive that was part of my personal computer. There is also no guarantee that the data I need can be extracted. The hard drive was looked at and it suffered a mechanical failure partially due to heat. The media in the drive was damaged, so data recovery would be hit or miss.

My conclusion is the expense exceeds the real need to recover the data. Yes, I too wish we could recover it, but there was nothing critical to the day to day MSTA activities associated with the data we lost.

There are now 3 back-ups of the forum/website and other server software. One on the server, one on my laptop hard drive and one on an external hard drive. Hopefully that is enough to protect the data in the future.

Why do we not have a complete nightly server back-up? $1.50 per gigabyte per month is why. Currently the is about 135 GB of data on the drive, so current costs would be $202.50 per month for a back-up. This cost will only climb each month as more data is stored on the server.

That's a great backup plan. And you're right on the data recovery, while there was lots of "valuable information" on the forum, nothing is critical. With a high cost and potentially low success rate it isn't really worth it.

I know its been said many times, but bears repeating...
THANKS!

[Brick]

Damn... I wish I could remember what my lifetime mileage is that I had figured out and posted... ??? I should have put it somewhere else.

Oh well... I think it was somewhere over 600,000 miles??

[stevegrab]

Damn... I wish I could remember what my lifetime mileage is that I had figured out and posted... ??? I should have put it somewhere else.

Oh well... I think it was somewhere over 600,000 miles??

WOW!

I had figured mine out recently based on the limited number of bikes I owned, and the mileage I had ridden on each.

Figure it out again while you still can, the memory isn't going to get better;)

600K sounds believable, I've got about 120K in 14 years riding. You've probably been racking up more miles/year and riding for what 30-40 years?

[RIDEMYST]

Jay - If you are setting priorities on our way to recover, I may have missed it, you might want to add the ability to upload GDB files so upcoming event coordinators can attach their GPS routes. -JEP-

[Brick]

Steve,
Yes, I suppose you are right... now what were we talking about?? ;)

Yes, I started riding my own bikes in 1970 = 41 years... it would have been sooner but Mom said... no bikes while you live under my roof. Then the USAF and I got one the last year in the USAF. Never been without one since. Now I have 4. :D


WOW!

I had figured mine out recently based on the limited number of bikes I owned, and the mileage I had ridden on each.

Figure it out again while you still can, the memory isn't going to get better;)

600K sounds believable, I've got about 120K in 14 years riding. You've probably been racking up more miles/year and riding for what 30-40 years?

[indypup]

Can we have a dual sport or off road section? I have always thought its hard to determine if any of the events offer dual sport rides. I don't know the best way to organize or show that they do, but we need something IMHO.

+1 :rolleyes:

[indypup]

It will cost upwards of $1000 to recover the data, from a drive that was part of my personal computer. There is also no guarantee that the data I need can be extracted. The hard drive was looked at and it suffered a mechanical failure partially due to heat. The media in the drive was damaged, so data recovery would be hit or miss.

My conclusion is the expense exceeds the real need to recover the data. Yes, I too wish we could recover it, but there was nothing critical to the day to day MSTA activities associated with the data we lost.

There are now 3 back-ups of the forum/website and other server software. One on the server, one on my laptop hard drive and one on an external hard drive. Hopefully that is enough to protect the data in the future.

Why do we not have a complete nightly server back-up? $1.50 per gigabyte per month is why. Currently the is about 135 GB of data on the drive, so current costs would be $202.50 per month for a back-up. This cost will only climb each month as more data is stored on the server.

Jon, I had a drive go bad recently and had to use Kroll Ontrack (http://www.krollontrack.com/data-recovery/) to recover the data. They still have the drive and it's been about a month now. They told me it would cost anywhere from $700 to $2000 to recover the data if they could. The last status update they gave me was that parts were on order. I'm still hoping they can recover the data. Since it's been so long I'm sure I'm looking at 2K range now. :(

[Brick]

Damn, I'm glad there isn't anything on my computer that I would spend $2,000 to recover... :eek:


Jon, I had a drive go bad recently and had to use Kroll Ontrack (http://www.krollontrack.com/data-recovery/) to recover the data. They still have the drive and it's been about a month now. They told me it would cost anywhere from $700 to $2000 to recover the data if they could. The last status update they gave me was that parts were on order. I'm still hoping they can recover the data. Since it's been so long I'm sure I'm looking at 2K range now. :(

[indypup]

Damn, I'm glad there isn't anything on my computer that I would spend $2,000 to recover... :eek:

Well I'm only out $65 for now but they are still working on it.

The deal with my drive was this...

I bought a 2TB USB3 Seagate external drive from Sam’s club to use to consolidate some data on my home computer and the damn thing failed a day after getting it. I moved my data to it and then rebuilt the original drive(s) by doing the factory restore on it or formatting. I then went to move everything back and noticed that the external drive doesn’t show up in my computers. I tried the drive on a different system and it doesn’t work. I noticed that it makes clicking sounds about 4 or 5 times when you first plug it in and then stops spinning.

[GSRider2Up]

I keep all our finances, health and all family records on our PC for the past 20 years. I rotate 3 external hard drives with different backup software on each and keep 1 in the safe at all times. I couldn't imagine losing all that data. Saw way too many customers faces that lost their data! :-(