System may not start when creating a large number of logical units and volumes (277222)

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If you want to be proactive because you believe that your server is at risk, use the procedure below to remove the registry entries for drives that have been physically removed.

A supported utility (the Scrubber utility) is now available from Microsoft, but it is only intended to correct the problem described in this article and should be applied only to systems experiencing this specific problem.

To resolve this problem, contact Microsoft Product Support Services to obtain the utility. For a complete list of Microsoft Product Support Services phone numbers and information on support costs, please go to the following address on the World Wide Web: The following instructions describe how to incorporate the Scrubber utility in a Windows 2000 environment by creating a shutdown script that checks the size of the SYSTEM hive. If the SYSTEM hive is over 8 megabytes (MB), the Scrubber utility deletes the removed drives and attempts to clean up the Dynamic disk database and compress any white space. The script does not remove any drives from the Dynamic disk database that were part of any type of RAID volume, including spanned volumes and striped volumes.

In addition, read the Readme.txt file that is contained in the utility package for a description of all of the files in the package. To create a shutdown script that checks the size of the SYSTEM hive:

1. Download the package and extract the contents to the SYSTEM partition in a folder named C:\Scrubber.
2. Click Start, and then click Run.
3. Type MMC, and then click OK.
4. On the Console menu, click Add/Remove Snap-in.
5. Click Add.
6. Click Group Policy in the snap-in list, and then click Add.
7. The Group Policy object defaults to "Local Computer;" click Finish.
8. Click Close, and then click OK.
9. Click the plus sign (+) in the left pane to expand the Local Computer Policy branch, and then expand the Windows Settings branch.
10. In the right pane, double-click the Shutdown policy
11. Click Add, and then click Browse.
12. Locate the C:\Scrubber folder, click the Cleanup.vbs file, and then click OK.
13. Click OK until you close the Shutdown Policy and close the MMC snap-in. You do not need to save the console settings for the script to run.
14. In Control Panel, double-click the System icon.
15. Click the Advanced tab, and then click Environment Variables.
16. Under System Variables, click the Path variable, and then click Edit.
17. Append the following text to the end of the variable:

    ;C:\SCRUBBER

18. Click OK for variables, and then click OK in System Properties.

With the shutdown script in place (Cleanup.vbs), if several drives fail and they are Dynamic disks, they are displayed in Disk Management as FAILED. You may need to right-click Disk Management, and then click Rescan Disks if the host bus adapter (HBA) does not use Plug and Play events if the drives are not reported immediately as FAILED. For more information about similar issues, click the following article numbers to view the articles in the Microsoft Knowledge Base: Windows Server 2003 increases the memory that is available at boot time so that the size of the System hive is not as relevant. For more information, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base: If you are using the /3GB switch in Windows Server 2003, the 16-MB limit still applies until Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1 (SP1) is available. Microsoft recommends that you create a second entry in the Boot.ini file that does not have the /3GB switch so that more memory is available.