Re: General advice needed : rebuilding server
Hi Jo
On 23/06/06, Jo Shields ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote:
> Rory Campbell-Lange wrote:
> >- a RAID card problem, possibly heat related
> >- an out-of-control daemon
> > apcupsd? samba? netatalk?
> >- a kernel problem
> > wrong kernel architecture, buggy kernel implementation by 3Ware
> >- cracker or newbie sysadmin killing /boot and /var
> What file system are you using for /boot and /var themselves?
We used ext3 for all of the file systems.
...
> >I encountered a major snag. All the amd64 repositories were offline or
> >only had partial contents. In the end I wasn't able to rebuild the
> >server this way (or install a new kernel) due to missing testing
> >repositories.
> Testing isn't missing. Debian has AMD64 testing, on any standard Debian
> mirror. What's missing is the obsolete unofficial Debian-AMD64 Project's
> clone of Testing. Use a real Debian mirror if Testing is what you want.
> See http://wiki.debian.org/DebianAMD64MirrorMove
Oh right! http://amd64.debian.net/README.mirrors.html appears to be out
of date in that case. I stupidly didn't try the straightforward
deb http://ftp.uk.debian.org/debian testing main
syntax.
Many thanks for your reply.
Rory
--
Rory Campbell-Lange
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General advice needed : rebuilding server
Dear All This is going to be a long email about various issues. Some are management issues rather than 64bit issues exactly, but I thought that I would post a full narrative in the hope that people would comment on parts of it. The Server -- We installed a new dual 2.GHz Xeon (1 MB Cache) 2U fileserver with a S5350-1 U Dual Opteron Motherboard, 2GB RAM and AMCC/3Ware 9500S-8 SATA RAID Controller at the beginning of the year. I had initial problems finding an installer to support the new 3Ware card -- I had to use the stable image prepared by 3Ware itself (viewable here http://www.3ware.com/support/OS-support.asp), and chose the amd64 generic version. 4 250GB SATA disks were arranged, for cost reasons, in a single RAID5 array. The main file shares are running on LVM2 volumes. A very minimalistic server environment was installed using Debian testing (amd64). No X or other unnecessary packages were installed. Running daemons were mainly apcupsd (battery daemon) samba netatalk (mac fileshareing daemon) exim4 (light version) portmapper (resolving only on loopback address) sshd The Problem --- The server has been running very well, although we have noticed the RAID card battery complaining of high temperatures. We have been pressing the client to install air conditioning. Yesterday some samba users could not log in and a technician from our office arrived on site to find that /boot and /var on the server were empty. Resorting to 'dmesg' in the absence of log files we found little of interest. I didn't have the 3ware raid utilities on the machine and didn't investigate the RAID array (although later on reboot is showed all ok -- I didn't run a full verify though). Thinking this might be a crack we reset all the passwords on the firewalls and other server machines. It seems unlikely to be a crack as an intruder would have had to go through 2 other machines to get to the fileserver. Simple forensics (running chkrootkit, looking at /var/log/auth.log, lsof, ps etc after reinstalling these) did not show up any problems. This leaves the chance that someone removed /boot and /var from the console. This is very unlikely considering our clients' office environment, although it could have been a newbie sysadmin. Current theses for the Problem: - a RAID card problem, possibly heat related - an out-of-control daemon apcupsd? samba? netatalk? - a kernel problem wrong kernel architecture, buggy kernel implementation by 3Ware - cracker or newbie sysadmin killing /boot and /var Resuscitation - I was able to fairly quickly get a working apt together and decided to reinstall all the critical packages so that /var would be populated properly. I encountered a major snag. All the amd64 repositories were offline or only had partial contents. In the end I wasn't able to rebuild the server this way (or install a new kernel) due to missing testing repositories. I had to rebuild the OS on the server, this time using the stable release as testing is unavailable. By carefully avoiding overwriting the LVM VG I was able to bring the main data volumes back online without loss. Questions - I'd be really grateful to know if anyone could suggest how or why this has happened. In particular: - can anyone suggest a 2.6.15 kernel flavour to use, with support for the 9550SX card, Xeons and a 64bit motherboard. - how to work with the Testing release for 64bit machines Thoughts and observations much appreciated. Kind regards, Rory -- Rory Campbell-Lange <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: Net boot install CD not working
Pleased really; just makes things more secure. The problem with the install disks is that they didn't trust themselves! Regards, Rory On 26/10/05, lordSauron ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: > should I be worried about this new apt method? > -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Net boot install CD not working
Hi. I'm a PPC/i386 lurker! On 26/10/05, Rupert Heesom ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: > I'm trying to reinstall Debian amd64, but I can't find a CD that will > actually install properly. The latest testing versions of many of the installers are failing because of the move to secure apt, as I understand it. See http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=334656 (although netboot is stated as working). I have successfully installed 3 machines in the interim from the businesscard iso images. According to http://wiki.debian.org/DebianInstallerToday the problem is going to hopefully about to be solved. Cheers Rory -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Advice sought on moving to AMD64
Hi Everyone On 20/06/05, Lennart Sorensen ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: > On Mon, Jun 20, 2005 at 03:49:33PM -0400, Nathan Dragun wrote: > > Woops, sorry about that bit of mis-information. > > > > What kind of performance gains have they been showing over the IDE/SCSI > > interface SATA drives, any clue? > > Well most drives have never hit the speed limits of the interface they > use, so in terms of raw throughput you generally won't see a difference. ... We intend to use 2 SCSI disks in RAID1 for the system and the others in RAID10 for the DB. There is (obviously) a lot of debate about SATA vs SCSI on the Postgresql list. The general opinion is that 7200 rpm SATA disks just aren't fast/smart enough to cut it for serious database use, 10K Raptors being a possible exception. Since SCSI drives are designed "to do physical I/O scheduling, because the CPU can issue multiple commands before the drive has to report completion of the first one. IDE isn't designed to do that..." [Tom Lane], we're going for that. Cheers Rory -- Rory Campbell-Lange <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Advice sought on moving to AMD64
Hi Nathan On 19/06/05, Nathan Dragun ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote: > Rory Campbell-Lange wrote: > Everything on your list is available as far as I'm aware, don't know > about the postgresql though. You have to realize that its much easier > than most to bring the standard x86 packages over since they use the > same execution structure. (I think I worded that right, my brain feels > fried right now.) Many thanks for your comments here. Makes it seem simple! ... > > Motherboard: Dual AMD Opteron,[X2881G2NR],AMD8131, > >Up to 3x PCI-X,S-ATA Raid,2x Gigabit LAN > Actually, I run the S2882UG3NR and have run it almost since day 1 of the > x86_64 debian days; works flawlessly. Tyan makes a great motherboard > too. Unlike most companies who will put out a motherboard and put out > random fixes for flaws, these guys actually go back and meticulously > update their supported hardware so that you really do get the most for > your money. Yes, I've heard great things about the Tyan boards. Many thanks for your comments, they are much appreciated. Many thanks Rory -- Rory Campbell-Lange <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Advice sought on moving to AMD64
How hard is it to use Debian AMD64? I run about 15 Debian servers for various clients. These are all 32 bit machines, mainly dual Xeons or Pentium IVs; we use Debian on our Apple ibooks too. All of our machines run stable + a few things from testing + occasionally something from unstable. We are getting ready to purchase a machine for a web application prototype. I won't go into the nitty gritty of what the machine is to be used for, but suffice it to say that we want good Postgresql 8.x read and write performance and enquiries on the postgres list brought us here. Basically, I'm keen not to make a lot of work for our team by supporting unusual hardware. However, we are keen to experience the benefits of using 64bit! Does Debian AMD64 have installers, eg netinstallers? Does AMD64 have stable, testing and unstable package trees? Thanks for any comments, Rory p.s. Our standard environment includes: Apache 1.3x/Apache 2.x PHP4 Python 2.3/2.4 including all standard modules Perl including all standard modules Postgresql 7.4/8 (I believe I can compile the latter from the debian source packages myself) Exim4 screen netfilter/iptables etc. One possible configuration we are looking for is as below: Motherboard: Dual AMD Opteron,[X2881G2NR],AMD8131, Up to 3x PCI-X,S-ATA Raid,2x Gigabit LAN Chipset: AMD-8131 Info : 5 x PCI (Total); 1x PCI-X for 1U and 3x PCI-X for 2U; Graphics Slot = None Ports : 2xUSB V2.0 [Rear],PS/2 Kb, Mouse,Serial,Parallel Maximum: RAM 16GB using 8 x 2GB On-board Graphics : Integrated ATI 8MB Rage XL Std HDD Controller : IDE UDMA 100 (Primary & Secondary On-board SCSI : None On-board RAID : S-ATA Raid (Raid 0, 1, 10, 4 drives) Silicon Image 3114 On-board LAN : 2 x Broadcom 10/100/1000 Gigabit Ethernet On-board Audio : None CPU: 2 x AMD Opteron 242 1.6GHz (2-way) - 1MB Cache RAM: 2,048 MB Total using 4 x 512MB PC3200 DDR Registered ECC (Use Only In Pairs) Chassis: 2U C215S, 8x H-Swap SCSI Bays, Slim CD and FD bays, 660mm, 2x 64bit PCI, 510W (Black) Rail Kit : Telescopic Rail Kit included with case RAID Controller: LSI MegaRaid 320-1, 64 Bit PCI, Ultra320, 64mb, Single channel, Raid levels 0,1,3,5,10 SCSI HDD : 6 x 36GB 15,000 rpm Ultra320 Ethernet : 1 2 x Broadcom 10/100/1000 Gigabit Ethernet on-board motherboard -- Rory Campbell-Lange <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
