Re: [expert] RAID Setup
Jason Snyder wrote: >Hi Mark, >I'm currently running a 4 disk RAID 5 on a 3Ware 6800 card under mdk 8.2. >The card uses a combination of hardware, firmware, and software to operate so >it is not a 'true' hardware RAID, but it still works pretty good for many >situations. Here are the pros and cons that I have come across with this >solution concerning RAID 5 arrays: > >Pros: >1. mdk 8.0 and up will recognize the card and will view the an array as one >disk from the get go. (The last time that I messed with software raid, the >mdk installer didn't handle software raid so you had to set it up after >installation.) > >2. Fast reads with current drivers. > >3. Good array monitoring software. > >4. Lastest firmware drivers handle 48-bit addressing. > >5. Handles single drive failures and power loss quite well from personal >experience. > >Cons: >1. Slow writes. (Tops out around ~5 MB/s for me.) They made an improvement >so that large writes go a lot faster than it used to. The problem is that >the card has a very small onboard memory so it just cannot efficiently do >RAID 5 writes. (Relies on harddrive caches which is supposed to work well in >RAID 0 and RAID 1.) The 7x50 series are supposed to have an extra cache chip >to dramatically speed up RAID 5 writes. > >- > >With my experience with purely software RAID under Linux, each disk in the >array is labled, so if you even pull the disks out and stick them in a >different order, Linux will still figure out which drive is which. All of >the RAID configuration can be figured out automatically from information >stored on partition, so yes you should be able to yank the disks from one >machine and stick them into another. > >>I want to install a RAID on my server, currently running Mandrake 8.2, in >>order to improve data integrity and guard against hardware failure. I've >>downloaded raidtools-0.9 rpm and installed it, the next things is to buy >>the hardware. I'm not sure whether to run RAID 1 or RAID 5, presumably I'll >>need two disks for the former and three for the latter? But do all the >>disks need to be identical? >> >>What happens if I have a major system problem and need to recover data from >>another machine? If I use RAID 1 I can restore from either disk on a >>machine without raidtools but with RAID 5 I'd need any two of the disks >>plus a machine with raidtools installed, is this correct? >> >>What other implications should I be aware of when using software RAID? >> >>Any help/experiences much appreciated. >> >>Thanks, >> >>Mark >> > Umm, not quite. RAID4 and RAID5 will tolerate the loss of ONE drive out of the drives in the array of N drives and they both have a storage capacity of (N-1)*smallest drive (if you are using a hardware RAID) For software RAIDS they don't necessarily span disks and all sorts of mixtures are possible. RAID1 can also be set up with several drives and you can lose all but one. Diskdrake does a wonderful job of setting up software RAIDs, And I have tested them with all 4 journaling filesystems in RAID0, 1, and 5 using a mix of IDE and SCSI drives without any RAID hardware. The downside is that the update function will absolutely not work with a RAID0 or RAID5 /. If / is RAID1 or just a plain partition, then no problem. I have run 8.0 with Mylex DAC960 controllers RAID0 and RAID5... You can find an article in forum about it, using 8.0 with kernel 2.2 and the old kernel 2.2 reiser. RAID is a lot easier than most folks think. RAID0 can improve performance dramatically with the right chunksize and perhaps 2 or 3 disks in the striping. Software RAID runs well, so you do not need identcal disks. Hardware RAID runs well and will base its work on the SMALLEST disk ikn the array if they are not identical. RAID1 requires two disks, RAID4 or RAID 5 requires 3 or more, and a system with a 5-disk RAID5 will store 4 times the smallest disk. RAID5 is not transferrable to a non-RAID machine, but with clever configuration of software RAID, that would not be an insurmountable problem. RAID1 will transfer with no problems, if it is a hardware RAID. IDE hardware RAIDs are rare. ARCO makes one, and Promise makes the SuperTrak. The ARCO is RAID1 only. For more info about what iIDE RAIDs are supported go to www.linux-ide.org/chipsets.html Civileme > > > > >Want to buy your Pack or Services from MandrakeSoft? >Go to http://www.mandrakestore.com > Want to buy your Pack or Services from MandrakeSoft? Go to http://www.mandrakestore.com
Re: [expert] RAID Setup
Hi Mark, I'm currently running a 4 disk RAID 5 on a 3Ware 6800 card under mdk 8.2. The card uses a combination of hardware, firmware, and software to operate so it is not a 'true' hardware RAID, but it still works pretty good for many situations. Here are the pros and cons that I have come across with this solution concerning RAID 5 arrays: Pros: 1. mdk 8.0 and up will recognize the card and will view the an array as one disk from the get go. (The last time that I messed with software raid, the mdk installer didn't handle software raid so you had to set it up after installation.) 2. Fast reads with current drivers. 3. Good array monitoring software. 4. Lastest firmware drivers handle 48-bit addressing. 5. Handles single drive failures and power loss quite well from personal experience. Cons: 1. Slow writes. (Tops out around ~5 MB/s for me.) They made an improvement so that large writes go a lot faster than it used to. The problem is that the card has a very small onboard memory so it just cannot efficiently do RAID 5 writes. (Relies on harddrive caches which is supposed to work well in RAID 0 and RAID 1.) The 7x50 series are supposed to have an extra cache chip to dramatically speed up RAID 5 writes. - With my experience with purely software RAID under Linux, each disk in the array is labled, so if you even pull the disks out and stick them in a different order, Linux will still figure out which drive is which. All of the RAID configuration can be figured out automatically from information stored on partition, so yes you should be able to yank the disks from one machine and stick them into another. > I want to install a RAID on my server, currently running Mandrake 8.2, in > order to improve data integrity and guard against hardware failure. I've > downloaded raidtools-0.9 rpm and installed it, the next things is to buy > the hardware. I'm not sure whether to run RAID 1 or RAID 5, presumably I'll > need two disks for the former and three for the latter? But do all the > disks need to be identical? > > What happens if I have a major system problem and need to recover data from > another machine? If I use RAID 1 I can restore from either disk on a > machine without raidtools but with RAID 5 I'd need any two of the disks > plus a machine with raidtools installed, is this correct? > > What other implications should I be aware of when using software RAID? > > Any help/experiences much appreciated. > > Thanks, > > Mark Want to buy your Pack or Services from MandrakeSoft? Go to http://www.mandrakestore.com
Re: [expert] RAID
On Sat, 2002-04-27 at 01:18, Robert wrote: > Conventional wisdom (Civilme) has it that the highpoint raid controller > will not offer any more gains than a linux software raid.i too have the > same controller on a Abit board, I used it in raid 0 with windows b4 I > turned to linux. Under windows the benchmarks are great but real life > gains are about 15%. I might point out here that I came across a set of benchmarks that compared IDE performance across the standard IDE ports and the HPT37X controller IDE ports. The HPT37X ports performed better than standard IDE under those benches; logically therefore you are better off to do soft RAID on the HPT37X. This somewhat justifies your investment; I for one have kept on buying the Abit VIA K-series boards. As I've said before elsewhere, this is also valuable from the viewpoint that you will have two extra standard IDE controllers to play with. Handy for doing data transfers from other drives, and for using them for ATAPI-CD burner connections. > I know highpoint have binary only drivers for RH, Caldera, Suse and a > few others but nothing for Mandrake which is not too surprising given > the bucketing mandrake have put on the highpoint combined with thier > distinct retisence to do anything about supporting it. I seem to recall > quite a deal of discussion on this subject in mandrake user ( I think) > I suspect one could get the kernael source from one of the supported > distros and compile in the drivers and use it as the kernel for mandrake > but I could and most likely wrong on this point. > sorry to be the bearer of disapointing news > Rob BTW, there was a poster here recently that actually had RAID working hardware native using the HPT37X drivers shipped in LM82. I believe it was Gregorio Pérez Aguilera. And he too was using an Abit KT7A-Raid. He posted his message on April 16th at 2:02PM here on the expert list. LX -- °°° Kernel 2.4.8-26mdk Mandrake Linux 8.1 Enlightenment 0.16.5Evolution 1.02 Registered Linux User #268899 http://counter.li.org/ °°° Want to buy your Pack or Services from MandrakeSoft? Go to http://www.mandrakestore.com
Re: [expert] RAID
Conventional wisdom (Civilme) has it that the highpoint raid controller will not offer any more gains than a linux software raid.i too have the same controller on a Abit board, I used it in raid 0 with windows b4 I turned to linux. Under windows the benchmarks are great but real life gains are about 15%. I know highpoint have binary only drivers for RH, Caldera, Suse and a few others but nothing for Mandrake which is not too surprising given the bucketing mandrake have put on the highpoint combined with thier distinct retisence to do anything about supporting it. I seem to recall quite a deal of discussion on this subject in mandrake user ( I think) I suspect one could get the kernael source from one of the supported distros and compile in the drivers and use it as the kernel for mandrake but I could and most likely wrong on this point. sorry to be the bearer of disapointing news Rob On Sat, 2002-04-27 at 06:34, Robert Boggs wrote: > Has anyone ever tried to put mandrake on a raid system. My system is > highpoint raid on a epox board. I would like to try to put 8.2 on this > system. I have 2 20 g IBM hard drives. They are on raid0. Please help. RB > > > > > > Want to buy your Pack or Services from MandrakeSoft? > Go to http://www.mandrakestore.com Want to buy your Pack or Services from MandrakeSoft? Go to http://www.mandrakestore.com
Re: [expert] RAID question-ATA133 hard disc and hard discs connection
Stephen, Let me say up front that most of my (work) experience comes from SCSI. But the principles hold for ATA drives as well. One thing that is unique to ATA drives is the fact that you get only 2 disks per channel - one master and one slave. It is also my understanding that that IDE based disks start a request and keep the channel tied up until that request is finished. On SCSI drives a request is issued and the disk can "disconnect" from the SCSI bus until is ready fulfill the request. So SCSI systems have a real advantage there. RAID: In general, the two primary modes of RAID used in businesses are RAID 1 (Mirroring) and RAID 5 (striping with parity). The reason for this is data protection. RAID 1 has some advantages in terms of write performance over RAID 5. Conversely, RAID 5 can have some read performance over RAID 1. Many people pick RAID 5 over RAID 1 because it uses their disk resources more efficiently in terms of storage capacity. Let's take 4 disks. If you protect your data using RAID 1 you will be mirroring and you will get 2 disks worth of total storage capcity. If you use RAID 5 you can get 3 disks of total storage capacity. RAID 1 has some advantages in terms of what has to be done when the disk set needs to be rebuilt following a disaster. If your disk set is RAID 1 then you "merely" copy the data from teh surviving disk onto the new mirror. If you are using RAID 5, then the new disk must be buidl with "calculated" data. That is the data from all the other disks (whether it is real data or parity data) will be need to be read from the surviving disks. That total data is then used to calculate the data going on to the new drive. Now for a personal opinion. I will be building a server for my church. I plan on using ATA100 drives with (probably) the Promise RAID card. I will use RAID 1. Hope this helps. -pen Want to buy your Pack or Services from MandrakeSoft? Go to http://www.mandrakestore.com
Re: [expert] raid and mandrake
On Sunday 11 November 2001 10:14 pm, you wrote: > civileme wrote: > >On Saturday 10 November 2001 04:11 pm, Bill Kenworthy wrote: > >>With the release of motherboards such as the ABIT KT7A-raid (highpoint > >>chip) and and addons like the promise ide raid cards, will Mandrake be > >>supporting these boards out of the box in the next version - 8.2 (that > >>is, install and boot from the raid device) > >> > >>BillK > > > >Look, it is software RAID with a $30 extra price tag for a BIOS add-on, > > and it is secret, proprietary, etc. It is software RAID and linux > > software RAID is superior, because it offers RAID 0, 1, 4, and 5 with > > non-identical disks while these fake hardware RAIDs offer RAID 0 and 1 on > > identical disks. > > > >There is a project for some GPL support so people can read their WinRAID > >partitions off this junk, but calling it junk is probably being kind. > > Check at linux-ide.org for a link to the project and see what the actual > > overall linux support is at > > > >www.linux-ide.org/chipsets.html > > > >OF course if the project is successful, we will probably try to include > > it, but mostly for those who have Windows partitions under RAID0 that > > they want to access. It is easier, and the performance is better to use > > linux software RAID, even with these chipsets and their extra PROM > > around. > > > >Civileme > > Civileme, > > With respect, everytime this subject has come up, you've been nothing > short of hostile about it. I admit that the Promise card is NOWHERE > near the efficiency of a SCSI raid card nor is it up to par with a $400 > ide raid card such as the 3ware Escalade card; however it's NOWHERE NEAR > THE PRICE. I have used the Promise ide raid card and it DOES improve > performance - like it or not. You compare to linux software raid; > Windows also has a software raid built into NT and it works great - as > long as you're booted into WINDOWS. Do you see what I'm getting at > here?? I would venture to say, that at least half the people running > linux are doing it on a multi-boot machine - if I use linux software > raid, what does that do when I'm booting into Windows? Or vise-versa? > I have used the Promise raid card on a multi-boot machine with redhat 7 > and windows 2000 and windows 98 all on the same set of striped drives > and ALL of the os's get to take advantage of the speed increase. There > is also great documentation online about how to hack a promise 66 > controller card into a raid card (the type I use) and you've dropped > your cost even more. I'm sorry "yell" so much, but please realize that > not everyone can run out and spend $400 on a raid card and your answer > DOES NOT serve everyone's purpose. Isn't Linux about being resourceful > and thinking of creative new ways of getting things done? Since that > card is a cheap answer for quite a few people, why not entertain the > idea of supporting it? > > Thanks for your time, > Mike Exellent reply - my thoughts exactly. Incidentally Highpoint have released binary drivers for RH 7 What are the chances of using these with MDK 8.1 ?? Rob Want to buy your Pack or Services from MandrakeSoft? Go to http://www.mandrakestore.com
Re: [expert] RAID
On Sunday 11 November 2001 08:12 am, Robert Boggs wrote: > Anyone tried to use a hpt 370 controller setup as raid0? How difficult is > this to do in 'Drake 8.1? Thanks RB It is not possible to use the so-called "hardware" RAID controller as RAID in 8.1 as the software to do so does not exist. There is a project for it, but it is still at least as efficient to use linux software RAID on the controller, because they are both software RAIDs and the linux version does give you the source. I am uncertain as to the status of the project now, but the drivers weren't ready at release time. If you already have a RAID under windows and want to dual-boot, you will be able to do so but neither will see the other's partitions. Civileme QA Team Want to buy your Pack or Services from MandrakeSoft? Go to http://www.mandrakestore.com
Re: [expert] raid and mandrake
civileme wrote: >On Sunday 11 November 2001 05:12 am, Tom Brinkman wrote: > >>On Saturday 10 November 2001 10:55 pm, Bill Kenworthy wrote: >> >>>Are there stats to backup the fact that linux software raid is >>>faster than the highpoint chips+linux software raid - I have not >>>seen any articals to that effect >>> >> http://www.mandrakeforum.org/article.php?sid=450&lang=en >> >> I'd want Civileme to respond to your speed query rather than try >>to speak for him. I would add tho, that the win-raid fad that many >>popular boards came out with a while back, requires a pcb design that >>actually introduces many problems. I believe it is at the heart of >>the much (over)hyped VIA-IDE 'bug' problems. Fortunately this >>win-raid kludge fad appears to have died out with mostly clueless >>windoze users being the majority of those who got snookered. Most >>from reading favorable win-raid motherboard reviews on otherwise >>respectable windoze hardware sites. eg, Tom's Hardware, Anand, Ars >>Technica, etc. >> > > >There is nothing to indicate that RAID0 under linux software RAID would be >any slower or faster than RAID0 on one of the HPT or Promise "RAID" >controllers. If you want higher performance on that, you need real hardware. > >Of course these hardware sites reviewed RAID favorably because it gave some >performance hains in Windows over the regular stuff, but realize that these >are basically WinRAID controllers. Obviously if many windows users have the >setup, and feel the need to access their WinRAID partition (yeah >singular--you get _one_ RAID partition with these controllers) and use >dual-boot, a project would be in order to assist them, but notice it is not >by commercial distributors. > What?? That last sentence is absolutely cryptic! What do you mean that you only get "one RAID partition with these controllers"? Once you setup the array, you can partition the drives as though they were only one drive - you can have as many partitions as you can without raid. >Even the linux-ide project has no personnel >involved. Andre Hedrick wrote quite an interesting letter about this junk on >kernel traffic, more than a year ago, as you can discover from the link Tom >posted. > >For right now, the Promixe RAID controllers are supported for one drive per >channel, as regular controllers, and the HPTs seem to work somewhat better as >regular controllers. > That depends on what controller you're talking about. The fasttrak 66/100 add-on cards work the same as your existing ide controllers; two devices per channel - two channels onboard. When you create the array, you have the choice of 2, 3 or 4 ide devices in that array. > > >There is a supported hardware IDE RAID documented at www.linux-ide.org and it >does work very well indeed. It is a tad on the expensive side, but it could >work wonders in limited space (one device runs two 2.5" notebook size drives >as a RAID0 or RAID1 totally transparent to the system in a single 3.5" >bay--great for a high-reliability thin box... > >Civileme >QA team > > > > > > > >Want to buy your Pack or Services from MandrakeSoft? >Go to http://www.mandrakestore.com > Want to buy your Pack or Services from MandrakeSoft? Go to http://www.mandrakestore.com
Re: [expert] raid and mandrake
On Sunday 11 November 2001 05:12 am, Tom Brinkman wrote: > On Saturday 10 November 2001 10:55 pm, Bill Kenworthy wrote: > > Are there stats to backup the fact that linux software raid is > > faster than the highpoint chips+linux software raid - I have not > > seen any articals to that effect > > http://www.mandrakeforum.org/article.php?sid=450&lang=en > >I'd want Civileme to respond to your speed query rather than try > to speak for him. I would add tho, that the win-raid fad that many > popular boards came out with a while back, requires a pcb design that > actually introduces many problems. I believe it is at the heart of > the much (over)hyped VIA-IDE 'bug' problems. Fortunately this > win-raid kludge fad appears to have died out with mostly clueless > windoze users being the majority of those who got snookered. Most > from reading favorable win-raid motherboard reviews on otherwise > respectable windoze hardware sites. eg, Tom's Hardware, Anand, Ars > Technica, etc. There is nothing to indicate that RAID0 under linux software RAID would be any slower or faster than RAID0 on one of the HPT or Promise "RAID" controllers. If you want higher performance on that, you need real hardware. Of course these hardware sites reviewed RAID favorably because it gave some performance hains in Windows over the regular stuff, but realize that these are basically WinRAID controllers. Obviously if many windows users have the setup, and feel the need to access their WinRAID partition (yeah singular--you get _one_ RAID partition with these controllers) and use dual-boot, a project would be in order to assist them, but notice it is not by commercial distributors. Even the linux-ide project has no personnel involved. Andre Hedrick wrote quite an interesting letter about this junk on kernel traffic, more than a year ago, as you can discover from the link Tom posted. For right now, the Promixe RAID controllers are supported for one drive per channel, as regular controllers, and the HPTs seem to work somewhat better as regular controllers. There is a supported hardware IDE RAID documented at www.linux-ide.org and it does work very well indeed. It is a tad on the expensive side, but it could work wonders in limited space (one device runs two 2.5" notebook size drives as a RAID0 or RAID1 totally transparent to the system in a single 3.5" bay--great for a high-reliability thin box... Civileme QA team Want to buy your Pack or Services from MandrakeSoft? Go to http://www.mandrakestore.com
Re: [expert] raid and mandrake
Are there stats to backup the fact that linux software raid is faster than the highpoint chips+linux software raid - I have not seen any articals to that effect - except that there are efforts to make the software raid work with the chips which seems to idicate there are advantages involved? My only experiance is on a winme (or was it 2000) system which was noticably faster on disk access for streaming audio work (recording) when running raid 0 (the other raid options are irrelevant to most "home" users I would think, speed being the priority - they may be fake but it appears to work well under windoze, why not linux?) - which was my aim when I purchased the board. RedHat have done some work and offer a kernel patch so my options at this stage appear to be to try and roll my own kernel using the redhat patches onto the Mandrake sources, after which to move to the redhat kernel. I am not sure but I think these patches are now in the RH7.2 kernel and have been subitted for the mainstream kernel, which may solve the problem eventually. BillK On Sun, 2001-11-11 at 11:27, civileme wrote: > On Saturday 10 November 2001 04:11 pm, Bill Kenworthy wrote: > > With the release of motherboards such as the ABIT KT7A-raid (highpoint > > chip) and and addons like the promise ide raid cards, will Mandrake be > > supporting these boards out of the box in the next version - 8.2 (that > > is, install and boot from the raid device) > > > > BillK > > > Look, it is software RAID with a $30 extra price tag for a BIOS add-on, and > it is secret, proprietary, etc. It is software RAID and linux software RAID > is superior, because it offers RAID 0, 1, 4, and 5 with non-identical disks > while these fake hardware RAIDs offer RAID 0 and 1 on identical disks. > > There is a project for some GPL support so people can read their WinRAID > partitions off this junk, but calling it junk is probably being kind. Check > at linux-ide.org for a link to the project and see what the actual overall > linux support is at > > www.linux-ide.org/chipsets.html > > OF course if the project is successful, we will probably try to include it, > but mostly for those who have Windows partitions under RAID0 that they want > to access. It is easier, and the performance is better to use linux software > RAID, even with these chipsets and their extra PROM around. > > Civileme Want to buy your Pack or Services from MandrakeSoft? Go to http://www.mandrakestore.com
Re: [expert] raid and mandrake
On Saturday 10 November 2001 04:11 pm, Bill Kenworthy wrote: > With the release of motherboards such as the ABIT KT7A-raid (highpoint > chip) and and addons like the promise ide raid cards, will Mandrake be > supporting these boards out of the box in the next version - 8.2 (that > is, install and boot from the raid device) > > BillK Look, it is software RAID with a $30 extra price tag for a BIOS add-on, and it is secret, proprietary, etc. It is software RAID and linux software RAID is superior, because it offers RAID 0, 1, 4, and 5 with non-identical disks while these fake hardware RAIDs offer RAID 0 and 1 on identical disks. There is a project for some GPL support so people can read their WinRAID partitions off this junk, but calling it junk is probably being kind. Check at linux-ide.org for a link to the project and see what the actual overall linux support is at www.linux-ide.org/chipsets.html OF course if the project is successful, we will probably try to include it, but mostly for those who have Windows partitions under RAID0 that they want to access. It is easier, and the performance is better to use linux software RAID, even with these chipsets and their extra PROM around. Civileme Want to buy your Pack or Services from MandrakeSoft? Go to http://www.mandrakestore.com
Re: [expert] RAID 5 via software
Alfredo Cole <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Hi: > > I have setup a RAID 5 system with 3 IDE 20 Gb drives. One of them has a > /boot partition, and the rest is assigned to the md0 RAID partition. I > can understand that if disks 2 or 3 fail, I can replace them and the > information will be rebuilt. But if disk 1, which holds the /boot > partition fails, what will happen then? Thank you. You'll need a boot floppy so you can boot to the raid / and rebuild /boot. Now you know why that boot floppy is so important! (Of course, you can also boot the cd in recover mode, but that's a bit more work ;-) rc Rusty E. Carruth Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] or [EMAIL PROTECTED] Voice: (480) 345-3621 SnailMail: Schlumberger ATE ___ FAX: (480) 345-8793 7855 S. River Parkway, Suite 116 \e/ Ham: N7IKQ @ 146.82+,pl 162.2 Tempe, AZ 85284-1825V ICBM: 33 20' 44"N 111 53' 47"W http://tuxedo.org/~esr/ecsl/index.html
Re: [expert] RAID
Todd Flinders wrote: > > Ah! good advice! I intend to use hd fans (I have > millions of fans in this thing..haha...geek). > > However, I'm still anxiously hoping someone can > recommend a RAID controller card that they've had > success with using Mandrake 8.0 final. :( Mylex SCSI RAID controllers are good cards. I'm not experienced with the others. This may or may not be a popular opinion, but there is no such thing as a good IDE RAID solution. Not yet. I'm open to future hardware solutions, but at the moment, it cannot touch the performance and stability of SCSI RAID. The opinions expressed are mine and mine alone. They should not be construed to be my employer's official statements. -- tlyons at mandrakesoft dot com http://www.linux-mandrake.com/en
Re: [expert] RAID installation
On Friday 09 March 2001 18:41, you wrote: > What are the commands for software raid? like status, array rebuilt etc. > thank you cat /proc/mdstat to check the raid-stus raid0run raidhotadd raidhotremove raidsetfaulty raidstart raidstop You can find an excellent man pag for them. Notice: there's a great difference if raid code between 2.2 and 2.4 kernel (much better now!) Claudio
Re: [expert] RAID installation
What are the commands for software raid? like status, array rebuilt etc. thank you - Original Message - From: "John J. LeMay Jr." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Friday, March 09, 2001 6:30 AM Subject: Re: [expert] RAID installation > ** Reply to message from Claudio (sekko) <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> on Fri, 09 Mar > 2001 10:48:17 +0100 > > > > I boot from RAID. I mean: partition "/boot" is not on raid device, while > > partition "/" is a raid 1 device. You just should create a small "/boot" > > partition (about 50 MB)... > > Thanks! I'm rather "old-school" and refuse to rely on software based RAID in > favor of dedicated hardware. I've been booting from my hardware RAID-5 array > since I set it up on my new server a few months ago. I'm using a Mylex > AcceleRAID 140. Nice card for an entry level controller. Works great for my home > server, and is WAY cheaper than the Compaq 3200's and such I use in enterprise > systems. > > John LeMay Jr. > Senior Enterprise Consultant > NJMC, LLC. > > > [tag] How do I set my LaserPrinter to "Stun"?! >
Re: [expert] RAID installation
** Reply to message from Claudio (sekko) <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> on Fri, 09 Mar 2001 10:48:17 +0100 > I boot from RAID. I mean: partition "/boot" is not on raid device, while > partition "/" is a raid 1 device. You just should create a small "/boot" > partition (about 50 MB)... Thanks! I'm rather "old-school" and refuse to rely on software based RAID in favor of dedicated hardware. I've been booting from my hardware RAID-5 array since I set it up on my new server a few months ago. I'm using a Mylex AcceleRAID 140. Nice card for an entry level controller. Works great for my home server, and is WAY cheaper than the Compaq 3200's and such I use in enterprise systems. John LeMay Jr. Senior Enterprise Consultant NJMC, LLC. [tag] How do I set my LaserPrinter to "Stun"?!
Re: [expert] RAID installation
On Friday 09 March 2001 01:08, you wrote: > ** Reply to message from Claudio (sekko) <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> on Thu, 08 > Mar 2001 16:00:27 +0100 > > > I used raid 1 with no problem but 2 days to build the raid with > > kernel-2.2.17. Installed 2.4.0-5mdk and all went fine: 20 minutes to > > build the same raid ;o) > > > > Claudio > > Of course this assumes you are not using the array to boot from. Is it > possible to configure software RAID and boot from the array in Linux? > Install and then create the array? No dear! ;o) I boot from RAID. I mean: partition "/boot" is not on raid device, while partition "/" is a raid 1 device. You just should create a small "/boot" partition (about 50 MB)... Claudio
Re: [expert] RAID installation
** Reply to message from Claudio (sekko) <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> on Thu, 08 Mar 2001 16:00:27 +0100 > I used raid 1 with no problem but 2 days to build the raid with > kernel-2.2.17. Installed 2.4.0-5mdk and all went fine: 20 minutes to build > the same raid ;o) > > Claudio Of course this assumes you are not using the array to boot from. Is it possible to configure software RAID and boot from the array in Linux? Install and then create the array? John LeMay Jr. Senior Enterprise Consultant NJMC, LLC. [tag] How do I set my LaserPrinter to "Stun"?!
Re: [expert] RAID installation
On Wednesday 07 March 2001 23:50, you wrote: > Hi: > > I have tried to install LM 7.2 and Corporate Server 1.0.1 in my server, > with three 20 Gb HD's in a RAID 5 (software) configuration. It always fails > at the end of the formatting phase with a "can't take the sqrt of 3," > message. RH 7.0 installs without a glitch. I would like to have LM mainly > because I want cups. Anybody has tried this and succeeded? Thank you. I used raid 1 with no problem but 2 days to build the raid with kernel-2.2.17. Installed 2.4.0-5mdk and all went fine: 20 minutes to build the same raid ;o) Claudio
RE: [expert] RAID IDE OK?
I've used IDE Raid without problems. The key to performance is the amount of buffer RAM on the controller. The more the better. SCSI Raid is indeed better, since each device is intelligent and can handle i/o requests independently. However SCSI raid is indeed very expensive. IDE hardware raid provides a less expensive option. Hardware IDE raid I find only marginally slower than regular IDE, with a larger buffer it may even seem faster. Higher raid levels are another matter altogether. AFAIK you can't really do RAID 5 with ide controllers... -JMS -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Homer Shimpsian Sent: Wednesday, January 24, 2001 11:04 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: [expert] RAID IDE OK? Can anyone relate their experiences with IDE RAID in Linux? I'm thinking of getting a Promise IDE RAID card.. The NT people seem to abhor the idea of software RAID or IDE RAID. If SCSI software RAID is so good, maybe it's not worth the $350 SCSI RAID card. On the other hand, if IDE RAID works equally well, I'd rather spend $700 on IDE then $4000 for SCSI. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of D. Stark - eSN Sent: Wednesday, January 24, 2001 4:53 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: [expert] RAID First off, any SCSI card will do, though some won't do well with hot swap. Look into each one seprately and make your decision. Second, under linux, Mylex cards are the BOMB. They've had some availability issues lately though. We use DPT cards, but since Adaptec has bought DPT, we aren't expecting any more kernel updates to thier software. So we'll probably go Mylex with any new machines and when the time is right to upgrade the current boxen. We use software RAID here in our shop on a good number of machines, as well. Mainly the mirroring RAID 1 variety. This is with RH 6.2, but I don't think there should be many differences, if any, between RH and Mdk. Its almost scary how well it works. After using the RedHat GUI installer to do the basic setup, we were more or less done. It just worked. This was on an HP LPR, but we've had good success with Dell 2450s as well. We tried to do some very NASTY things to it. Pulled one of the two drives out while running. The kernel spit out some ugly warnings all over the screen (mainly due to SCSI bus errors), but the machine continued to function perfectly. We shut the machine down, pulled /dev/sda, and it booted off of sdb like nothing was wrong. Took out a completely identical unformatted drive and tossed it in hot. I created the proper fdisk partitions, and used the hotadd commands to rebuild the array. Shut down the machine, pulled the original sdb out, and booted off the freshly created drive. Again, it worked. Setup is important. Don't make one huge raid partition. Make a bunch of small /dev/md devices, one for each partition. You'll have less chance of data corruption should one drive or the other go down in some strange way. But then, that same advice applies with *any* server implementation. The long and short of it is, the software raid for scsi is VERY mature. If you recompile your kernel, there are certain things you NEED to have compiled in, and certain things that NEED to be in the inital ramdisk. Just read the docs that come with the package. I will lose no sleep at night because of the software RAID running at the office. This is by no means an endorsement on either my behalf or my employer's. My advice is to set up software raid on the machine before it enters production and play with it as we did. Find out how fault tolerent it is, and what you'll need to do do recover. Derek Stark IT / Linux Admin eSupportNow xt 8952 -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Homer Shimpsian Sent: Tuesday, January 23, 2001 8:36 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [expert] RAID Can someone explain to me their RAID experiences in Linux? How would hot swapping work? Do U need specific software with a SCSI raid controller to handle this? Can anyone recommend a SCSI RAID controller for use with Linux Mandrake 7.1? Thanks for your advice. HA, Loadbalancing, redundancy, fail-over oh yeah
RE: [expert] RAID IDE OK?
Can anyone relate their experiences with IDE RAID in Linux? I'm thinking of getting a Promise IDE RAID card.. The NT people seem to abhor the idea of software RAID or IDE RAID. If SCSI software RAID is so good, maybe it's not worth the $350 SCSI RAID card. On the other hand, if IDE RAID works equally well, I'd rather spend $700 on IDE then $4000 for SCSI. -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of D. Stark - eSN Sent: Wednesday, January 24, 2001 4:53 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: RE: [expert] RAID First off, any SCSI card will do, though some won't do well with hot swap. Look into each one seprately and make your decision. Second, under linux, Mylex cards are the BOMB. They've had some availability issues lately though. We use DPT cards, but since Adaptec has bought DPT, we aren't expecting any more kernel updates to thier software. So we'll probably go Mylex with any new machines and when the time is right to upgrade the current boxen. We use software RAID here in our shop on a good number of machines, as well. Mainly the mirroring RAID 1 variety. This is with RH 6.2, but I don't think there should be many differences, if any, between RH and Mdk. Its almost scary how well it works. After using the RedHat GUI installer to do the basic setup, we were more or less done. It just worked. This was on an HP LPR, but we've had good success with Dell 2450s as well. We tried to do some very NASTY things to it. Pulled one of the two drives out while running. The kernel spit out some ugly warnings all over the screen (mainly due to SCSI bus errors), but the machine continued to function perfectly. We shut the machine down, pulled /dev/sda, and it booted off of sdb like nothing was wrong. Took out a completely identical unformatted drive and tossed it in hot. I created the proper fdisk partitions, and used the hotadd commands to rebuild the array. Shut down the machine, pulled the original sdb out, and booted off the freshly created drive. Again, it worked. Setup is important. Don't make one huge raid partition. Make a bunch of small /dev/md devices, one for each partition. You'll have less chance of data corruption should one drive or the other go down in some strange way. But then, that same advice applies with *any* server implementation. The long and short of it is, the software raid for scsi is VERY mature. If you recompile your kernel, there are certain things you NEED to have compiled in, and certain things that NEED to be in the inital ramdisk. Just read the docs that come with the package. I will lose no sleep at night because of the software RAID running at the office. This is by no means an endorsement on either my behalf or my employer's. My advice is to set up software raid on the machine before it enters production and play with it as we did. Find out how fault tolerent it is, and what you'll need to do do recover. Derek Stark IT / Linux Admin eSupportNow xt 8952 -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Homer Shimpsian Sent: Tuesday, January 23, 2001 8:36 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [expert] RAID Can someone explain to me their RAID experiences in Linux? How would hot swapping work? Do U need specific software with a SCSI raid controller to handle this? Can anyone recommend a SCSI RAID controller for use with Linux Mandrake 7.1? Thanks for your advice. HA, Loadbalancing, redundancy, fail-over oh yeah
RE: [expert] RAID
First off, any SCSI card will do, though some won't do well with hot swap. Look into each one seprately and make your decision. Second, under linux, Mylex cards are the BOMB. They've had some availability issues lately though. We use DPT cards, but since Adaptec has bought DPT, we aren't expecting any more kernel updates to thier software. So we'll probably go Mylex with any new machines and when the time is right to upgrade the current boxen. We use software RAID here in our shop on a good number of machines, as well. Mainly the mirroring RAID 1 variety. This is with RH 6.2, but I don't think there should be many differences, if any, between RH and Mdk. Its almost scary how well it works. After using the RedHat GUI installer to do the basic setup, we were more or less done. It just worked. This was on an HP LPR, but we've had good success with Dell 2450s as well. We tried to do some very NASTY things to it. Pulled one of the two drives out while running. The kernel spit out some ugly warnings all over the screen (mainly due to SCSI bus errors), but the machine continued to function perfectly. We shut the machine down, pulled /dev/sda, and it booted off of sdb like nothing was wrong. Took out a completely identical unformatted drive and tossed it in hot. I created the proper fdisk partitions, and used the hotadd commands to rebuild the array. Shut down the machine, pulled the original sdb out, and booted off the freshly created drive. Again, it worked. Setup is important. Don't make one huge raid partition. Make a bunch of small /dev/md devices, one for each partition. You'll have less chance of data corruption should one drive or the other go down in some strange way. But then, that same advice applies with *any* server implementation. The long and short of it is, the software raid for scsi is VERY mature. If you recompile your kernel, there are certain things you NEED to have compiled in, and certain things that NEED to be in the inital ramdisk. Just read the docs that come with the package. I will lose no sleep at night because of the software RAID running at the office. This is by no means an endorsement on either my behalf or my employer's. My advice is to set up software raid on the machine before it enters production and play with it as we did. Find out how fault tolerent it is, and what you'll need to do do recover. Derek Stark IT / Linux Admin eSupportNow xt 8952 -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Homer Shimpsian Sent: Tuesday, January 23, 2001 8:36 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [expert] RAID Can someone explain to me their RAID experiences in Linux? How would hot swapping work? Do U need specific software with a SCSI raid controller to handle this? Can anyone recommend a SCSI RAID controller for use with Linux Mandrake 7.1? Thanks for your advice. HA, Loadbalancing, redundancy, fail-over oh yeah
Re: [expert] raid-1
> > 4. runinge2fsck /dev/md0i'm getting an error > e2fsck 1.19, 13-Jul-2000 for EXT2 FS 0.5b, 95/08/09 > The filesystem size (according to the superblock) is 1909726 blocks > The physical size of the device is 1909696 blocks > Either the superblock or the partition table is likely to be corrupt! > Abort? yes > Thank U already fixed, just after mkraid /dev/md0 all you need to run mke2fs /dev/md0 :))) Dovydas
Re: [expert] RAID for mandrake
On Monday 15 January 2001 08:20, you wrote: > Dear Experts, > I'm currently using Redhat 7.0 on one of my computers because I have the > Promise Fasttrak 66 RAID controller installed and I don't have a driver for > Mandrake. I like using Redhat, but I would like to be able to install > Mandrake on this computer so that my computers will be using the same > versions of Linux. The README that came with the drivers that I loaded for > Linux said that I could use these modules with any version as long as I > compiled that kernel against those modules; what does that mean? I've > recompiled kernels in the past, but what does it mean to compile the kernel > AGAINST a certain module? Anyone feel like giving detailed directions? > > Thanks in advance, Mike > Are they binary-only drivers? If you have source you need to recompile the kernel with the source included in the source tree, and include it in the config, probably with a "Yes" not a "module." Civileme
Re: [expert] raid / reiserfs
Sorry, I thougth you meant $50 just for the hack. Does he ship to south africa ? Mike & Tracy Holt wrote: > > >P.S. From what I can remember, the Promise ATA->RAID hack is the > >addition of the right resistor in the right place (which will cost you > >about 5c). > > Exactly, it costs 29.99 (+shipping and sales tax) for the card (5c for the > resistor), then the time to do the work. This guy is selling the cards > modified with a 30 day guarantee for $35 + $5 for shipping and you can > deduct $10 if you send cash for a total of $30 - no tax. That's a savings > of 4c (a little more if you count the tax and time it would take to do it > yourself). > > > Keep in touch with http://mandrakeforum.com: > Subscribe the "[EMAIL PROTECTED]" mailing list. -- |--| Buchan MilneMechanical Engineer, Network Manager Cellphone +27824722231 email mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Centre for Automotive Engineering http://www.cae.co.za South Africas first satellite:http://sunsat.ee.sun.ac.za Control Models http://www.control.co.za |Registered Linux User #182071-| Keep in touch with http://mandrakeforum.com: Subscribe the "[EMAIL PROTECTED]" mailing list.
RE: [expert] raid / reiserfs
>P.S. From what I can remember, the Promise ATA->RAID hack is the >addition of the right resistor in the right place (which will cost you >about 5c). Exactly, it costs 29.99 (+shipping and sales tax) for the card (5c for the resistor), then the time to do the work. This guy is selling the cards modified with a 30 day guarantee for $35 + $5 for shipping and you can deduct $10 if you send cash for a total of $30 - no tax. That's a savings of 4c (a little more if you count the tax and time it would take to do it yourself). Keep in touch with http://mandrakeforum.com: Subscribe the "[EMAIL PROTECTED]" mailing list.
Re: [expert] raid / reiserfs
I am not sure if you're going to have any luck with hardware raid, espescially with cards like this. I hope you have researched this well (read the relevant HOWTOs, kernel docs etc) and are sure that your kernel supports it. If you do have success setting up the raid, maybe you would want to write a short bit up on it. Once the raid is set up (be it hardware or software) the filesystem shouldn't know a thing about it. It's probably best not to put your root on the raid (without reading the ROOT-RAID-HOWTO) Buchan P.S. From what I can remember, the Promise ATA->RAID hack is the addition of the right resistor in the right place (which will cost you about 5c). Mike & Tracy Holt wrote: > > Hello, > I would have searched the archives on this but I can't seem to get into the > Mandrake website? > > Anyway, I'm planning on putting a Promise IDE RAID card (Fast trak udma 66) > in one of my computers this weekend and I was wondering if anyone could tell > me if reiserfs will work on a hardware raid setup as this? > > Also, if anyone is interested, this guy will do the necessary hack to a > standard Promise udma 66 controller card to make it a fast trak 66 raid card > (saving at least $50). If anyone knows about this/is interested, here's the > address: > > http://promiseraid.tripod.com/ > > Mike > > > Keep in touch with http://mandrakeforum.com: > Subscribe the "[EMAIL PROTECTED]" mailing list. -- |--| Buchan MilneMechanical Engineer, Network Manager Cellphone +27824722231 email mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Centre for Automotive Engineering http://www.cae.co.za South Africas first satellite:http://sunsat.ee.sun.ac.za Control Models http://www.control.co.za |Registered Linux User #182071-| Keep in touch with http://mandrakeforum.com: Subscribe the "[EMAIL PROTECTED]" mailing list.
Re: [expert] raid
/sbin/hdparm -A1 should set your drive "read-lookahead" flag. for more options type /sbin/hdparm --help or man hdparm --Greg > Greetings. > > When running a mkraid it fails and looking in the /proc/mdstat reveals > read_ahead not set. > I have done some searching but do not seem to be able to find any > references to read_ahead in any of the how-to's. > This might be a kernel compile-time type problem. I am running 7.0 and > trying to mirror 2 ide partitions. > > Stuart Lewallen > Network Administrator > SparkLIST.com Corporation > > __ message envoye depuis http://www.ifrance.com emails (pop)-sites persos (espace illimite)-agenda-favoris (bookmarks)-forums Ecoutez ce message par tel ! : 08 92 68 92 15 (france uniquement)
Re: [expert] Raid controllers
Yeah we use the AMI product in a few of our systems successfully. I have also used the DPT controllers. Both are extremely good. As for the AMI being expensive, it is one of the CHEAPEST raid controllers on the market. -- Greg Rumple [EMAIL PROTECTED] On Fri, 4 Jun 1999, Nick Kay wrote: > Hi All, > Anyone have any experience or comments on RAID > controllers for Linux? I need a hardware RAID-5 solution, > the AMI offering is too expensive and the DPT drivers give > my kernels the hiccups. > All thoughts gratefully recieved. > > tar > nick@nexnix >
