Initial RAID 0+1 Setup Question
I have 8 36GB drives which during the OS install, I partition as follows;
c0t0d0s0/32GB
all the other slices I leave blank so I only have a / (root) partition on slice 0. I am trying to set up RAID 0+1 on c0t0d0s0 to go accross all 8 drives on slice 0.
But, when I create the RAID on /dev/md/rdsk/d100, I can't mount it as / (root) because it's being used/mounted by c0t0d0s0. So how do I set up the RAID to mount / (root) as 1 RAIDed drive (/dev/md/rdsk/d100)? When I comment out the line with / (root) mounted on /dev/rdsk/c0t0d0s0 and try to mount / (root) on /dev/md/rsk/d100, the server does not boot, and doesn't let me vi /etc/vfstab to uncomment that out because it says that it's a read-only file and I have to start all over.
By the way I am running Solaris 2.6 on an E450 server and am running Solstice DiskSuite to manage the RAID.
Oh yeah and I am creating my metadb's on s7 which is partitioned for 25MB on all 8 drives.
What am I doing wrong. Thanks guys.
[1025 byte] By [
netadmin27] at [2007-11-25 23:02:32]
# 1
I am a bit confused about what you are asking here. On a system that does not have a RAID controller ( like an E450 ), you must first have the operating system running before you configure SDS. So a typical set up might be to install the OE on c0t0d0, slice the disk into /, /var and swap and then mirror this to c0t1d0. After that is configured you can creat a software RAID 0 + 1 on the remaining 18 disks.
# 2
<table border="0" align="center" width="90%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td class="SmallText"><b>m-lennon wrote on Fri, 27 January 2006 12:46</b></td></tr><tr><td class="quote">
I am a bit confused about what you are asking here. On a system that does not have a RAID controller ( like an E450 ), you must first have the operating system running before you configure SDS. So a typical set up might be to install the OE on c0t0d0, slice the disk into /, /var and swap and then mirror this to c0t1d0. After that is configured you can creat a software RAID 0 + 1 on the remaining 18 disks.
</td></tr></table>
Ok, I was wondering how that worked because all of the other servers that I set up, the 1st thing you do, even before the OS is to set up the RAID. So the E450 doesn't have a RAID controller because it is connected to the SCSI controller?
So I should probly put / on slice 0, /var on slice 3, /swap on slice 1, and probably /usr on slice 4. I'm pretty sure /usr is going to be the biggest partition (probly make it about 32GB) because the app that I am installing installs to /usr/app. I'm not sure exactly where the data writes to though, I have to look. Wherever the data writes to is where I really need the RAID setup.
So all in all, I should really only be mirroring slice 4, where /usr is going to be. Right?
Thanks for the help man
I'm just trying to set it up the exact same way the other E450 this client has setup. They only have /dev/md/rdsk/d10 mounted as /. So that's what I was trying to do.
# 3
Also, is there a RAID controller that you can purchase for the E450?
# 4
the only raid card I have heard of has a very bad reputation...software raid...haroldkarl
# 5
I agree with HaroldKarl, use a software RAID configuration.
There <i><u>was</u></i> an adapter card that provided some RAID capabilities for that platform.
It would control the disks for one 8-disk backplane - four disks per SCSI channel on the card.
Sun has discontinued selling it for lack of demand.
Option X6542A ( the SRC/P card, part # 375-0078 )
<a href="http://sunsolve.sun.com/handbook_pub/Systems/E450/components.html#SCSI" target="_blank"> http://sunsolve.sun.com/handbook_pub/Systems/E450/components .html#SCSI</a>
One of its points of failure was that it had an integrated cache battery and when the battery died your RAID gave horrible performance.
You needed to bring the whole system down to get that NiCd battery replaced.
Search Docs.Sun.Com for keyword "src/p" and see the manuals for the HBA.
# 6
Thanks for the info guys.So is that what most people are doing, just RAIDing the partition with the data on it (/usr in my case). And not the / (root) partition?
# 7
What I would do is implement a different directory structure and plan your volume around that. For example you may want to use /usr/local to store software development packages, so an ideal set up might be:
/ on c0t0d0s0 mirrored to c0t1d0s0
/var on c0t0d0s3 mirrored to c0t1d0s3
/usr on c0t0d0s4 mirrored to c0t1d0s4
Then your volume:
/usr/local on c1t0d0s7 stripped with c1t1d0s7 c1t2d0s7 c1t3d0s7
You could then mirror that volume to another volume on a seperate backplane or controller like:
c2t0d0s7 c2t1d0s7 etc. etc.
# 8
yeah I think i will try that, but the problem i keep having is that i can not mirror a mounted file system (/ or /usr). Every time I set up a mirror on these mounted file systems, i then edit the etc/vfstab file and I set /usr to mount on /dev/md/rdsk/d100 which is the metadevice name. Then I reboot the system and all hell breaks loose and I have to start over with re-installing the OS.
what am i doing wrong? is there some special way of mirroring a already mounted file system such as / or /usr?
am i going to have the same problem mirroring /usr/local?
