[clue-tech] Need new hardware (was two monitors)

[Jack Parker]

(OT) Popped FC5 in, set up software RAID and (lazy me) told it to install
everything.  85% of the way through disk 1 it had a media error.  Tested the
CD - sure enough.  Coaster.  Burned a new one.  Tested it - coaster.
checked the SHA1 hash on the download - matches (yes I should have done that
first).  Ok, let's try a minimal install - that works.  Had no further
issues with the CD.

(SW RAID) 4 160GB SATAs.  deleted the default LVM0, created a 128GB raid
partition on each disk.  Put swap and / on portions of the remainder -
holding the rest in reserve.  Got through the entire install.

booted.  got stuck at GRUB for 20 minutes.  Try again.

I tried this a number of different ways:
/ on the RAID
/ on another disk
with and without grub loader.

Completed the install 2 or three times, but never got a boot.  Had a number
of failures during the install from application errors.

finally gave up and went into the BIOS and setup HW RAID.  While I was in
there I poked around and fiddled with this and that.  (idiot!)

Booted.  went into RAID screen.  Set up two RAID volumes - entire disk each
time.  Rebooted

Two RAID volumes - both healthy.  Get into FC5 setup - tries to start the
Xserver - I get the diagonal crosshairs and nothing else.

Ok.  Go back to BIOS and reload defaults.  One or two tries while I remember
that I had to shift the boot order and reset up the RAID.  Try again.  Same
thing.  Reload defaults again.  Shift boot order.  Same thing.  By now it's
stupid:30am, way past time to have fingers in the patient.  So I dropped you
a note wondering what you had run into.

Makes no sense that the RAID is related to the Xserver not starting properly
(but first rule of debugging is to eliminate variables).  Obviously I've
mucked something up in the BIOS which did not reset when I reloaded
defaults.  odds are it has to do with disabling the onboard video.

Unfortunately, I've been burning the candle at both ends and have been doing
lots of stupid things lately, more than my usual quotient.

j.


-----Original Message-----
From: clue-tech-bounces at cluedenver.org
[mailto:clue-tech-bounces at cluedenver.org]On Behalf Of erik at ezolan.com
Sent: Wednesday, June 07, 2006 9:36 AM
To: CLUE tech
Subject: RE: [clue-tech] Need new hardware (was two monitors)


> So tell me Erik...
>
> When you tried to set up a RAID server what sort of issues did you run
> into?
>
> I've been spending some quality time trying to get FC5 to come up.  Think
> I broke everything.

It's been a while, and it was a different setup, so I don't know how
helpful this will be...

1. The Linux drivers for SATA weren't fully implemented yet, the 2.6
kernel was still really new. I couldn't do a pure software RAID.
2. So I ended up buying a RAID card. Made a horrible choice and bought a
closed source Promise card that claimed to support Linux.
3. What they meant was that it supported specific flavors and versions of
Linux. RH9 was the last one they supported (At the time, FC3 was just
coming out. And any version of Windows.
4. Found an unsupported driver for FC2. Got it all installed and working,
and then had a friend who works with creating and testing RAIDs as part of
his job tell me I did it wrong.
5. Partitioned and formatted it correctly. It worked fine up to the point
where the frequent power outages (And my lack of battery backup) corrupted
the set.

Gave up and bought a NAS.

I'm afraid I'm not very knowledgeable on RAID under Linux. I'd be happy to
help you research any problems you're having though. So what's the story?

Erik Z

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