Maybe someone can help me figure out how to get RAID 0 up and running under FC 4. My system has a pair of SATA II drives and an nforce 410 chipset. I have installed the latest nvidia drivers for that chipset (another story - they are for audio and ethernet). Currently I have it booting off an external USB hard drive. The BIOS is configured to place the two hard drives in RAID 0 configuration. It says the RAID array is healthy. I have read as many HOWTOs and message threads as I have been able to find on the subject.
The hard drives are brand new. There is no data or partitions from other operating systems to preserve. Here is what I have tried.
1. From FC4 (running on the USB drive), try to see the RAID array using dmraid. Nada. (I tried dmraid -s, dmraid -ay, dmraid -b. That last command does show the USB drive.)
2. Attempt to install FC4 onto the RAID array. Disk Druid complains that it does not see any disks.
I know some people advise to turn off "fake raid" support in the BIOS and just do software raid. So, here are my questions:
A) is there any way at all (from inside FC4 when it is running or during install) to get at the raid array that I have made in the BIOS?
B) if the answer to the above is no, and I need to disable RAID in the BIOS, do I still use dmraid (because the nv_sata driver is involved) to set up the array under FC4? Or can I accomplish everything in Disk Druid during the install? Or do I need to set things up in Disk Druid and then activate the RAID array in dmraid?
C) if the answer to A) is yes, what advantage would there be to disabling the BIOS RAID anyway? (I'm just curious.)
When I finally do get this working, perhaps I should write a HOWTO for this - a real step-by-step cookbook. OTOH, FC5 is coming soon...
TIA
Debbie
Debbie Deutsch kirjoitti viestissään (lähetysaika lauantai, 28. tammikuuta 2006 17:20):
The hard drives are brand new. There is no data or partitions from other operating systems to preserve.
In that case, forget dmraid and use the native RAID setup in Disk Druid instead. Dmraid exists only for dual-boot compatibility with Windows.
A) is there any way at all (from inside FC4 when it is running or during install) to get at the raid array that I have made in the BIOS?
If dmraid doesn't see it, then no.
B) if the answer to the above is no, and I need to disable RAID in the BIOS, do I still use dmraid (because the nv_sata driver is involved) to set up the array under FC4?
No, dmraid isn't used at all if you choose to use native software RAID.
The hard drives are brand new. There is no data or partitions from other operating systems to preserve.
In that case, forget dmraid and use the native RAID setup in Disk Druid instead. Dmraid exists only for dual-boot compatibility with Windows.
A) is there any way at all (from inside FC4 when it is running or during install) to get at the raid array that I have made
in the BIOS?
If dmraid doesn't see it, then no.
B) if the answer to the above is no, and I need to disable
RAID in the
BIOS, do I still use dmraid (because the nv_sata driver is
involved)
to set up the array under FC4?
No, dmraid isn't used at all if you choose to use native software RAID.
-- Markku Kolkka markku.kolkka@iki.fi
Thanks, Markku. Since my original post I have discovered that the FC5 installer will have greater support for "fake RAID", including my system's chipset. The FC5 installer recognized the RAID array I had configured in BIOS and just did the right thing, including letting me boot from the RAID array. So, I am thinking of just waiting six weeks and working off the external USB drive in the interim.
Debbie
Debbie Deutsch wrote:
Maybe someone can help me figure out how to get RAID 0 up and running under FC 4. My system has a pair of SATA II drives and an nforce 410 chipset. I have installed the latest nvidia drivers for that chipset (another story - they are for audio and ethernet). Currently I have it booting off an external USB hard drive. The BIOS is configured to place the two hard drives in RAID 0 configuration. It says the RAID array is healthy. I have read as many HOWTOs and message threads as I have been able to find on the subject.
The hard drives are brand new. There is no data or partitions from other operating systems to preserve. Here is what I have tried.
- From FC4 (running on the USB drive), try to see the RAID array using
dmraid. Nada. (I tried dmraid -s, dmraid -ay, dmraid -b. That last command does show the USB drive.)
- Attempt to install FC4 onto the RAID array. Disk Druid complains that it
does not see any disks.
I know some people advise to turn off "fake raid" support in the BIOS and just do software raid. So, here are my questions:
A) is there any way at all (from inside FC4 when it is running or during install) to get at the raid array that I have made in the BIOS?
B) if the answer to the above is no, and I need to disable RAID in the BIOS, do I still use dmraid (because the nv_sata driver is involved) to set up the array under FC4? Or can I accomplish everything in Disk Druid during the install? Or do I need to set things up in Disk Druid and then activate the RAID array in dmraid?
C) if the answer to A) is yes, what advantage would there be to disabling the BIOS RAID anyway? (I'm just curious.)
When I finally do get this working, perhaps I should write a HOWTO for this
- a real step-by-step cookbook. OTOH, FC5 is coming soon...
TIA
Debbie
Forget about the bios settings for RAID. They need special software and that may be a Windows Only issue. Install both SATA cards and then configure them using raid tools.
My bios settings did nothing to get the RAID 1 working on my computer. Using the raid tools I had the drives up and running in no time. Note, I only use the RAID drives for my home directory.
A benefit of using totally software raid is if you want to add more drives. It is very easy and you can move the drives around between controllers without much work.
I added two drives and a controller, moved one of my drives from the MB SATA port to the new controller port. Put one of the new drives on the empty MB port and the other on the new controller. Booted the machine and the original RAID was up and running. Configured the new drives as RAID 1. Created an LVM and then moved all my data to the new LVM. Converted the old RAID array to LVM and added it to the Volume and resized the partition. It was just that easy.
Debbie Deutsch wrote:
Maybe someone can help me figure out how to get RAID 0 up
and running
under FC 4. My system has a pair of SATA II drives and an
nforce 410
chipset.
<snip>
I know some people advise to turn off "fake raid" support
in the BIOS
and just do software raid. So, here are my questions:
A) is there any way at all (from inside FC4 when it is running or during install) to get at the raid array that I have made in the BIOS?
B) if the answer to the above is no, and I need to disable
RAID in the
BIOS, do I still use dmraid (because the nv_sata driver is
involved)
to set up the array under FC4? Or can I accomplish
everything in Disk
Druid during the install? Or do I need to set things up in
Disk Druid
and then activate the RAID array in dmraid?
C) if the answer to A) is yes, what advantage would there be to disabling the BIOS RAID anyway? (I'm just curious.)
When I finally do get this working, perhaps I should write
a HOWTO for
this
- a real step-by-step cookbook. OTOH, FC5 is coming soon...
TIA
Debbie
Forget about the bios settings for RAID. They need special software and that may be a Windows Only issue. Install both SATA cards and then configure them using raid tools.
My bios settings did nothing to get the RAID 1 working on my computer. Using the raid tools I had the drives up and running in no time. Note, I only use the RAID drives for my home directory.
A benefit of using totally software raid is if you want to add more drives. It is very easy and you can move the drives around between controllers without much work.
I added two drives and a controller, moved one of my drives from the MB SATA port to the new controller port. Put one of the new drives on the empty MB port and the other on the new controller. Booted the machine and the original RAID was up and running. Configured the new drives as RAID 1. Created an LVM and then moved all my data to the new LVM. Converted the old RAID array to LVM and added it to the Volume and resized the partition. It was just that easy.
Thanks very much, Robin. That looks like the way to go for FC4. However, since my original post I experimented with FC5 T2. My hard drives were configured as a bootable RAID array in the BIOS. The FC5 installer did not bat an eyelash. It asked me if it would be okay to erase all the information so it could format and partition /dev/mapper/xxxx. (I don't remember what xxxx was; it was alphabet soup that probably identified the RAID controller and the array.) After that, everything just worked. The installer treated the RAID array just as I would expect it to treat a true hardware RAID array. To ice the cake, I could even boot from it without doing anything special. This is exactly what I want to be able to do.
I see your point about the flexibility that LVM offers. Thanks for explaining. It's certainly something to bear in mind. In this case, however, the system is a small-form-factor machine with room for two drives only. So, the expanded RAID support in the FC5 installer looks very attractive to me!
Debbie
-
Debbie Deutsch -
Markku Kolkka -
Robin Laing