[WBEL-users] RAID

[Scott Silva]

Alon wrote:
> I actually found an email from a coleague who did a semi-walkthrough
> with me on the setup.
> I know the HowTos are great, but they are very technical.
> I can read them but I find that they are hard to implement as they are
> explaining the benefits, and suggest
> that You should configure.. etc.. but no real steps and orders of what
> to click.
> So it feels like you are invited to this great party.. and you are
> standing in front of this door,.. and you hear
> the party going and everyone excited, but you can't open the door
> because it has a combination lock.
> 
> We had some other issues with our server and actually returned it back
> to the supplier and we are getting
> a new server instead.
> 
> Since I have the old instructions of how I've done it last time, I'm
> going to actually try and build a picture
> by picture of screen shots of how I configured the RAID-1 (for the
> dummies like me who need someone
> to hold their hands).
> 
> Here is another thing:
> 
> With the LVM option, I never actually had any experience.
> It would be great to play with it,. the only problem that I'm having is
> that I'm never having the physical hardware
> long enough to play with it and experiment with it.
> 
> But,. while I'm on that subject, I remember that when I did the RAID-1
> option few months ago, I tried to test it
> and see what happens if I pull one of the HDs out and try to connect
> them one at a time to simulate a
> HD's failure.
> To my understanding, I was expecting to see both HDs (each in his turn)
> boot up and no problem.
> However, I found that only one of them was booting up correctly.
> 
> Was I missing something? (very likely).
> Would I encounter something like that with the LVM?

You still need some means to boot if the failed drive is the one with
the bootsector  on it. I have a boot floppy with grub on it, all set up
to boot from the mirror drive just in case. I have several copies, and
leave one part way into the floppy drive.
If you were creative and careful when you updated your boot loader, you
could probably just swap the failed boot drive with the mirror.

-- 
"If you have ever eaten crow,
It don't taste like chicken!!"