On Fri, 18 Jan 2002, Stephan Hiltenkamp wrote:
> Seems like many people are trying the same as me, so here a summary:
>
> Config:
> MSI K7T266R with onboard Promise FastTrak lite ATA-RAID
> 2x 40GB IBM UDMA100 as RAID 0
>
> SUSE 7.2 (OKok, I'm no RedHat, but I have used your kindly supplied
> Problem: How to install the system in a RAID partition and boot from it.
>
> [...]
>
> What I have done:
> - Installed a minimal system on an idle third disk; the ugly part of it
> - you need a temporary space to put your system. The problem is
> obviously how to put a bootable system together, from where you can
> continue the installation with an installation routine that doesn't
> support your hardware - mounting part of the array as single disk and
> part of it as raid creates some VERY strange behaviour (I have tried to
> move a small partition for installation to the very end of /dev/hde and
> then install to RAID partitions at the beginning of the disks - no way).
> Hence the third disk
Promise use hardisks last two sectors for array descriptions, don't use
them in partitions..! or-> VERY strange behavior may occur...
> - Got Kernel 2.4.9 and patched it with ac14
> - Compiled RAID support for Promise in (will probably also work for
> Highpoint)
> - booted the new kernel - now the system recognizes the array at boot
> time and can mount it directly
> - partitioned and formatted the array for my new system
> - copied the system as was onto the new partitions
dd if=/dev/hdc? of=/dev/ataraid/d0p1?
fsck /dev/ataraid/d0p1
resize /dev/ataraid/d0p1 ?
> - copied the kernel on a floppy and booted from Win98 using loadlin -
> FROM THE ARRAY NOW (root device = /dev/ataraid/d0p*)
dd if=/boot/bzImage2.4.9-ac14 of=/dev/fd0
rdev /dev/fd0 /dev/ataraid/d0p1
make kernel-floppy to mount root device from ataraid... no need to use
m$-windows...
> - removed the third disk from the system.
> - installed the rest of the system with very nice disk performance :-))
:)
>
> A more elegant way would be to take the SUSE (or RedHat for that matter)
> installation boot-disk, unpack the ramdisk image, build a new one with
> the new kernel, put everything back together, boot and install from that
> disk. What I don't know is, how the part of the installation system that
> resides on the CD will react to that boot-disk.
In suse, kernel is in first disk, it is easy task to replace, to make more
generic installation need replacing modules also. But easier is compile
all what you need in kernel... After ftp:ing (or cdrom) installation
system to ramdisk you have working shell to do /dev/ataraid/d0 partions
etc... If YaST can't... (SuSe installation disk is vfat formated, so
kernel is easy to replace...) I have not newer installed SuSE in ataraid.
Debian is more easily to install, you don't need third disk etc. Only need
is debian rescue disk where kernel is replaced ataraid version. (fat)
Boot with rescue disk, kernel find ataraid, but there are not ataraid
device nodes, take shell (alt+f2) cd /dev/ and make them. If you want use
debian installation program you can make device nodes diffrent names like
hda, hda1 etc...
If not, run fdisk, make partitions, format them (ext2, reiser...) Mount
root-partiton to /target dir and switch back installation program. Install
base system.
Reboot with rescue disk and give correct 'root=/dev/ataraid/d0p1' string.
Continue installation... Upgrade lilo, compile new kernel, install modules
make /dev/ataraid/ nodes. Make correct fstab. Configure & run lilo (or
grup). After that you can try boot...
>
> I have just done the same thing with SuSE 7.3. Some comments, though:
> - replace kernel 2.4.9 with 2.4.17
> - patched and installed LILO
Ideal is do installation without third harddisk, directly to array. Debian
is easy, suse little harder, redhat, I have no knownledge...
> -One thing, that happened to me with reiserfs: while copying my system
> to the
> array with cpio, all files on the reiserfs / were there and readable,
> but not executable had to do it again with cp. cpio worked fine for
> ext2.
>
Maybe dd is beter way to do system transfers...?
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