----- Original Message ----- From: "Marcin" <migor@xxxxx> To: "ataraid" <ataraid-list@xxxxxxxxxx> Sent: Saturday, January 18, 2003 11:15 AM Subject: Mixing ataraid and software raid > Hi, > I've got Gigabyte GA-7ZXR motherboard with Promise 20265 FastTrack Lite raid > controller. After disk failure, I've decided to setup raid 1, bought two > Seagate Barracuda IV 40 GB drivers, and configure them with Promise Bios > utility. I created 4 Linux and one WinXP Pro NTFS (still waiting for > SuperMemo for Linux...) partitions. I restored Linux from backup, changed > /dev/hdaX to /dev/ataraid/d0pX in /etc/fstab, modified lilo.conf, and > everything run fine. Than I turned off power, disconnected one drive (to > simulate drive failure) and ... "oops" during loading ataraid appeared > (2.4.19 from Debian). The same oops shows in 2.4.20-ac2. > > Strongly disappointed, I came to the following question: is it possible (and > safe, of course) to use software raid-1 (which I succesfully run on several > others computers) for Linux, making /dev/hdeX and /dev/hdgX parts of the > software raid array, and simulaneously take advantage of Promise feature in > WinXP using FastTrack drivers array? Yes it is. I got scared reading about experiences people have when using ataraid and one drive dies. I decided to bail out while I still had a working system. I modified my GRUB lines to pass root=/dev/hdaX to the kernel instead of /dev/ataraid/... and also modified /etc/fstab, then shut down, plugged the drives into the standard IDE ports instead of the FastTrak ports, and then started up - no problems! Then I used cpio to copy the root volume to another temp location and set up software raid /dev/mdX devices on the disks and then cpio'd the root volume back into place on the software raid devices (I have a little /boot volume that isn't raided), modified grub and fstab AGAIN (this time, to /dev/md0) and rebooted - voila! Software RAID and my system is literally 4 times as fast (storage throughput) as it was when running ataraid! Dave...
