Hello, This is my first message to the list, first at all, apologize about my horrible english, I will try to do my best. I have 8 200GB new SATA HDs, my distro is Ubuntu 5.04, mdadm v1.9.0 and kernel 2.6.11.8. I create the array with the following config: mdadm --create --verbose /dev/md0 --chunk=512 --level=raid5 --raid-devices=8 /dev/sda1 /dev/sdb1 /dev/sdc1 /dev/sdd1 /dev/sde1 /dev/sdf1 /dev/sdg1 /dev/sdh1 I also setup the /etc/mdadm/mdadm.conf root@Torero-2:/usr/src # cat /etc/mdadm/mdadm.conf DEVICE /dev/sd[abcdefgh]1 ARRAY /dev/md0 level=raid5 num-devices=8 UUID=f28b2043:a30358af:1c6d9640:49302af7 devices=/dev/sdh1,/dev/sdg1,/dev/sdf1,/dev/sde1,/dev/sdd1,/dev/sdc1,/dev/sdb 1,/dev/sda1 auto=yes This start creating the array that spent severals hour until /proc/mdstat reports active array and it supposed to be ready to work, but my problem is the following, after creating the array it began to do "strange things"... When the create command finish proc/mdstats report the following: root@Torero-2:/usr/src # cat /proc/mdstat Personalities : [linear] [raid5] md0 : active raid5 sda1[0] sdh1[8] sdg1[6] sdf1[5] sde1[4] sdd1[3] sdc1[9](F) sdb1[1] 1367507456 blocks level 5, 256k chunk, algorithm 2 [8/6] [UU_UUUU_] unused devices: <none> All seems to be right here, bu I saw activity in the hdd led so i did a mdadm --detail, an obtained this: root@Torero-2:/usr/src # mdadm --detail /dev/md0 /dev/md0: Version : 00.90.01 Creation Time : Tue May 24 20:02:28 2005 Raid Level : raid5 Array Size : 1367507456 (1304.16 GiB 1400.33 GB) Device Size : 195358208 (186.31 GiB 200.05 GB) Raid Devices : 8 Total Devices : 8 Preferred Minor : 0 Persistence : Superblock is persistent Update Time : Sun May 29 17:29:45 2005 State : clean, degraded Active Devices : 6 Working Devices : 7 Failed Devices : 1 Spare Devices : 1 Layout : left-symmetric Chunk Size : 256K UUID : f28b2043:a30358af:1c6d9640:49302af7 Events : 0.48957213 Number Major Minor RaidDevice State 0 8 1 0 active sync /dev/sda1 1 8 17 1 active sync /dev/sdb1 2 0 0 - removed 3 8 49 3 active sync /dev/sdd1 4 8 65 4 active sync /dev/sde1 5 8 81 5 active sync /dev/sdf1 6 8 97 6 active sync /dev/sdg1 7 0 0 - removed 8 8 113 7 spare rebuilding /dev/sdh1 9 8 33 - faulty /dev/sdc1 Really strange, also cpu load is high... load average: 1.89, 1.87, 1.82. And in the system logs I have thousands of messages like this, that not were generating during the create command: May 29 17:34:45 localhost kernel: .<6>md: syncing RAID array md0 May 29 17:34:45 localhost kernel: md: minimum _guaranteed_ reconstruction speed: 1000 KB/sec/disc. May 29 17:34:45 localhost kernel: md: using maximum available idle IO bandwith (but not more than 200000 KB/sec) for reconstruction. May 29 17:34:45 localhost kernel: md: using 128k window, over a total of 195358208 blocks. May 29 17:34:45 localhost kernel: md: md0: sync done. May 29 17:34:45 localhost kernel: .<6>md: syncing RAID array md0 May 29 17:34:45 localhost kernel: md: minimum _guaranteed_ reconstruction speed: 1000 KB/sec/disc. May 29 17:34:45 localhost kernel: md: using maximum available idle IO bandwith (but not more than 200000 KB/sec) for reconstruction. May 29 17:34:45 localhost kernel: md: using 128k window, over a total of 195358208 blocks. May 29 17:34:45 localhost kernel: md: md0: sync done. I really have to stop the array because the log files are really getting HUGE. So I did a mdadm -S /dev/md0 ,so it stops the array and the generating of the messages. If I try to run the array again it have no effect... root@Torero-2:/usr/src # mdadm -R /dev/md0 mdadm: failed to run array /dev/md0: Invalid argument root@Torero-2:/usr/src # mdadm -A /dev/md0 mdadm: /dev/md0 assembled from 6 drives and 1 spare - not enough to start the array. root@Torero-2:/usr/src # cat /proc/mdstat Personalities : [linear] [raid5] md0 : inactive sda1[0] sdh1[8] sdg1[6] sdf1[5] sde1[4] sdd1[3] sdc1[2] sdb1[1] 1562865664 blocks unused devices: <none> root@Torero-2:/usr/src # mdadm --detail /dev/md0 mdadm: md device /dev/md0 does not appear to be active. root@Torero-2:/usr/src # mdadm -R /dev/md0 mdadm: failed to run array /dev/md0: Invalid argument I have tried this several times, I have even earsed and checked each drive with: mdadm --zero-superblock /dev/sdd dd if=/dev/sdd of=/dev/null bs=1024k badblocks -svw /dev/sdd But all is ok, the hardware (HDs) are fine... But when I tried to setup it again I have the same problems.So it must be a config problem or a software problem. Anyone can help me with this raid? I am a little desperate... Thanks to all in advance... Paco Zafra. PD: I sent this mail previusly from an unathorized mail account, I have wait some minutes and I didn't saw it in the mail list so I resend it again. I hope the mail didn't get repeated. - To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-raid" in the body of a message to majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html