Hi, Folk I've bad experience with a two SCSI Seagate 73,4 10K.6 Ultra320 disks failed one by one in my software RAID5 from 8th SCSI Disks -- Hot Swapable. From /var/log/messages i see /dev/sdb1 failed first, and after /dev/sda1 failed second. RAID5 stop your functionality. Then i reboot my Fedora Core 3 Linux #uname -a Linux server 2.6.9-1.667smp #1 SMP Tue Nov 2 14:59:52 EST 2004 i686 i686 i386 GNU/Linux and in rescue mode begin with recover procedure. #mdadm -V mdadm - v1.6.0 - 4 June 2004 I success made mdadm -A /dev/md0 -f /dev/sd[acdefgh]1, and after assemble my RAID5 i add failed first /dev/sdb1, mdadm /dev/md0 -a /dev/sdb1. When, with mdadm create my RAID5 i use all 8 SCSI Disks, but not define "--spare-devices=1" by --create options. Is possible to add one more nine SCSI Seagate 73,4 10K.6 Ultra320 disk like spare one. And if one from 8th SCSI Disks failed the mdadm will automatic use this spare for reconstruction. How can do this if possible with mdadm or if add in /etc/mdadm.conf something like follows: changes in [2]: spares=1 /dev/sdj1 [1]original /etc/mdadm.conf # mdadm.conf written out by anaconda DEVICE /dev/sd[abcdefgh]1 MAILADDR admin@xxxxxxxxxx ARRAY /dev/md0 super-minor=0 ARRAY /dev/md0 level=raid5 num-devices=8 UUID=656519ce:b6b59cb5:d5a5aaf2:25a61506 devices=/dev/sda1,/dev/sdb1,/dev/sdc1,/dev/sdd1,/dev/sde1,/dev/sdf1,/dev/sdg1,/dev/sdh1 ============================================================================ [2]after possible modification /etc/mdadm.conf # mdadm.conf written out by anaconda DEVICE /dev/sd[abcdefgh]1 MAILADDR admin@xxxxxxxxxx ARRAY /dev/md0 super-minor=0 ARRAY /dev/md0 level=raid5 num-devices=9 spare=1 UUID=656519ce:b6b59cb5:d5a5aaf2:25a61506 devices=/dev/sda1,/dev/sdb1,/dev/sdc1,/dev/sdd1,/dev/sde1,/dev/sdf1,/dev/sdg1,/dev/sdh1,/dev/sdj1 ============================================================================ Current mdadm -D /dev/md0 is follows: /dev/md0: Version : 00.90.01 Creation Time : Wed Aug 3 14:37:00 2005 Raid Level : raid5 Array Size : 501773440 (478.53 GiB 513.82 GB) Device Size : 71681920 (68.36 GiB 73.40 GB) Raid Devices : 8 Total Devices : 8 Preferred Minor : 0 Persistence : Superblock is persistent Update Time : Fri Jan 6 17:37:48 2006 State : clean Active Devices : 8 Working Devices : 8 Failed Devices : 0 Spare Devices : 0 Layout : left-symmetric Chunk Size : 64K Number Major Minor RaidDevice State 0 8 1 0 active sync /dev/sda1 1 8 17 1 active sync /dev/sdb1 2 8 33 2 active sync /dev/sdc1 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 8 113 7 active sync /dev/sdh1 UUID : 656519ce:b6b59cb5:d5a5aaf2:25a61506 Events : 0.2120052 Thanks for all answares! *********************** * Happy New 2k6 Year ! * *********************** - 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