On Sunday May 14, Dexter.Filmore@xxxxxx wrote: > Am Sonntag, 14. Mai 2006 16:50 schrieben Sie: > > > What do I need to do when I want to install a different distro on the > > > machine with a raid5 array? > > > Which files do I need? /etc/mdadm.conf? /etc/raittab? both? > > > > MD doesn't need any files to function, since it can auto-assemble > > arrays based on their superblocks (for partition-type 0xfd). > > I see. Now an issue arises someone else here mentioned: > My first attempt was to use the entire disks, then I was hinted that this > approach wasn't too hot so I made partitions. I always use entire disks if I want the entire disks raided (sounds obvious, doesn't it...) I only use partitions when I want to vary the raid layout for different parts of the disk (e.g. mirrored root, mirrored swap, raid6 for the rest). But that certainly doesn't mean it is wrong to use partitions for the whole disk. > Now the devices have all two superblocks, the one left from the first try > which are now kinda orphaned and those now active. > Can I trust mdadm to handle this properly on its own? You can tell mdadm where to look. If you want to be sure that it won't look at entire drives, only partitions, then a line like DEVICES /dev/[hs]d*[0-1] in /etc/mdadm.conf might be what you want. However as you should be listing the uuids in /etc/mdadm.conf, any superblock with an unknown uuid will easily be ignored. If you are relying nf 0xfd autodetect to assemble your arrays, then obviously the entire-disk superblock will be ignored (because they wont be in the right place in any partition). NeilBrown - 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
