Hi all i had a sas driver failure leading to a failure of 4 drives out of 7+1 during a raid5 grow reshape.... first i tried mdadm -Avv then -Afvv but it still doesn't work... is this recoverable? bernstein@server:~$ sudo mdadm --assemble -vv /dev/md5 /dev/sd[efghijkl]1 mdadm: looking for devices for /dev/md5 mdadm: /dev/sde1 is identified as a member of /dev/md5, slot 5. mdadm: /dev/sdf1 is identified as a member of /dev/md5, slot 4. mdadm: /dev/sdg1 is identified as a member of /dev/md5, slot 6. mdadm: /dev/sdh1 is identified as a member of /dev/md5, slot -1. mdadm: /dev/sdi1 is identified as a member of /dev/md5, slot 0. mdadm: /dev/sdj1 is identified as a member of /dev/md5, slot 2. mdadm: /dev/sdk1 is identified as a member of /dev/md5, slot 1. mdadm: /dev/sdl1 is identified as a member of /dev/md5, slot 3. mdadm:/dev/md5 has an active reshape - checking if critical section needs to be restored mdadm: No backup metadata on device-6 mdadm: No backup metadata on device-7 mdadm: added /dev/sdi1 to /dev/md5 as 0 (possibly out of date) mdadm: added /dev/sdk1 to /dev/md5 as 1 (possibly out of date) mdadm: added /dev/sdj1 to /dev/md5 as 2 (possibly out of date) mdadm: added /dev/sdl1 to /dev/md5 as 3 (possibly out of date) mdadm: added /dev/sde1 to /dev/md5 as 5 mdadm: added /dev/sdg1 to /dev/md5 as 6 mdadm: added /dev/sdh1 to /dev/md5 as -1 mdadm: added /dev/sdf1 to /dev/md5 as 4 mdadm: /dev/md5 assembled from 3 drives and 1 spare - not enough to start the array. so i know the 4 drives attached to the sas card are now out of date, verified by: bernstein@server:~$ sudo mdadm -E /dev/sdl1 /dev/sdl1: Magic : a92b4efc Version : 1.2 Feature Map : 0x4 Array UUID : dac93bfc:702d2146:9aed480b:916cc4fe Name : server:5 (local to host server) Creation Time : Fri Apr 15 20:16:31 2011 Raid Level : raid5 Raid Devices : 7 Avail Dev Size : 1953521392 (931.51 GiB 1000.20 GB) Array Size : 5860563840 (5589.07 GiB 6001.22 GB) Used Dev Size : 1953521280 (931.51 GiB 1000.20 GB) Data Offset : 272 sectors Super Offset : 8 sectors State : clean Device UUID : 6833d9f1:6b0461f1:4a784ee9:8e91d2f9 Reshape pos'n : 4031497728 (3844.74 GiB 4128.25 GB) Delta Devices : 1 (6->7) Update Time : Thu Jun 06 04:37:24 2013 Checksum : cde0f44f - correct Events : 3428 Layout : left-symmetric Chunk Size : 64K Device Role : Active device 3 Array State : AAAAAAA ('A' == active, '.' == missing) bernstein@server:~$ sudo mdadm -E /dev/sdj1 /dev/sdj1: Magic : a92b4efc Version : 1.2 Feature Map : 0x4 Array UUID : dac93bfc:702d2146:9aed480b:916cc4fe Name : server:5 (local to host server) Creation Time : Fri Apr 15 20:16:31 2011 Raid Level : raid5 Raid Devices : 7 Avail Dev Size : 1953521392 (931.51 GiB 1000.20 GB) Array Size : 5860563840 (5589.07 GiB 6001.22 GB) Used Dev Size : 1953521280 (931.51 GiB 1000.20 GB) Data Offset : 272 sectors Super Offset : 8 sectors State : clean Device UUID : 6a4e2b2a:67487ba6:6ea4bad8:1a528bf3 Reshape pos'n : 4031497728 (3844.74 GiB 4128.25 GB) Delta Devices : 1 (6->7) Update Time : Thu Jun 06 04:47:33 2013 Checksum : a46e425d - correct Events : 3430 Layout : left-symmetric Chunk Size : 64K Device Role : Active device 2 Array State : .AA.AAA ('A' == active, '.' == missing) bernstein@server:~$ sudo mdadm -E /dev/sdk1 /dev/sdk1: Magic : a92b4efc Version : 1.2 Feature Map : 0x4 Array UUID : dac93bfc:702d2146:9aed480b:916cc4fe Name : server:5 (local to host server) Creation Time : Fri Apr 15 20:16:31 2011 Raid Level : raid5 Raid Devices : 7 Avail Dev Size : 1953521392 (931.51 GiB 1000.20 GB) Array Size : 5860563840 (5589.07 GiB 6001.22 GB) Used Dev Size : 1953521280 (931.51 GiB 1000.20 GB) Data Offset : 272 sectors Super Offset : 8 sectors State : clean Device UUID : 0d82174d:83124ce9:947dea32:77cf5cdb Reshape pos'n : 4032783744 (3845.96 GiB 4129.57 GB) Delta Devices : 1 (6->7) Update Time : Thu Jun 06 04:48:55 2013 Checksum : 4c53d5f1 - correct Events : 3431 Layout : left-symmetric Chunk Size : 64K Device Role : Active device 1 Array State : .AA.AAA ('A' == active, '.' == missing) bernstein@server:~$ sudo mdadm -E /dev/sdi1 /dev/sdi1: Magic : a92b4efc Version : 1.2 Feature Map : 0x4 Array UUID : dac93bfc:702d2146:9aed480b:916cc4fe Name : server:5 (local to host server) Creation Time : Fri Apr 15 20:16:31 2011 Raid Level : raid5 Raid Devices : 7 Avail Dev Size : 1953521392 (931.51 GiB 1000.20 GB) Array Size : 5860563840 (5589.07 GiB 6001.22 GB) Used Dev Size : 1953521280 (931.51 GiB 1000.20 GB) Data Offset : 272 sectors Super Offset : 8 sectors State : clean Device UUID : 2fd2c79c:2c54ee4a:546057d7:8db5e2be Reshape pos'n : 4031497728 (3844.74 GiB 4128.25 GB) Delta Devices : 1 (6->7) Update Time : Thu Jun 06 04:40:39 2013 Checksum : 8570efa1 - correct Events : 3429 Layout : left-symmetric Chunk Size : 64K Device Role : Active device 0 Array State : AAA.AAA ('A' == active, '.' == missing) compared to the rest : bernstein@server:~$ sudo mdadm -E /dev/sde1 /dev/sde1: Magic : a92b4efc Version : 1.2 Feature Map : 0x4 Array UUID : dac93bfc:702d2146:9aed480b:916cc4fe Name : server:5 (local to host server) Creation Time : Fri Apr 15 20:16:31 2011 Raid Level : raid5 Raid Devices : 7 Avail Dev Size : 1953521392 (931.51 GiB 1000.20 GB) Array Size : 5860563840 (5589.07 GiB 6001.22 GB) Used Dev Size : 1953521280 (931.51 GiB 1000.20 GB) Data Offset : 272 sectors Super Offset : 8 sectors State : active Device UUID : cedef881:6080f029:2d123ffc:a8fd8e84 Reshape pos'n : 4032783744 (3845.96 GiB 4129.57 GB) Delta Devices : 1 (6->7) Update Time : Thu Jun 06 15:35:42 2012 Checksum : 345efafb - correct Events : 3440 Layout : left-symmetric Chunk Size : 64K Device Role : Active device 5 Array State : ....AAA ('A' == active, '.' == missing) so i tried forcing: bernstein@server:~$ sudo mdadm --assemble -fvv /dev/md5 /dev/sd[efghijkl]1 mdadm: looking for devices for /dev/md5 mdadm: /dev/sde1 is identified as a member of /dev/md5, slot 5. mdadm: /dev/sdf1 is identified as a member of /dev/md5, slot 4. mdadm: /dev/sdg1 is identified as a member of /dev/md5, slot 6. mdadm: /dev/sdh1 is identified as a member of /dev/md5, slot -1. mdadm: /dev/sdi1 is identified as a member of /dev/md5, slot 0. mdadm: /dev/sdj1 is identified as a member of /dev/md5, slot 2. mdadm: /dev/sdk1 is identified as a member of /dev/md5, slot 1. mdadm: /dev/sdl1 is identified as a member of /dev/md5, slot 3. mdadm: forcing event count in /dev/sdk1(1) from 3431 upto 3440 mdadm: forcing event count in /dev/sdj1(2) from 3430 upto 3440 mdadm: forcing event count in /dev/sdi1(0) from 3429 upto 3440 mdadm: forcing event count in /dev/sdl1(3) from 3428 upto 3440 mdadm: clearing FAULTY flag for device 7 in /dev/md5 for /dev/sdl1 mdadm: Marking array /dev/md5 as 'clean' mdadm:/dev/md5 has an active reshape - checking if critical section needs to be restored mdadm: No backup metadata on device-6 mdadm: No backup metadata on device-7 mdadm: added /dev/sdk1 to /dev/md5 as 1 mdadm: added /dev/sdj1 to /dev/md5 as 2 mdadm: added /dev/sdl1 to /dev/md5 as 3 mdadm: added /dev/sdf1 to /dev/md5 as 4 mdadm: added /dev/sde1 to /dev/md5 as 5 mdadm: added /dev/sdg1 to /dev/md5 as 6 mdadm: added /dev/sdh1 to /dev/md5 as -1 mdadm: added /dev/sdi1 to /dev/md5 as 0 mdadm: /dev/md5 assembled from 7 drives and 1 spare - not enough to start the array. so now i have all devices, but it still doesn't work. any help is appreciated! thx -- 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