Hi all, I have a RAID5 array comprised of 4 devices (partitions). On top of the RAID, I have an LVM volume which contains my /home. Recently, I started getting a lot of SATA errors relating to one of my hard drives and I decided to remove it from the array. I do not know what I did, but after marking the device as failed, the RAID array would not assemble and drops me to a root shell. I am running ArchLinux and have whatever are the latest packages available - don't have the machine at hand, hence unable to specify exact versions. This is what I see when I run the various commands. It should be noted that the array to be assembled is actually /dev/md127. The array was actually created using SystemRescueCD. # cat /proc/mdstat Personalities : [raid6] [raid5] [raid4] md127 : inactive sdc2[1](S) sda2[0](S) sdb1[4](S) 480215144 blocks super 1.2 unused devices: <none> # mdadm -E --scan -v ARRAY /dev/md/0 level=raid5 metadata=1.2 num-devices=4 UUID=01b153ea:a93c7325:c13bf9cf:3195666f name=sysresccd:0 devices=/dev/sdc2,/dev/sdb1,/dev/sda2 # mdadm -E /dev/sda2 /dev/sda2: Magic : a92b4efc Version : 1.2 Feature Map : 0x0 Array UUID : 01b153ea:a93c7325:c13bf9cf:3195666f Name : sysresccd:0 Creation Time : Sat Mar 2 11:03:45 2013 Raid Level : raid5 Raid Devices : 4 Avail Dev Size : 312570400 (149.05 GiB 160.04 GB) Array Size : 468475392 (446.77 GiB 479.72 GB) Used Dev Size : 312316928 (148.92 GiB 159.91 GB) Data Offset : 2048 sectors Super Offset : 8 sectors State : active Device UUID : 3a44949c:aba25c05:76fb0146:3192a757 Update Time : Thu Sep 12 19:16:14 2013 Checksum : dacd122 - correct Events : 118427 Layout : left-symmetric Chunk Size : 512K Device Role : Active device 0 Array State : AA.A ('A' == active, '.' == missing) # mdadm -E /dev/sdb1 /dev/sdb1: Magic : a92b4efc Version : 1.2 Feature Map : 0x0 Array UUID : 01b153ea:a93c7325:c13bf9cf:3195666f Name : sysresccd:0 Creation Time : Sat Mar 2 11:03:45 2013 Raid Level : raid5 Raid Devices : 4 Avail Dev Size : 312317616 (148.92 GiB 159.91 GB) Array Size : 468475392 (446.77 GiB 479.72 GB) Used Dev Size : 312316928 (148.92 GiB 159.91 GB) Data Offset : 262144 sectors Super Offset : 8 sectors State : active Device UUID : 73aaeb8f:9e33caf5:7837c9f5:f3ac36ab Update Time : Thu Sep 12 19:16:14 2013 Checksum : f4c83ba7 - correct Events : 118427 Layout : left-symmetric Chunk Size : 512K Device Role : Active device 3 Array State : AA.A ('A' == active, '.' == missing) # mdadm -E /dev/sdc2 /dev/sdc2: Magic : a92b4efc Version : 1.2 Feature Map : 0x0 Array UUID : 01b153ea:a93c7325:c13bf9cf:3195666f Name : sysresccd:0 Creation Time : Sat Mar 2 11:03:45 2013 Raid Level : raid5 Raid Devices : 4 Avail Dev Size : 335542272 (160.00 GiB 171.80 GB) Array Size : 468475392 (446.77 GiB 479.72 GB) Used Dev Size : 312316928 (148.92 GiB 159.91 GB) Data Offset : 2048 sectors Super Offset : 8 sectors State : active Device UUID : 3da52be1:5dbcb8f2:90e0904b:1150045d Update Time : Thu Sep 12 19:16:14 2013 Checksum : 4bea74b3 - correct Events : 118427 Layout : left-symmetric Chunk Size : 512K Device Role : Active device 1 Array State : AA.A ('A' == active, '.' == missing) # mdadm -Avf /dev/md127 mdadm: looking for devices for /dev/md127 mdadm: no RAID superblock on /dev/dm-6 mdadm: no RAID superblock on /dev/dm-5 mdadm: no RAID superblock on /dev/dm-4 mdadm: no RAID superblock on /dev/dm-3 mdadm: no RAID superblock on /dev/dm-2 mdadm: no RAID superblock on /dev/dm-1 mdadm: no RAID superblock on /dev/dm-0 mdadm: /dev/sdc2 is busy - skipping mdadm: no RAID superblock on /dev/sdc1 mdadm: no RAID superblock on /dev/sdc mdadm: /dev/sdb1 is busy - skipping mdadm: no RAID superblock on /dev/sdb mdadm: no RAID superblock on /dev/sda3 mdadm: /dev/sda2 is busy - skipping mdadm: no RAID superblock on /dev/sda1 mdadm: no RAID superblock on /dev/sda Now, the question that arises is why are the devices: /dev/sda2, /dev/sdb1 and /dev/sdc2 busy, even though the RAID has not been assembled? How can I fix this? How can I fix "mdadm -E --scan -v" so that it shows the device as /dev/md127. If nothing else, how can I recover the data and recreate the RAID array? Have been struggling with this for some time. Any help would be gleefully accepted. Thanks, Sachin -- 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