*This Reply from / Antwort von / Antwoord van:* LLLActive@GMX.Net - 2011-06-09 - 01:25:41 +0200 Thanks for the replies Per, Andrew and David. @David: I actually have a Linux unsympathetic Gigabyte GA-K8N Ultra-9, with two onboard Raids; Sil 3114 (Silicon Image) and Nvidia. The Sil only works if it is set to Raid 0,1 or 10. The Nvidia allows the disks to be used as either Raid or singles. These Raids are also fakeraids. lspci 00:07.0 IDE interface: nVidia Corporation CK804 Serial ATA Controller (rev a3) 01:09.0 RAID bus controller: Silicon Image, Inc. SiI 3114 [SATALink/SATARaid] Serial ATA Controller (rev 02) So I thought the JMicron JMB 362/363 AHCI, with its advertised seperate BIOS and setup independent from OS, will be a proper Raid (see below). Some say they got it to work with a firmware driver at install time (F6 I think with openSuSE 11.4). @Per: I tried the methods with pata_jmicron and dmraid. They are loaded, but the so-called HW-Bios setup Raid 10 disk is not seen, only the seperate disks. I got it working with a Linux Raid. Would prefer a HW Raid though, the reason I got this one: http://www.amazon.com/Port-Sata-Raid-Controller-eSATA/dp/B003MEUT5W/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1307727469&sr=8-1 It says: Raid Controller Leaf LC3124i Rev 6.0 *4 Port Sata II 300, PCI 32bit, 66Mhz* Silicon Image SIL3124-2, Sata II 300MB/s supports 4 internal HDD, as WD Green Caviar 4x2TB or seagate ST31500341AS 4x1.5TB or 4 external HDD using LC4CEB eSATA Adapter with own Bios (works independent from OS) supports optical drives (ATAPI) as CD/DVD/BlueRay burner supports Portmultiplier for up to 20 HDD supports Windows Sleep Modus and Wake On LAN (WON) Hot-Plug up to 7 Controller per Motherboard *Functions* Raid 5 (Parity) Auto Rebuild RAID 0 (Striping) RAID 1 (Mirroring) Raid 10 (Striping + Mirroring) Auto Rebuild CONCATENATION (makes from many HDD's large one) JBOD (single HDD) NON RAID (for additional HDD without RAID) BACKUP (HDD copy in bios) boots NT 4.0, Windows 2000, XP, 2003, Vista, Windows 7, 2000 2003 2008 Server, 32/64bit Mac OSX ab 10.4.9 (not bootable) bootable under Solaris bootable under BSD bootable under 32bit/64bit Linux Distribution 2.4.18.1 or later following distributions encludes already the driver: Archlinux, Centos, Debian, Frugalware, Gentoo, knoppix, RedHat, Suse, Ubuntu HDD's which are connected to the controller will be visible and you can install your favorite OS (operation system) on it. All well promised, but it is a fakeraid. @Andrew: Very true and correct what you say. I worked with 3Ware Escalade 4 Port cards the last 5 years without a hitch. I set up 2 Raid 5 servers with DRBD between them about 5 years ago. It is still running in my ex company. The Escalades are not cheap for private use, but I may wring myself eventually to get one. :-) http://www.amazon.com/3ware-9650SE-4LPML-256MB-Express-Controller/dp/B000K2IF6Y/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1307727793&sr=8-2 I was thinking of using 2"3ware Escalade 9650SE-2LP" at 165Euro a piece, two mirrors striped by Linux Raid 0. Or is it better to mirror two stripes with Linux Raid 1? I have 2 PCIe X1 free as it is. http://www.amazon.de/3ware-Escalade-9650SE-2LP-Adapter-retail/dp/B000KBG4Y0/ref=sr_1_fkmr0_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1307727934&sr=8-1-fkmr0 I just have to convince my minister of finance that we need the investment. So, in the end, the JMicron is going back. I will have to invest into some real HW Raid. It is not a backup replacement, just some redundancy. Backups are made differential daily and weekly full. But my data backup now takes too long with my script using DAR. This brings me to another point - Anyone know of a reliable Mac-TimeMachine Like backup for Linux? I will start another thread for it. Thanks in the mean time. :-) Al *Original sent by / Original von / Oorspronklik van:* per@opensuse.org - Tue, 07 Jun 2011 18:37:25 +0200

Per Jessen wrote:

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LLLActive@gmx.net wrote:

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Hi all,

I just got a JMicron JMB362/363 Fake RAID (SoftRAID). I searched the internet, and most are M$ drivers, and some mention Linux. None seem to have a real good idea how to get it to work properly. Does anyone know of a method to let opensuse read the hardware raid setup off of the controller, and not the separate drives.

I have: uname -a Linux Linux 2.6.37.6-0.5-desktop #1 SMP PREEMPT 2011-04-25 21:48:33 +0200 i686 athlon i386 GNU/Linux on an AMD Athlon 64 Processor 3200+ CPU and a GA-K8N Ultra-9 Mobo. There is in fact a pata_jmicron driver, which seems to intended for your controller - however, IIRC, these fake raid cards are often supported by dmraid. SOme quick googling indicates that dmraid has support for your controller. http://www.jmicron.com/Support_FAQ.html Q9

-- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

*This Reply from / Antwort von / Antwoord van:* LLLActive@GMX.Net - 2011-06-11 - 16:28:38 -0400 Yes, does this *Nix basis not make it quit cute? When will M$ dump their basis (attempt to be an OS) and just develop their GUI onto a Linux box? Eye candy is their strength, but their OS is just too bad for words. *Original sent by / Original von / Oorspronklik van:* joakimsen@gmail.com - Sat, 11 Jun 2011 01:21:07 -0400

Yea, more than RAID the best plan is to have good backups and even more important is a tested disaster recovery plan. Buy some blank hard drives and spend a holiday weekend testing "what if" we have a total data loss. In the long run IMO it will be more valuable than any RAID. I'll stick to taking full disk images and the like, can you restore single files without unpacking the image? Or are you satisfied just to restore the image? What do you use, dd or ddrescue?

but some people will go as far as storing their configs in a version management system like CVS. haven't thought about this one yet - interesting Idea ... As far as I can tell Time Machine on MacOS is nothing more than rsync The rsync method is used by some opensource backup concepts, which seems quite good. I just need some experience reports and/or comments. with a pretty interface and the usual Apple let's-make-this-proprietary-but-sort-of-open way of doing things. If you look at what they are doing as a whole you'll see what I mean, even my iPhone is just a little UNIX-like machine, all the voicemail. contacts, etc are stored in sqlite databases, but they always add their bit of proprietary yea, hard to admit that opensource is superior to decades of developed closed source by Apple in the end; it was a clever move though. Sales rocketed afterwards. stuff so it won't out-of-the-box interoperable. E.g. iTunes, AFP, etc.

:-) Al -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

LLLActive@GMX.Net wrote:

@Per: I tried the methods with pata_jmicron and dmraid. They are loaded, but the so-called HW-Bios setup Raid 10 disk is not seen, only the seperate disks. I got it working with a Linux Raid.

If I'm not using hardware RAID, I use software RAID (mdraid) - this is typically where reliability is important, performance less so. -- Per Jessen, Zürich (13.4°C) -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

LLLActive@GMX.Net wrote:

*This Reply from / Antwort von / Antwoord van:* LLLActive@GMX.Net - 2011-06-11 - 16:41:33 +0200

So, what do you think of a combination or hybrid raid; 2 HW Raid 1's on two separate 3ware 2 port cards (169 Euro each) and that striped with a Linux Raid 0? Is it better to use a 4 port raid 3way card (250 Euro) with raid5? 4 Port has a "one point of failure" in the controller. What other controllers are good?

I use mostly HP, but also Adaptec and 3ware. I have a couple of large storage-servers with 3ware controllers. What's good and what's best depends on the requirements and the environment, but generally speaking, if you're buying hardware RAID controllers, I don't see much reason for also using software RAID (mdraid). -- Per Jessen, Zürich (15.4°C) -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

On Sat, 11 Jun 2011 18:38:58 +0200, "LLLActive@GMX.Net" wrote:

Unfortunately, the Qnap is a softraid on a Linux box it seems. http://www.whichnas.net/network-attached-storage/qnap-ts-410-nas-product-rev...

Then a HW Raid is preferable.

Why? This is a Linux that more or less only does RAID and nothing else and the transfer speeds it reaches are really nice. Philipp -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

On 6/15/2011 6:12 PM, LLLActive@GMX.Net wrote:

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...

Then a HW Raid is preferable. Why? This is a Linux that more or less only does RAID and nothing else and the transfer speeds it reaches are really nice.

Philipp *This Reply from / Antwort von / Antwoord van:* LLLActive@GMX.Net - 2011-06-16 - 02:49:34 +0200

Because I do not know how to successfully restore a broken software array.

Its just as easy as restoring a hardware array. RTFM helps. I bet you RTFM on the hardware raid, so why is it a problem for software raid? I've done it on a couple of occasions both with software raid 5 and software mirroring. In fact, software raid is so effective, I frequently use fake raid boards and just jumper them to act as simple controllers, taking advantage of the multitude of ports and killing off their internal raid controller. -- _____________________________________ ---This space for rent--- -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

On Wed, Jun 15, 2011 at 21:12, LLLActive@GMX.Net wrote:

@ Philipp

*Original sent by / Original von / Oorspronklik van:* Philipp.Thomas2@gmx.net - Wed, 15 Jun 2011 22:16:01 +0200

...

On Sat, 11 Jun 2011 18:38:58 +0200, "LLLActive@GMX.Net"  wrote:

...

Unfortunately, the Qnap is a softraid on a Linux box it seems.

http://www.whichnas.net/network-attached-storage/qnap-ts-410-nas-product-rev...

Then a HW Raid is preferable.

Why? This is a Linux that more or less only does RAID and nothing else and the transfer speeds it reaches are really nice.

Philipp

*This Reply from / Antwort von / Antwoord van:* LLLActive@GMX.Net - 2011-06-16 - 02:49:34 +0200

Because I do not know how to successfully restore a broken software array. I had to remake a software array in the past, and put the backups on the newly created array. With HW-RAID it was a piece of cake to rebuild a raid 5 with a 3Ware 4 port sata RAID running on the remaining 3 disks, rebuilding with a new 4th drive while the system was running normally. The rebuild was started with the HW-RAID's bios, allowing normal booting and server operation(albeit a little slowed down), during the rebuild.

I was hanging around the PC shop and someone brought one of those NAS appliances and said they couldn't access it. SMART indicated one of the drives was failing. I assumed the appliance ran Linux but feared its 2 drives were in RAID-0. I plugged the drives into a PC and booted the 11.4 GNOME live CD and discovered it was a spanned array. With 1 click in Disk Utility I started the RAID array and with another I mounted it. I used dd_rhelp to copy to another drive. I'm not sure if or how you could interact with Disk Utillity to say restore the RAID array to a working state. Whenever I've had a RAID-1 issue I've been able to mount the individual partitions of the array.

I do not trust a software raid from personal and the experience of (or reason given by) joakimsen@gmail.com - Tue, 7 Jun 2011 15:48:32 -0400

Don't forget the big picture. Just today one of my sites had a down server, RAID array not detected. The RAID controller's on the motherboard and it will be down until parts arrive. There are other identical servers but all all running more important applications, but we can bypass this server running the call center management and temporarily route the calls directly to the employee's phones. If you value your data, do you value how rapidly you could access that information. If the server's out of warranty can you afford the parts? Do you need to wait weeks for a purchase order through an approved vendor can be placed? -- Med Vennlig Hilsen, A. Helge Joakimsen -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

On Fri, Jun 17, 2011 at 06:41, Dave Howorth wrote:

That's an argument for kernel RAID. You can just plug in any disk controller and restart the RAID. Or switch to any spare server, no need for one with particular hardware as long as it has sufficient ports.

You can view my description as a "pro" for software RAID, sure. That's what freedom's about. But I don't in any way advocate the use of software RAID -- I strongly discourage it. I think DM raid might be able to mount some hardware RAID volumes. This might come in handy if you have a failure that wasn't properly planned for. -- Med Vennlig Hilsen, A. Helge Joakimsen -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org

On 06/10/2011 09:49 PM, Cristian Rodríguez wrote:

El 07/06/11 11:36, LLLActive@gmx.net escribió:

...

Hi all,

I just got a JMicron JMB362/363 Fake RAID (SoftRAID).

Stay far away from that thing, if you value your data, that's nothing more than a cheap piece of crap that motherboard vendors market.

Do not trust your data to it.

Hehe... I think Linux is smart on that front. I don't think you can use the JMicron fakeraid. My guess is it was included on an MSI board along with an nvidia fakeraid controller. Linux will use the nvidia controller for dmraid by default :) -- David C. Rankin, J.D.,P.E. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org