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Date:      Sat, 19 Feb 2011 14:00:10 -0800
From:      David Brodbeck <gull@gull.us>
To:        FreeBSD Questions <freebsd-questions@freebsd.org>
Subject:   Re: ZFS-only booting on FreeBSD
Message-ID:  <AANLkTi=ZyBaPqbxSahP=-BJvMi97YwJrtCj7V3FPapN9@mail.gmail.com>
In-Reply-To: <B365A66AECD410EA3539D5FB@mac-pro.magehandbook.com>
References:  <201102192012.p1JKCKnP038248@mail.r-bonomi.com> <B365A66AECD410EA3539D5FB@mac-pro.magehandbook.com>

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On Sat, Feb 19, 2011 at 1:52 PM, Daniel Staal <DStaal@usa.net> wrote:
> I see the advantage, and that it offers higher levels of resiliency and i=
f
> properly handled should cause no problems. =A0I just hate relying on huma=
ns to
> remember things and follow directions. =A0That's what computers are for.
> Repairing a failed disk in a ZFS boot pool requires a human to remember t=
o
> look for directions in an unusual place, and then follow them correctly.

That's why I generally prefer to boot off hardware RAID 1 in
situations where reliability is critical.  There are too many fiddly
unknown factors in booting off software RAID.  Even if you do
everything else right, the BIOS may refuse to look beyond the failed
drive and boot off the good one.  I save the software RAID for data
spindles (which I tend to keep separate from the boot/OS spindles,
anyway.)

2-port 3ware cards are relatively inexpensive, and well supported by
every OS I've used except Solaris.  If you're going for RAID 1 you
don't need expensive battery-backed cache.



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