From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Wed Mar 16 00:29:43 2005 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 52FFB16A4CE for ; Wed, 16 Mar 2005 00:29:43 +0000 (GMT) Received: from ratchet.nebcorp.com (ratchet.nebcorp.com [205.217.153.72]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id D1DE443D39 for ; Wed, 16 Mar 2005 00:29:42 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from djh@nebcorp.com) Received: by ratchet.nebcorp.com (Postfix, from userid 1014) id D9195D9848; Tue, 15 Mar 2005 16:29:41 -0800 (PST) Date: Tue, 15 Mar 2005 18:29:41 -0600 From: Danny Howard To: Mike Loiterman Message-ID: <20050316002941.GG44253@ratchet.nebcorp.com> References: <42372F20.80308@toldme.com> <200503152356.j2FNuVC18378@fat_man.ascendency.net> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Disposition: inline In-Reply-To: <200503152356.j2FNuVC18378@fat_man.ascendency.net> User-Agent: Mutt/1.4.2.1i X-Loop: djhoward@uiuc.edu cc: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: <$100 SATA RAID Card 5.3 compatible X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.1 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Wed, 16 Mar 2005 00:29:43 -0000 On Tue, Mar 15, 2005 at 05:53:30PM -0600, Mike Loiterman wrote: > >> Can anyone recommend a SATA RAID card that is compatible with 5.3? > >> The 3ware ones listed in the hardware notes are pretty > >> expensive...over a hundred dollars for the lowest end card. Is 5.3 > >> compatible with any of the adpatec or promise cards? > >> > > What kind of RAID do you want? For a simple system-level RAID1, skip > > the hardware and go with gmirror. > > RAID1. I'm looking into gmirror, but it seems like it might be messy if > one of the drives dies. Mike, Messy how? You keep an eye on "gmirror list" and it will tell you if one of the disks has died. If a disk dies, you swap in an RMA, and rebuild the mirror. If "swap in the RMA" involves downtime, then gmirror will see the new disk at boot and DTRT. Or have you seen too many horror stories on the mailing lists? Currently, I have a whole bunch of systems with one-off 3ware or Adaptec controllers, and I don't know how to monitor them reliably. I tried doing a 3ware a month or two back, and there was this crazy race between how old the binary versus the kernel module versus the firmware was and I just gave up. Grr! As RAID1 solutions go, gmirror take a lot of the headache out of administration. IMO, YMMV, and I have daily backups ... -- http://dannyman.toldme.com/