From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Mon Aug 18 10:07:30 2008 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 3FEB1106567A for ; Mon, 18 Aug 2008 10:07:30 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from freebsd-questions@m.gmane.org) Received: from ciao.gmane.org (main.gmane.org [80.91.229.2]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id C9C1A8FC1E for ; Mon, 18 Aug 2008 10:07:29 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from freebsd-questions@m.gmane.org) Received: from list by ciao.gmane.org with local (Exim 4.43) id 1KV1e3-00070L-Ni for freebsd-questions@freebsd.org; Mon, 18 Aug 2008 10:07:27 +0000 Received: from lara.cc.fer.hr ([161.53.72.113]) by main.gmane.org with esmtp (Gmexim 0.1 (Debian)) id 1AlnuQ-0007hv-00 for ; Mon, 18 Aug 2008 10:07:27 +0000 Received: from ivoras by lara.cc.fer.hr with local (Gmexim 0.1 (Debian)) id 1AlnuQ-0007hv-00 for ; Mon, 18 Aug 2008 10:07:27 +0000 X-Injected-Via-Gmane: http://gmane.org/ To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org From: Ivan Voras Date: Mon, 18 Aug 2008 12:07:19 +0200 Lines: 62 Message-ID: References: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/signed; micalg=pgp-sha1; protocol="application/pgp-signature"; boundary="------------enig683913742825AB73C87B357B" X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org X-Gmane-NNTP-Posting-Host: lara.cc.fer.hr User-Agent: Thunderbird 2.0.0.16 (X11/20080724) In-Reply-To: X-Enigmail-Version: 0.95.0 Sender: news Subject: Re: Migrating to gmirrored RAID1 X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Mon, 18 Aug 2008 10:07:30 -0000 This is an OpenPGP/MIME signed message (RFC 2440 and 3156) --------------enig683913742825AB73C87B357B Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable Henry Karpatskij wrote: > Hi, >=20 > I have a failing IDE disk which is running my 7.0-p1 server. I've been > investigating the possible solutions and I've decided to go with two ne= w > IDE disks and gmirror. However, I'm not too familiar with disk > internals, I know how to install the system and somehow understand the > concept of slices and partitions, but that's about it. >=20 > I found some examples on how to install the gmirror on a running system= , > but they all have in common that they just add new spare disk to the > system and turn on the mirroring to it, but I need to replace the > current disk which is not the same size as the new ones. >=20 > Any suggestions how one would do such an operation? Should I just > re-install the server to a new disk, turn on the mirroring and then > restore the configuration and files from the failing disk? Or is it > easier to add the disks to the running system, turn on mirroring and > then somehow dump the current disk to the mirror and then re-configure > it to boot from the gmirror and remove the failing disk? If the new drives have the same size as the old one, you could do it gradually: - Mirror the old drive to new drive #1 - Replace the old drive with new drive #2, mirror it from new drive #1 If the sizes are different, this won't work and the best would be to install a fresh system on a new drive and transfer the configuration from the old one. Booting will always happen from a single drive. Since up to the point file systems are mounted all relevant drive access is read-only, the BIOS will happily boot one of the mirrored pair, then the kernel will pick up and activate mirroring before file systems are mounted. This is why all instructions start with one drive and later add a new drive to hold the mirror; it's easy to set up a single drive and then simply mirror it. --------------enig683913742825AB73C87B357B Content-Type: application/pgp-signature; name="signature.asc" Content-Description: OpenPGP digital signature Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="signature.asc" -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.6 (GNU/Linux) iD8DBQFIqUnXldnAQVacBcgRAqtOAKDkOZEbIH5PGlzHsX4yI41Owm1klgCgylXM xFk5zUx2fPuNjl62gzklb8c= =+tmE -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- --------------enig683913742825AB73C87B357B--