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Date: Mon, 15 Aug 2005 11:13:29 -0700 (PDT)
From: dpk <dpk@dpk.net>
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To: Brandon Fosdick <bfoz@bfoz.net>
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Cc: stable@freebsd.org
Subject: Re: Create 2.5TB file system on 5.4S?
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On Sun, 14 Aug 2005, Brandon Fosdick wrote:

> Now that my shiny new 9500S is installed and not fighting for IRQs, I've
> created and initialized a ~2.5TB array using the bios utility. So the
> next step is mounting the new array.
>
> I naively tried following the regular handbook instructions for adding a
> new drive and failed miserably. And after googling a bit I now know why,
> and realized that I knew why before, but I was being stupid.
>
> I've seen a few mentions of using gpt(8) and some vague references to
> using dedicated mode. But I haven't seen anything that says "this is the
> Right Way to do it". So...what's the proper way to make a large file
> system?

Whatever you end up doing (we used auto-carving here, had to
unfortunately) be sure to test the partitions fully before proceeding.
>2TB support in FreeBSD is not yet perfect, so it'd be worth your time
to find out what works and what doesn't work.

The most recent general data available appears to be at:

http://www.freebsd.org/projects/bigdisk/

Things to check, in particular, are background fscks, which are
automatically enabled, regular fscks with a full/nearly full partition,
and backups if you use some sort of 'raw disk' method like with 'dump'.

If you can boot off another device other than the RAID, you'll save
yourself a lot of hassle, for sure.