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El Bastardo

Member

Registered: 2006-06-21

Posts: 19

raid controllers & linux (solved through workaround)

Hi All,

at current I use a highpoint card for my raid array. However, when I upgrade the kernel I always have to compile the highpoint driver.
Now this in itself is no big problem. However, as of the 2.6.18 kernel the highpoint driver won't compile because of loads of missing methods. Ofcourse it will be updated in time or I can hack something together myself, but it is quite annoying.

So now I want to switch to a raid controller where it is supported by the default kernel so I don't have such a maintenance issue.
I heard that this is the case with the promise cards.
Can any of you shed some light on this?

Thanks,

Leon..

FUBAR

Member

From: Belgium

Registered: 2004-12-08

Posts: 1,029

Website

Re: raid controllers & linux (solved through workaround)

Doesn't the kernel have built in Highpoint support? (hpt37x module)

Or are you using a "real" (not onboard) card, i.e. something fancy?

If you're using onboard RAID, you might aswell get rid of it and use Linux software RAID and just use the Highpoint as a simple diskcontroller without the RAID functionality.

---

A bus station is where a bus stops.
A train station is where a train stops.
On my desk I have a workstation.

El Bastardo

Member

Registered: 2006-06-21

Posts: 19

Re: raid controllers & linux (solved through workaround)

Doesn't the kernel have built in Highpoint support? (hpt37x module)

Or are you using a "real" (not onboard) card, i.e. something fancy?

If you're using onboard RAID, you might aswell get rid of it and use Linux software RAID and just use the Highpoint as a simple diskcontroller without the RAID functionality.

I use the onboard raid. The default hpt374 kernel support is not applicable for the raid. You have to run a special highpoint driver and turn probing of the disks off at grub.

Snarkout

Member

Registered: 2005-11-13

Posts: 542

Re: raid controllers & linux (solved through workaround)

3ware 9xxx is built into the kernel since 2.6.9.  I can't say anything nice about the performance of the cards though.  Writing to them is painful, unless you think it's fun to have your entire system brought to its knees while the writes are going on (assuming your OS is on the same array).  Reads aren't anything to write home about either.  Still, it's native, and it's sata instead of $$$ for real SCSI, so it's hard to complain too loudly, and certainly no worse than software raid.  Maybe their new pci-express cards are better.

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Unthinking respect for authority is the greatest enemy of truth.
-Albert Einstein

FUBAR

Member

From: Belgium

Registered: 2004-12-08

Posts: 1,029

Website

Re: raid controllers & linux (solved through workaround)

Doesn't the kernel have built in Highpoint support? (hpt37x module)

Or are you using a "real" (not onboard) card, i.e. something fancy?

If you're using onboard RAID, you might aswell get rid of it and use Linux software RAID and just use the Highpoint as a simple diskcontroller without the RAID functionality.

I use the onboard raid. The default hpt374 kernel support is not applicable for the raid. You have to run a special highpoint driver and turn probing of the disks off at grub.

If I understand correctly, using the hpt374 module you'll have access to the seperate disks but not to the RAID-arrays configured on the controller.
If that's the case, I'd go for Linux software RAID. Especially if you're using the connected disks solely for Linux and your bootdisk is on a regular IDE/SATA/SCSI controller: I don't know if you can boot from the onboard controller. You certainly won't be able to boot a software RAID-0 array.

---

A bus station is where a bus stops.
A train station is where a train stops.
On my desk I have a workstation.

El Bastardo

Member

Registered: 2006-06-21

Posts: 19

Re: raid controllers & linux (solved through workaround)

I've read up on a lot of raid controller stuff lately.
It seems that software raid cards, like the cheaper highpoint, advance, promise and whatever have proprietary drivers which usually are not up to date on bleeding edge kernels. So with arch on a server, this can be quite the pain in the ass.
But all cards I've read up about do seem to be supported by the kernel as normal ide or sata controllers without the raid.
So I have two options now,

1. Go back to an older redhat or suse distro
2. Don't use the proprietary driver for raid, but use linux software raid

I think I'm going for number 2, although I have no experience with linux software raid.
Can anybody give me some pointers as to the recoverability of a linux raid1 array when a disk breaks down?

FUBAR

Member

From: Belgium

Registered: 2004-12-08

Posts: 1,029

Website

Re: raid controllers & linux (solved through workaround)

Hm, good question. I have never had to deal with that so far. But mdadm (the tool to administer a software RAID-device) does have commands to remove a faulty disk from the array, and one to rebuild the array once you've replaced the disk.

---

A bus station is where a bus stops.
A train station is where a train stops.
On my desk I have a workstation.

El Bastardo

Member

Registered: 2006-06-21

Posts: 19

Re: raid controllers & linux (solved through workaround)

Hm, good question. I have never had to deal with that so far. But mdadm (the tool to administer a software RAID-device) does have commands to remove a faulty disk from the array, and one to rebuild the array once you've replaced the disk.

thanks man. I've read up some more on mdadm and I think I'm going for it.
You're comments were a definate help.

Cheers,

Leon..