Arch Linux

DnF

Member

Registered: 2010-08-15

Posts: 19

Hardware change from AMD to Intel, RAID, Grub legacy, sysvinit

Hi all,

this thread should be mainly for my reference what I'm going to do and in which order. However, I will warmly welcome your comments "how not to ruin my box".

My arch installation is up-to-date, no X server is used on the box (although installed)

What I have is AMD Athlon II X4 605e, NVIDIA GeForce 8200 chipset, 4 SATA ports, nvidia integrated graphics, 2GB DDR2 RAM
What I will have is Intel Core i5-3470S, Intel H77 chipset, 6 SATA ports, intel graphics, 16GB DDR3 RAM

Data storage: 4x 1TB disk sd[abcd].

#parted
(parted) print                                                            
Model: ATA WDC WD10EARS-00M (scsi)
Disk /dev/sda: 1000GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/4096B
Partition Table: msdos
Disk Flags: 

Number  Start   End     Size    Type     File system     Flags
 1      32.8kB  98.7MB  98.7MB  primary  ext2            boot, raid
 2      98.7MB  4195MB  4096MB  primary  linux-swap(v1)  raid
 3      4195MB  34.2GB  30.0GB  primary                  raid
 4      34.2GB  1000GB  966GB   primary                  raid

# mdadm --detail --scan
ARRAY /dev/md1 metadata=0.90 UUID=e8056140:04c6990f:52419904:51489ef3
ARRAY /dev/md2 metadata=0.90 UUID=1c4d66c0:85a07d12:52419904:51489ef3
ARRAY /dev/md/3 metadata=1.2 name=archiso:3 UUID=7853294e:2a904458:b5b72983:699954fd
ARRAY /dev/md0 metadata=0.90 UUID=9a81a0d9:45fe362e:52419904:51489ef3

#cat /etc/fstab
...
/dev/md0 /home ext4 defaults 0 1
/dev/md1 /boot ext2 defaults 0 1
/dev/md2 swap swap defaults 0 0
/dev/md3 / ext2 defaults,acl 0 1
...

all raid1 but /dev/md0, which is raid5

Obstacles and things I should examine:

. architecture change
. exchange of disks to 2TB each
. new partition for use with grub2
. upgrade raids metadata to 1.2
. lvm - yes or no

Idea:

1. change hardware, make mkinitcpio, reboot, resolve errors.
2. add one 2TB disk, use it as backup for /home, and for grub2 bios partition
3. reistall or upgrade array, upgrade grub to grub2 
4. add 2TB as next disk, grow array
5. exchange 1TB disks one by one
6. upgrade ends, it is time for another!

So, this is the setup, hardware will arrive next week.

Last edited by DnF (2012-10-05 17:09:58)

DnF

Member

Registered: 2010-08-15

Posts: 19

Re: Hardware change from AMD to Intel, RAID, Grub legacy, sysvinit

New board has UEFI, so I decided not to grow array to new disks, but create new array from start. I'm starting with 3 new disks, old array will be turned off, and kept as backup, while all data are duplicated on big external drive, and will be copied from it to new array then.
I have 3x 2TB disk, so I will start with it, installing system with /home on external drive, then set acl permissions according to old, then transfer data

Disk partitioning plan, GPT

1G   fat32    efi 
200M ext2     /boot
40G  reiserfs /var
50G  ext4     /        
rest ext4     /home 

I want to keep all configuration. I can try to add new disk to old array, let all system partition replicate, then reinstall grub etc. But - will it works good on new uefi system (raid from 3xmbr + 2xGPT)? If not, I will make fresh installation, and only configure according to old one - what is more work?

Anyway, all new system partitions will be created as raid1 with 3 disks, /var maybe raid5: more space for shared pacman cache. Or change pacman cache sharing for my arch users.

for now, I'm in for reinstall. What configuration is important:

- acl and samba coexistence - took way too long to figure all out, I will try to transfer configuration.
- ??