Arch Linux

Chrilleee

Member

Registered: 2011-04-27

Posts: 34

[Solved] RAID 1 on non-root harddrive, should I use LVM?

I just added 2 2TB disks to my system, created equal 1.7TB GPT "Linux RAID" partitions on them and created a RAID 1. This RAID is only for data, not for any root or swap. I didn't use the entire disk because I want the last 200GB or so for Windows.
I created the RAID using this:

# mdadm --create /dev/md0 --level=1 --raid-devices=2 /dev/sd[de]1

Then I just encrypted the entire /dev/md0, unlocked it, formatted it, and mounted it:

# cryptsetup... luksFormat /dev/md0
# cryptsetup ... luksOpen /dev/md0 name
# mkfs.ext4 /dev/mapper/name
# mount /dev/mapper/name /name

And now it's ready to use. However, I saw in the Wiki that they are using LVM and says it has several advantages over not using it. I don't really understand it though. What are the advantages? And do you think I should add LVM? I haven't added any data yet, so it wouldn't be too much hassle adding it. But I would like to know if it's worth it, and why.

Last edited by Chrilleee (2015-05-09 17:19:18)

WorMzy

Administrator

From: Scotland

Registered: 2010-06-16

Posts: 13,049

Website

Re: [Solved] RAID 1 on non-root harddrive, should I use LVM?

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/LVM#Advantages

If you're not planning on having multiple volumes/snapshots, then it's probably not worth setting it up.

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Spider.007

Member

Registered: 2004-06-20

Posts: 1,176

Re: [Solved] RAID 1 on non-root harddrive, should I use LVM?

I agree, something to consider is using btrfs instead, it can replace both mdadm and lvm and provides a lot of compelling features

https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Btrfs#Features

Chrilleee

Member

Registered: 2011-04-27

Posts: 34

Re: [Solved] RAID 1 on non-root harddrive, should I use LVM?

Thanks! Then I'll leave it as it is.