topic Re: Intergrated Mirror rx 6600 in Integrity Servers

Intergrated Mirror rx 6600

harsr — Thu, 18 Jan 2007 00:06:14 GMT

We are installing a rx 6600 server and were configuring the SAS controller for Integrated mirror volume.When selecting the Boot disk as primary to migrate the volume it gives a error as : Not enough space at the end of the disk and this cannot be used in a array.

Can anyone please suggest on this above issue.

Thanks

Re: Intergrated Mirror rx 6600

Sameer_Nirmal — Thu, 18 Jan 2007 02:32:04 GMT

I assume you are dealing with HPUX and SAS1068?

What do you see under existing array configuration?

Re: Intergrated Mirror rx 6600

harsr — Thu, 18 Jan 2007 04:47:02 GMT

Hi

Ya we are dealing with HP-UX 11.23 and there is no View Existing Array Screen in the Utility. There is only one Create IM Volume tab.

When we select the root disk as primary and Migrate the Array . It terminates with a error as There is no enough space in the end of the disk.

Re: Intergrated Mirror rx 6600

rick jones — Thu, 18 Jan 2007 21:32:23 GMT

The core SAS I/O "supported" under 11.23 on the rx6600 is a "simple" one that IIRC only does RAID1. It differs from the P600 (?) SAS SmartArray which is supported as the core I/O for Win/Linux.

I suspect that docs.hp.com will have system manuals for the rx6600 describing things with the simpler SAS controller. (as well as the SmartArray one...)

Re: Intergrated Mirror rx 6600

ketenn57 — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 18:00:28 GMT

Hi, just wanted to know if anybody has a solution for the initial issue that harsr had? We have two disks in our rx6600, one is VG00 and the other is unused. I would like to mirror the drives but when I select the primary disk (disk that is VG00) I recieve the same error "Not enough space at the end of the disk and this cannot be used in a array." Is there a way to mirror these drives without destroying all the data on these disks and starting over?

Thanks

Re: Intergrated Mirror rx 6600

Sameer_Nirmal — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 00:25:37 GMT

The first disk (primary) must have free space of 512KB for the metadata after the last partition.

If there is no 512KB free space after the last partition on the primary disk, you would see the error message.

Re: Intergrated Mirror rx 6600

ketenn57 — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 05:56:19 GMT

Thanks Sameer,

Currently there is one volume group on the primary drive VG00 and within that volume group about 7 logical volumes. Also the volume group currently isn't as large as the primary disk.

How would I go about adding space after the last partion?

What do you consider the last partition, VG00?

Do I need to add space after VG00 or within?

Can I use SAM to make this change?

Thanks In Advance....

Re: Intergrated Mirror rx 6600

Torsten. — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 06:59:32 GMT

This has nothing to do with LVM or vg00, because this is located in the "middle" of the disk.

The problem here is the disk layout.

See this figure:

http://docs.hp.com/en/B2355-90950/ch06s02.html#d0e52328

Figure 6-5 Example LVM Disk Layout on HP Integrity Server

To work around this I used to take an ignite backup, configure the integrated raid and restore the backup. Depending on the tape drive used (or network speed) the procedure takes 20~60 min.

BTW, if you have only 2 disks installed, you should consider to move them from slot 7/8 to 1/2 before creating the RAID for several reasons.

Re: Intergrated Mirror rx 6600

Torsten. — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 12:45:45 GMT

There is another workaround, but I think you need a third disk for that.

Mirror or clone (with DRD - dynamic root disk) the system to another disk and prepare to boot from.

Create the Integrated mirror (with data loss on that disks).

Sync (just like after a disk replacement) the mirror to the IR volume or clone it back.

Re: Intergrated Mirror rx 6600

Brian Beck HPUX — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 13:51:09 GMT

Hi Torsten!

Sorry to semi-hijack this thread, but we are now deploying our first rx6600's and they came from the factory w/ 2 SAS drives in slots 7/8. I was concerned about your comment suggesting "numerous reasons" for moving them to 1/2. Could you please elaborate on these reasons?

Thanks!

Re: Intergrated Mirror rx 6600

Torsten. — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 14:04:24 GMT

We are still using a "foreign" thread
;-o

See
http://docs.hp.com/en/5991-6002/ch01s05.html

quote
"When HP Integrity rx2660, rx3600 and rx6600 servers are shipped from HP, the SAS bays may be populated from 8 and working downwards. Placing a new SAS device into a lower bay number will cause the hardware paths to change after a new cold-install or recovery session. When you receive an rx2660, rx3600 or rx6600 system from HP, if you ever plan to add other SAS devices into the system, you should consider moving the SAS devices so they start in Bay 1 going upwards."

Re: Intergrated Mirror rx 6600

Brian Beck HPUX — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 14:08:26 GMT

Torsten-

Danke!

:)

Re: Intergrated Mirror rx 6600

Sameer_Nirmal — Thu, 13 Dec 2007 02:43:31 GMT

With the mention of partition in my last post, I meant the disk partitions created by idisk. You can see the disk partiton table using
# idisk /dev/rdsk/cxtydz
# idisk -p /dev/rdsk/cxtydz

HPUX partiton i.e s2 gets the remaining disk space allocation unless someone keep some space during ignite install. The partiton is used by LVM/VxVM for logical partitioning therein. Thus if there is no space left, you can't add the disk in an IR array for the reason mentioned before.

I think HP should document this for the IR migration to succeed done in the later stage?

Re: Intergrated Mirror rx 6600

Torsten. — Thu, 13 Dec 2007 07:02:04 GMT

If you order a new system, consider to take the Smartarray P800, see

http://docs.hp.com/en/SM_SA3/SA_Support_Matrix.htm

Re: Intergrated Mirror rx 6600

ketenn57 — Thu, 13 Dec 2007 15:23:59 GMT

Could I use the process in the following post to help me resolve this issue (manually mirror to the unused disk, format the orginal primary disk, and then build the IM)

http://fixunix.com/hp-ux/144569-how-i-locate-swap-area.html

But for step 2 (partiotion discription file) I would make the HPUX partition 95% so space is left for the IM metadata
#vi /tmp/partitionfile
3
EFI 500MB
HPUX 95%
HPSP 400MB

Once the disk is mirrored, test that I can boot from it.

Then using the drvcfg utility I could format what was my primary drive (one with the 100& HPUX partition).

Then use the drvcfg to build the IM.

Any thoughts,

Thanks for everybody's help with this..

Re: Intergrated Mirror rx 6600

Torsten. — Thu, 13 Dec 2007 15:38:41 GMT

I don't think so, because IMHO the secondary partition table is always at the end of the disk - regardless how many free space is in the "middle" of the disk.

I'm not sure if the config utility will allow you to create the integrated raid on a single (free) disk and add the second later, but I doubt.

Re: Intergrated Mirror rx 6600

ketenn57 — Thu, 13 Dec 2007 16:17:32 GMT

Just to make sure I understand, you are saying that if I manually mirror the primary to the unused using the following partitions...

3
EFI 500MB
HPUX 95%
HPSP 400MB

The free disk space will be between the HPUX (partition 2) and HPSP (partition 3) and in order to create an integrated mirror (IM) the free disk space needs to be after the HPSP partition?

Also in regard to creating the IM, I would not be creating it with only 1 disk. Once I succesfully manually mirrored the primary to unused I was going to switch the secondary to the primary (so the primary now would have space to build the IM). Then format the secondary (this was the old primary) Then build the IM using primary as primary and secondary as the disk just formatted. Is this any cleared? Will this still not work?

Thanks again...

Re: Intergrated Mirror rx 6600

Torsten. — Thu, 13 Dec 2007 16:38:36 GMT

I guess I don't understand your procedure.
You want to create the IR on a single disk and add the second later? Try it.

Regarding the disk layout see

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GUID_Partition_Table