Dual Boot on HP DL380 G4 SmartArray 6i

[Greg Carlisle]

Does the HP DL380 G4 SmartArray 6i support a dual boot? If so, which disks can I use? 0,1? Thanks

[Johan Guldmyr]

Hi, dual boot? Like installing two operating systems on it?

In the 6i controller you can create one array with both disks (raid0 or raid1), or you can create two arrays of raid0.

You create arrays by pressing F8 in the POST at the right time.

Then you can either install the OS on the same array but with different partitions or two individual drives..

[gregersenj]

You have 2 ways of creating logical disks with the Smart Array Controller.

One method is as Johan describe.
Press F8 (ORCA) when prompted by the Controller during post, and create 1 or 2 arrays.

The other method is using the ACU (Array Configuration Utility.
Boot from the Smart Start CD.
Select the maintenance tab.
Open the Array Configuration Utility.
Here you get the advanced configuration.

Ei. If you got 2 physical disks.
You want RAID 1 for redundancy.
You want 2 logical disks.
That is possible.

First you create an array using both disks.
Then you create the first logical disk.
choose the size and RAID level.
Then you create the next logical drive.

note the logical drives can use different RAID levels

There's a down side to create multible logical drives within the same array.
If you later on, want to add more disks, then it is possible to extend the last logical drive only.


Regarding the dual boot.
From the OS point of view you now got 2 disks.
You can install one OS on disk 1 and another os on disk 2.
You still need a bootloader on disk 1.
In some BIOS versions you can change wich logical drive to boot from. But still need the bootloader.

Link to the ACU user guide:
http://docs.hp.com/en/9320/acu.pdf

BR
/jag

[Greg Carlisle]

Jag -

Our issue may be a little more complex, we are not starting from scratch. I have 6 disks....disk 0 & 1 are mirrored and the remaining 4 are WebLogic application space.

The OS is now Linux 3.x

We want to break the mirror and create a dual boot system with Linux 5 and can still see the remaining 4 disks.....

Our architect says that is doable.

That sound reasonable?

[gregersenj]

You can split the mirror on the Smart Array 6xxx, using the ACU.

Q9 in the below link is what you are looking for:
http://bizsupport1.austin.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/Document.jsp?objectID=c00737598〈=en&cc=us&taskId=101&prodSeriesId=348488&prodTypeId=329290

Also Read this:
http://bizsupport1.austin.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/Document.jsp?objectID=c00737598〈=en&cc=us&taskId=101&prodSeriesId=348488&prodTypeId=329290

And a link for the ACU user guide:
http://docs.hp.com/en/9320/acu.pdf
(Page 29)

I did find an advisory on how to do it some time ago. Just can't find it right now.

But Yes you can split an excisting RAID 1 onto 2 RAID 0's.


Another solution is:
Replace the disks in the RAID 1 to larger disks.
Relace disk 1.
Let it rebuild
Replace disk 2
Let rebuild
Then create new logical drive on the new free space.

This way, you still have RAID 1 for the OS'

BR
/jag

[gregersenj]

And here's the doc I couldn't find :)

http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bc/docs/support/SupportManual/c00378986/c00378986.pdf

BR
/jag