Raid - deleting a raid on LH4 ?

[Ian Wilson_1]

We have an LH4 with drives in both cages, forming two raids.
We need to upgrade the drives in the left cage from the current bunch of 9Gb drives in raid 0 format to 72Gb ones in a raid5. How do I delete the current raid config for just one cage /raid, without damaging the other raid, which has the NOS (Netware). The bios ^M setup nor the raid util on the original cd allow a raid to be deleted or reconfigured.
If I plug the new drives in the bios does not notice, and says the raid is still the original 4x9 setup, even though it now sees each individual drive correctly as a 72.
Bios(s?) are the most recent available for LH4.
Any help appreciated..

Ian

[William Harrington_1]

I have a LH3 I've been studying and it's about the same as the LH4.
I have sucessfully created a new drive configuration in array 1 without affecting array 0 by choosing the new configuration, selecting (space bar) the array 1 drives and enter then initiating (F10)that array and exiting. I have also lost the array 0 in this process and I'm not sure why. It does seem to me that if you initiate array 0 during this new configuration process that the boot is lost. I'm going to try it again right now and will repost in a few minutes.

[William Harrington_1]

OK...I just went back thru the process.
The LH3 is running Server2000 loaded on six 9.1GB drives in array 0 on the right hand side of the machine seen as the left side in the Control M configurator view.
It has six 18.2GB drives on the lefthand side as array 1. In this case I pulled one drive from the #15 spot just to make sure I had actually created a new array.

I selected new configuration.
Used the space bar to select the six drives for array A0 and hit enter.

Then used the space bar to select the five drives for the A1 array and hit enter.

I then used F10 to configure the drives and accept the defaults given for both array 0 and 1 and saved configuration.

Then select Initialize and select logical drive 1 (NOT 0) and F10 to initialize. ESC out of it after the intialize.
Important.....it will now prompt you to intialize your newly created drive, respond NO, do not intialize because that would lead you to reformat your logical drive 0 which is the OS.

Exit, it will prompt for a ctl=alt=delete and your new storage array will be available.

You will need to use the disc manager in Windows to assign a drive letter and format the drive.

[e4services]

That is right. Just re-select the array you are keep just as it showed before you remove the other drives. That is, if it is the 0 array, re-select it before the new drive or id it is array 1, re-select it after the new drives. Select each drive in the same order as it was. DO NOT INITIALIZE to old array, only the new, just save and exit.

[Ian Wilson_1]

>I selected new configuration.
>Used the space bar to select the six drives for array A0 and hit enter.

Problem is that selecting new configuration wipes the definition for both raids. Reselecting the original drives and parameters for Raid_0 does not appear to work, I just get a "missing boot partion table" type error. Reloading the previously saved config via the Netraid utils on the CD restores good health, but of course that restores both raids....

I thought that when the bios boot shows a "NVRAM mismatch" error you could go into the setup and choose to read either the NVRAM or Disk configuration and save that back. The option of choosing from Nvram or disk no longer appears. Is there some hidden key sequence to bring up that option, or maybe just delete the one raid in the first place????

Ian

[William Harrington_1]

It sounds to like you are not intializing the new RAID 1 array.

You should be able first select the six drives for RAID 0 array, next select the six drives for the RAID 1 array.
Select F10 to set each array as active.

After leaving that screen select Intialize and intialize only the RAID 1 array by using the arrow keys and space bar to select the RAID 1.

You should be able to then boot as before with the OS still in tact and you should have a second array with the larger drives.

I'm not familiar with the other process you asked about but I do know that what I described does in fact work. I performed the new array set up several times on Friday just to make sure I was correct.

[William Harrington_1]

Hi Ian,

I'd like to try to clarify my comments.

With the server shut down replace the drives in RAID 1 array.

Start up, you may get a nvram prompt however you may disregard that prompt and go directly to control+M.

Select the new configuration.
Use the space bar to select the RAID 0 drives and hit enter.
Use the space bar to select the RAID 1 drives and hit enter.
Now use F10 to congigure the drives.
Select RAID 0 and accept.
Select Raid 1 and accept.
Save out of it.
select intialize (the second line)
Now intialize logical drive 1 only.
Save out of it and reboot.

The configuration should be set.

[Sean T. Craig]

Hi Ian,

Okay, we're getting a little off-track here. The first thing I want to address is that you mentioned an NVRAM Mismatch and didn't know why you couldn't use the utility to select one or the other. Answer: there are two types of mismatches that can appear with the NetRAID controllers and shouldn't be confused with one another. One says configuration mismatch between NVRAM and Disks, the other says Unresolved Configuration Mismatch. The first one means that the logical drive configuration on the controller doesn't match the configuration written to the scratch-pads on the drives. The second one (unresolved) usually indicates a corrupt scratch-pad on one of the disks. The reason you are seeing this now is because you have replaced the 9GB drives with the 72GB's and they don't have a scratch-pad written to them. The controller still has the configuration in it's NVRAM which knows that 9GB drives were used to create this array. You need to delete this logical drive from the NVRAM and create a new one with the 72GB drives.

Now, back to the original problem.
First and formost, always record your logical and physical drive configurations. From the Express Tools utility, go to Objects-->Logical Drive and select LD0 and choose Properties. Write down all the values. This is absolutely imperative because if the original LD0 (with the O/S) was created using values other than defaults, you can lose everything. Use the Physical Drive selection menu to check how each of the drives are labeled by the controller and write it down.

Next, (I'm assuming you have the data from the RAID-0 drive backed up) you need to clear the configuration and then recreate. From the Management Menu, select Configure-->Clear Configuration-->Proceed.
Then choose New Configuration-->Proceed.

Now we recreate your configuration. Press the space bar on each of the drives that were part of Logical Drive 0. Press when done. Then press the space bar on the remaining drives until it looks like the physical drive configuration you recorded above, and press . Now we should have the drives labeled. I don't know what your current configuration is but here is an example of a simple config with a RAID-1 and a RAID-5:
ID0 A0-0 ONLINE
ID1 A0-1 ONLINE
ID2 A1-0 ONLINE
ID3 A1-1 ONLINE
ID8 A1-2 ONLINE

Now the drive designations have been assigned and it is time to configure the Logical Drive Properties. Press again (2nd time in a row) and it will bring you to the menu. Make sure all the values match what you recorded earlier. Be sure to check the Advanced Menu and make sure the Stripe Size, read, write & cache policies match. Then choose Accept. This will immediately take you to the next logical drive. I always recommend default values for simplicity and ease of recovery but ultimately the decision is yours to make. Press Accept and then Accept again. It will then ask if you want to save the configuration. Choose Yes.

Now comes the initialization step, and your opportunity to completely destroy all data if you're not careful. Go back to the Management Menu, select Objects-->Logical Drive and then choose only the new RAID-5 array (possibly LD1) and select Initialize from the list. There is another way of performing this step but this one ensures that you only do it to one array and not both.

Escape out of the utility and boot to the O/S. You're logical drive is now ready to be setup. Create your volume(s) and restore your data from backup.

Last note: these are generic instructions and may not match your situation exactly. For specific instructions, include your logical and physical configurations including drive ID's, sizes, array designations, RAID Levels, etc.

Hope these instructions don't totally mess you up. Good luck,

Sean T. Craig Sr. C.E.T., M.C.P.