vgcreate device busy

[Shawn Miller_2]

I have found other problems like this but the resolutions did not help with me. When running vgcreate the system states unable to create device busy. I tried fuser -u and nothing showed up. I ran strings againts lvmtab and could find nothing. I just finished running pvcreate on all the devices with no errors or problems and had to increase maxvgs in the kernel and reboot.

[S.K. Chan]

Did you use "pvcreate -f" ? It may not make the difference if the usual just "pvcreate" lets you through without any problem. What kind of disks are they ?

[PIYUSH D. PATEL]

Hi,

Use pvcreate -f ( forcefully does )

Piyush

[Shawn Miller_2]

I did not use pvcreate -f since they were new disks and I received no errors when I used pvcreate with the -f option. The disks are on an EMC symmetrics array.

[Ian Dennison_1]

If you are really really sure that this disk is not used (which you do by checking /etc/lvmtab - done already), then use 'pvcreate -f /dev/rdsk/[Drive]' to wipe the previous contents.

However, if you want to keep the contents (from another system perhaps), perform a vgimport.

I always have to do the pvcreate -f on XP512 disks, it can be a pain!

Share and Enjoy! Ian

[MANOJ SRIVASTAVA]

Shawn

If you used the disks to do a vgcreate w/o the -p options and then you are trying to use the same disks for vgcreate with -p optuion it will not work . You hae to do a pvcrete -f first and then only do the vgcreate again.

I hope I am able to make my self clear.


Manoj Srivastava

[Helen French]

The "cannot create: device busy" error during vgcreate normally comes if the disk have not been prepared for LVM use. The pvcreate command does this job for you:

# ioscan -fnC disk ( find out device file)
# pvcreate -f /dev/rdsk/cxtydz
# mkdir /dev/vgxx
# mknod /dev/vgxx/group c 64 0x??0000
# vgcreate /dev/vgxx /dev/dsk/cxtydz

You can also try doing this with SAM

[Shawn Miller_2]

Thanks for everyone's help but the problem was with EMC PowerPath.

[Tim D Fulford]

Do you have problems with controllers/paths to disks

try ioscan -funCdisk, make sure it is claimed & not got NO_HW

Tim