Problems with adding SATA disk to SC430

Question

The state of affairs : SC430 Dell Power Edge server, with two SCSI disks of 146G in mirror.  BIOS is A03. My RAID controller is : Dell CERC SATA 1.5/6ch Controller. (PE SC430 - SATA - P4 521, 2.8GHZ/1MB, 80 is the definition of my server on Dell site). Operating system : RHEL4U5 (old I know, but it is what it is). Now the problem is that I have to add another hard disc, and all I have is a 1T SATA HDD, BUT all the existing data on mirrored disks (2x146G) has to stay intact and available after the intervention. The disc was put in the box, controller sees it, no problem, formats it, no problem, and than comes the PROBLEM. No way does the operating system see the new disc. I tried upgrading to RHEL5, to no avail. I tried the lshw tool. Does not see the new disc. Looked up kernel modules, and they should be OK The only other thing I can think of it to update BIOS version to A04 (it is the latest). Is even possible what I am trying to do?

theflash1932 · Accepted Answer

You said you 'formatted' the drive with the controller - I'm assuming you're talking about the Disk Utilities in CTRL-A?  Did you also 'configure' the drive in the controller (Container Management(?))?  The OS generally cannot see a drive unless the controller has told it what it should see ... my recollection is a bit vague on the CERC, but most controllers require a single drive to by configured as a RAID 0.

ebel · Answer

THANK YOU!!!!! I was doing this for the first time in my life, and so missed the OBVIOUS. :emotion-2:

theflash1932 · Answer

You bet ... it is overlooked by more than just first-timers :)

ebel · Answer

Sorry, that was very uncomplete of me.

I meant I did the fdisc and this :

Command (m for help): n
Command action
e extended
p primary partition (1-4)
p
Partition number (1-4): 1
First cylinder (1-121597, default 1):
Using default value 1
Last cylinder or +size or +sizeM or +sizeK (1-121597, default 121597):
Using default value 121597

Command (m for help): w
The partition table has been altered!

Calling ioctl() to re-read partition table.
Syncing disks.

and it has been standing like this for nearly 72 hours. I mean I know it is not a strong (or new) server, but still...

ebel · Answer

Well not 5 minutes after the post, it finished, and is all OK now So much for HDDs :emotion-2:

Garth.Quaid · Answer

{$content} Many thanks to your description! It helps me out of the problem.

PowerEdge HDD/SCSI/RAID

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