Adding a new Hard Drive

Question

I just handed over a server, PowerEdge 2850 with 4 of 146GB HDD and Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES release 3 (Taroon Update 2) installed. Unfortunately there's no other information about this server.. especially RAID controller related, and the server is 10,000 miles away. :smileysad:   What I'm going to do is adding a 300GB SCSI HDD into this system. It doesn't have to be a part of current array.  This drive space is secondary back-up purpose, and it is OK to be a separate drive space.   I checked some information and there's PassThru (Legacy) SCSI Channel on PERC 4/Di.   The problem is .. I don't know exact model of my RAID controller..   So... questions are.. 1. is there any way of checking the RAID controller's model ? 2. Is it hot swappable and can I put the new HDD into one of the empty slots without shutting down the server? 3. How can I partition this new drive into usable space?   I'm sorry that I'm quite new to Linux..  and the server is 10,000 miles away and the only way to access it is via SSH.   Thank you very much   Edward

Eric BY · Answer

Run the command :cat /proc/scsi/scsi It should tell you the SCSI / RAID controller. From there, we can obtain more information, such as hot plug capabilities.

EdwardMagicHand · Answer

Dear Eric

Thank you for the tip.

It says:

Attached devices:
Host: scsi0 Channel: 00 Id: 00 Lun: 00
Vendor: MegaRAID Model: LD 0 RAID5 419G Rev: 513O
Type:   Direct-Access                    ANSI SCSI revision: 02
Host: scsi0 Channel: 04 Id: 06 Lun: 00
Vendor: PE/PV    Model: 1x6 SCSI BP      Rev: 1.0
Type:   Processor                        ANSI SCSI revision: 02

Thank you..

Edward.

Eric BY · Answer

You have a Megaraid RAID controller, and it looks like a hot plug back plane. What type of server do you have so that I can confirm?

Eric BY · Answer

the backplane and raid controller support hot plug. If you plan on modifying the existing RAID set, you should shut down. Otherwise the you can configure the new disk using the megaraid linux utility.

I would recommend doing a shutdown to be safe, but if that is not an option, there are methods as I previously stated.

EdwardMagicHand · Answer

Oopsy.. what has happend?   I posted  that my server is PE2850 and Eric recommended to check http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/SCSI-2.4-HOWTO/mlproc.html   By the way, the server is running and doing very important job as well as it has very important data.  So could you confirm again that it IS hot pluggable and it won't harm any other HDDs already installed and running?   Thank you very much again.!!   Edward.

EdwardMagicHand · Answer

Thanks Eric.

We're going to have a scheduled shutdown/restart soon and I think that's the perfect timing for HDD upgrade.

There are a couple of more questions....

1. Since the server is 10000 miles away, I cannot see the console message ( can I? ) and i'm wondering if there's anying I need to do while boot up.

2. I'm Linux newbie and it would be really appreciated if you could give me a step by step instruction to create a partition on the new HDD. It doesn't have to be a part of RAID array.

3. Just curiosity that the RAID controller won't merge the hew drive into the existing RAID array automatically......

Best regards,

Edward

Eric BY · Answer

Does your server have a DRAC installed?  If so, you can get console access through it.

EdwardMagicHand · Answer

As I mentioned earlier, I didn't setup this server. someone else did and he's gone now. :(   So.. could you tell me how to check if this server has a DRAC installed?   Thank you very much.   Edward.

EdwardMagicHand · Answer

I don't think DRAC is available.. :(   Regards,   Edward

EdwardMagicHand · Answer

I just checked the MegaRAID manual file and ....

is it only accessible by pressing Ctrl+M while boot-up process? which means there's no way of accessing this utility through the OS?

If so, I definitely need a step by step instruction to pass over to someone who can physically access the server.

Thank you very much again.

Edward.

Eric BY · Answer

There are Dell utilities for managing the RAID controller within Linux. Check out this link:     http://linux.dell.com/storage.shtml#megaraid

EdwardMagicHand · Answer

Thanks for the reply..

By the way, today we shutdown the server and inserted the new HDD into slot #4 by the technician in the facility.

ANd I think he did something in the RAID BIOS software so that this new drive doesn't go to the RAID array which is already configured.

Now, I checked the /dev/sd* and there are so many devices in there and I couldn't find which one should I create the partition on and format..

Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks

Edward

Eric BY · Answer

run the command : fdisk -l. It should report back which scsi devices already have a partition table. Choose the one that doesn't have one.

If that doesn't work for you , run the mount command. That should tell you which devices are currently mounted. If you have a partition from the fdisk -l command that is not mounted, mount it, and see what is on it.

EdwardMagicHand · Answer

Dear Eric

I tried fdisk -l, but it said nothing.

Instead, I tried

cat /proc/megaraid/diskdrives-ch0

and it says

Channel: 0 Id: 0 State: Online.
Vendor: SEAGATE   Model: ST3146807LC       Rev: DS09
Type:   Direct-Access                      ANSI SCSI revision: 03
Channel: 0 Id: 1 State: Failed.
Vendor: SEAGATE   Model: ST3146807LC       Rev: DS09
Type:   Direct-Access                      ANSI SCSI revision: 03
Channel: 0 Id: 2 State: Online.
Vendor: SEAGATE   Model: ST3146807LC       Rev: DS09
Type:   Direct-Access                      ANSI SCSI revision: 03
Channel: 0 Id: 3 State: Online.
Vendor: SEAGATE   Model: ST3146807LC       Rev: DS09
Type:   Direct-Access                      ANSI SCSI revision: 03
Channel: 0 Id: 4 State: Un-configured.
Vendor: MAXTOR    Model: ATLAS10K5_300SCA Rev: JNZH
Type:   Direct-Access                      ANSI SCSI revision: 03

The new drive is in the Id4 and its state is "Un-configured".

What is the "Un-configured" and what should I do?

* Id1 Failed drive will be replaced, though..

Thanks a million.

Edward

Eric BY · Answer

Once that failed drive is replaced, it should rebuild that RAID Then run the Megaraid utility in Linux to create a new container for the new disk. (dellmgr v 5.22).

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