Avamar: How to determine if a grid is RAIN or Non-RAIN

Summary: This article describes how to identify if a grid is RAIN or non-RAIN.

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Instructions

RAIN: Redundant Array of Independent Nodes

This article describes how to identify if a grid is RAIN or non-RAIN.

Note: A single-node grid is always NON-RAIN.
 
 

1. To see if a grid may have a RAIN setup, use the status.dpn command:

For example:

status.dpn 

Fri Oct 14 09:35:10 UTC 2011  [AVAMAR1] Fri Oct 14 09:35:10 2011 UTC (Initialized Fri Apr 22 17:07:20 2011 UTC) 
Node   IP Address     Version   State   Runlevel  Srvr+Root+User Dis Suspend Load UsedMB Errlen  %Full   Percent Full and Stripe Status by Disk 
0.0    10.5.161.109  6.0.0-592  ONLINE fullaccess mhpu+0hpu+0hpu   0 false   0.07 8929480   699923   3.9%   4%(onl:160)  3%(onl:171)  3%(onl:173) 
0.1    10.5.161.110  6.0.0-592  ONLINE fullaccess mhpu+0hpu+0hpu   1 false   0.21 9713140   678009   3.8%   3%(onl:161)  3%(onl:173)  3%(onl:171) 
0.2    10.5.161.111  6.0.0-592  ONLINE fullaccess mhpu+0hpu+0hpu   1 false   0.14 8156724   709954   3.8%   3%(onl:158)  3%(onl:164)  3%(onl:167) 
0.3    10.5.161.112  6.0.0-592  ONLINE fullaccess mhpu+0hpu+0hpu   0 false   0.16 9275296   714186   3.9%   4%(onl:161)  3%(onl:171)  3%(onl:162) 
Srvr+Root+User Modes = migrate + hfswriteable + persistwriteable + useraccntwriteable

  • From this output, this is a 1x4 Avamar grid. 

  • A normal assumption would be that this is a RAIN setup, but further investigation may be required depending on the errors being presented.

2. To check if parity is enabled, the following command can be used: 

avmaint nodelist |grep paritygroups
 

Example output from a RAIN grid: (The first data node reports paritygroups="N8") 

paritygroups="" 
paritygroups="" 
paritygroups="" 
paritygroups="N8"
 

Example from a non-RAIN grid: (The first data node reports paritygroups="none")

paritygroups="" 
paritygroups="" 
paritygroups="" 
paritygroups="none"
 

Example from a mirrored grid: (The first data node reports paritygroups="N1")

paritygroups="" 
paritygroups="" 
paritygroups="" 
paritygroups="N1"
Note: This is uncommon and no longer supported in any current versions of Avamar.
 
 

3. If a node is offline, the paritygroups output may not display as expected. If so the nearparity value can be used to determine RAIN or non-RAIN:

avmaint nodelist |grep nearparity
 

Example output from a RAIN grid:

 nearparity="8" 
 

Example output from a non-RAIN grid:

 nearparity="0" 
 

4. Alternatively, the data nodes can be searched for the actual parity stripes:

a. Log in to the Avamar Utility Node as admin

b. Load the admin ssh keys per Avamar: How to Log in to an Avamar Server and Load Various Keys.

c. Run a mapall command to find parity stripes:

mapall --noerror 'ls -l /data0?/cur/*.par'
 

Sample output:

-r--r-----  5 admin admin 377487360 Aug  8 19:26 /data01/cur/0000000000000036.par 
-r--r-----  5 admin admin 377485532 Jun  3 18:12 /data01/cur/0000000000000045.par 
-r--r-----  5 admin admin 377479507 Jun  3 17:44 /data01/cur/000000000000004B.par 
-r--r-----  5 admin admin 377487122 Jun  3 17:39 /data01/cur/000000000000004F.par

Affected Products

Avamar

Products

Avamar, Avamar Server
Article Properties
Article Number: 000014464
Article Type: How To
Last Modified: 10 Oct 2025
Version:  7
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