On 13/03/10 03:58, Michael Evans wrote:

This is a really basic thing, but do you have the x86 support for very
large block devices (I can't remember what the option is, since I've
been running 64 bits on any system that even remotely came close to
needing it anyway) enabled in the config as well?

Here's a hit from google, CONFIG_LBD http://cateee.net/lkddb/web-lkddb/LBD.html

Enable block devices of size 2TB and larger.

Yes I have LBD support
grep LBD /boot/config-2.6.18-164.11.1.el5PAE
CONFIG_LBD=y

Since you're using a device>2TB in size, I will assume you are using
one of the three 'version 1' superblock types.  Either at the end 1.0,
beginning 1.1 or 4kb in from the beginning.

Please provide the full output of mdadm -Dvvs

If you mean metadata then I'm at default -> 0.90
Is this the problem? I 've seen in the manual that
2 TB is the limit for raid 1 and above

"0, 0.90, default:   Use the original 0.90  format  superblock.   This 
format limits  arrays  to 28 component devices and limits component 
devices of levels 1 and greater to 2 terabytes."


[root@server ~]# mdadm -Dvvs
mdadm: bad uuid: UUID=324587ca:484d94c7:f06cbaee:5b63cd3
/dev/md0:
         Version : 0.90
   Creation Time : Sat Mar 13 02:00:23 2010
      Raid Level : raid0
      Array Size : 14627614208 (13949.98 GiB 14978.68 GB)
    Raid Devices : 2
   Total Devices : 2
Preferred Minor : 0
     Persistence : Superblock is persistent

     Update Time : Sat Mar 13 02:00:23 2010
           State : clean
  Active Devices : 2
Working Devices : 2
  Failed Devices : 0
   Spare Devices : 0

      Chunk Size : 256K

            UUID : 324587ca:484d94c7:f06cbaee:5b63cd37
          Events : 0.1

     Number   Major   Minor   RaidDevice State
        0       8       16        0      active sync   /dev/sdb
        1       8       32        1      active sync   /dev/sdc

You can use any block device as a member of an md array.  However if
you are going 'whole drive' then it would be a very good idea to erase
the existing partition table structure prior to putting a raid
superblock on the device.  This way there is no confusion about if the
device has partitions or is in fact a raid member.  Similarly when
transitioning back the other way ensuring that the old metadata for
the array is erased is also a good idea.

I have erased prior creating the gpt and the raid devide
dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sdb bs=512 count=64
dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sdc bs=512 count=64

(I accidentally erased my boot disk also but I managed to recover)

The kernel you're running seems to be ... exceptionally old and
heavily patched.  I have no way of knowing if the many, many, patches
that fixed numerous issues over the /years/ since it's release have
been included.  Please make sure you have the most recent release from
your vendor and ask them for support in parallel.

This is centos 5.4 stock kernel. So this is redhat 5.4 stock kernel
They say they support all these...

thanks
Giannis