LinuxQuestions.org
Share your knowledge at the LQ Wiki.
Go Back   LinuxQuestions.org > Forums > Linux Forums > Linux - General
User Name
Password
Linux - General This Linux forum is for general Linux questions and discussion.
If it is Linux Related and doesn't seem to fit in any other forum then this is the place.

Notices


Reply
  Search this Thread
Old 01-28-2005, 05:03 PM   #1
jmacdonald801
LQ Newbie
 
Registered: Jan 2005
Posts: 4

Rep: Reputation: 0
Can fake raid be converted to linux software raid?


I'm sorta a n00b, so I hope I'm posting in the correct place.

I'm happily using Suse Pro 9.2. I was using a Highpoint RocketRaid 1640 with 4 hard drives in a raid0+1 configuration using the open source drivers off the highpoint web site.

Well I got the urge to tweak, so I made me a 2.6.10 kernel with a bootsplash and CIOCGDEV patch.

I came to find out that I could no longer compile the highpoint open source drivers and figured it was time to use the linux kernel raid support instead, I had heard it was a better option anyway.

Well this lead me down the path of finding and learning about DMRAID. Cool little utility... however... I would like to know how I can convert these raided driver to regular linux software raid drives so the Suse boot.md script can do all it's nifty raid configuring etc. without all the **** I had to mangle to get it mounting with dmraid. I guess when i say regular, I mean I can manage it with the Suse partitioning tools and have suse mount it etc. without my hackery.

So to re-iterate, I have my Highpoint raid mounting with dmraid, is there no way to move thise to a regular linux software raid so that suse can just recogize it and start it up normally?

-James
 
Old 01-30-2005, 09:47 AM   #2
trickykid
LQ Guru
 
Registered: Jan 2001
Posts: 24,149

Rep: Reputation: 269Reputation: 269Reputation: 269
Your Highpoint Raid is a hardware raid, nothing fake about it. If it's not supported in later kernels and you want to do a software raid, remove the card from your system and attach the drives either to the existing connections or you may have to get an expansion card to connect your drives, if they're either SCSI or IDE.. etc.

But to tell you the truth, hardware raid seems to fail less than software raid. Having hardware control the raid takes less load off the cpu and system. You'll get better performance as well.
 
Old 01-30-2005, 11:27 AM   #3
jmacdonald801
LQ Newbie
 
Registered: Jan 2005
Posts: 4

Original Poster
Rep: Reputation: 0
Quote:
Originally posted by trickykid
Your Highpoint Raid is a hardware raid, nothing fake about it. If it's not supported in later kernels and you want to do a software raid, remove the card from your system and attach the drives either to the existing connections or you may have to get an expansion card to connect your drives, if they're either SCSI or IDE.. etc.

But to tell you the truth, hardware raid seems to fail less than software raid. Having hardware control the raid takes less load off the cpu and system. You'll get better performance as well.
There is plenty fake about it. The highpoints bios is loaded into ram and executed. It has no coprocessor whatsoever. This is true of all cheap low end raid cards. No processing is actually being done on the highpoit other than the standard ATA stuff that all IDE controllers do. When I load the HPT366 module, it recognizes the drives as vanilla ide drivers.

The only difference between linux software raid and highpoints raid is that its a different piece of software. Not to mention, using the linux software raid, throughput is actually faster, since there is no real co-processor on the high point.
 
Old 01-30-2005, 12:33 PM   #4
trickykid
LQ Guru
 
Registered: Jan 2001
Posts: 24,149

Rep: Reputation: 269Reputation: 269Reputation: 269
Quote:
Originally posted by jmacdonald801
There is plenty fake about it. The highpoints bios is loaded into ram and executed. It has no coprocessor whatsoever. This is true of all cheap low end raid cards. No processing is actually being done on the highpoit other than the standard ATA stuff that all IDE controllers do. When I load the HPT366 module, it recognizes the drives as vanilla ide drivers.

The only difference between linux software raid and highpoints raid is that its a different piece of software. Not to mention, using the linux software raid, throughput is actually faster, since there is no real co-processor on the high point.
I understand what your saying since I just mentioned hardware raid in general having better performance.. If your looking for performance along with compatibility with your newer kernel, get a newer hardware based raid controller.. but other than that, your better off yanking that card out and plugging in your drives in an alternative way to setup software raid.
 
  


Reply


Thread Tools Search this Thread
Search this Thread:

Advanced Search

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off



Similar Threads
Thread Thread Starter Forum Replies Last Post
Why can't I mount this md0 raid? (mdadm and software raid) cruiserparts Linux - Software 35 01-05-2013 03:35 PM
Which motherboard for (fake) SATA RAID? ilhbutshm Linux - Hardware 10 08-10-2005 04:29 AM
Software RAID to recover data from HW RAID ocschwar Linux - Hardware 5 02-25-2005 10:05 PM
moving system from ide software raid to new box with scsi raid ftumsh Linux - General 0 10-28-2003 09:34 AM
Software RAID vs Hardware RAID system Linux - General 3 12-25-2001 08:11 PM

LinuxQuestions.org > Forums > Linux Forums > Linux - General

All times are GMT -5. The time now is 03:39 AM.

Main Menu
Advertisement
My LQ
Write for LQ
LinuxQuestions.org is looking for people interested in writing Editorials, Articles, Reviews, and more. If you'd like to contribute content, let us know.
Main Menu
Syndicate
RSS1  Latest Threads
RSS1  LQ News
Twitter: @linuxquestions
Open Source Consulting | Domain Registration