Opensuse 11 software RAID 5 failed: how to recover ?
 

Hi there!
A friend has a dell 4550 http://support.dell.com/support/edoc...cs.htm#1101572 with Opensuse 11 on it. It has 4 drives, one to boot, three 160 Gig for the RAID 5 array.

After hooking up a monitor (VNC does not work at that stage) I can read the following error message:
"repair filesystem"

I am searching and reading for the past days and find no solution for this. Right now I am making a 1:1 backup of the drives before I go on fiddeling with them.

I tried forcing the array (also with that "echo" thingi), dis- and reattaching the drives (both hardware and software), but all has failed thus far.

the system responds with some messages, but searching those yielded no practical info:
"bitmap file is out of date" (151/150)
"mdadm: device /dev/sdb not suitable for any style of array"
"Uuu" 1

It seems that all drives are OK hardwarewise.

During my research many answers were on this site, and I am amazed by the helpfulness of the "elders" here.

I am totally new to Linux unfortunately, but try to learn this amazing OS.

So I registered and here it comes:

1) when the (failed) boot process stops (with the "repair filesystem" message) some lines had indicated some "failed" but they pass very fast and I cannot scroll back to see what they say. How can I see what was going on? I tried Ctrl-S etc. during the boot process to pause the messages in vain.


2) has anybody come across those "bitmap file is out of date" and "mdadm: device /dev/sdb not suitable for any style of array"?


3) what is the correlation of sdb to the actual IDE port? I have sda...sdd. Is sda the primary master and sdb the primary slave? I.e. which drive is sdb with a 2 port IDE configuration?


4) some places I read that booting with Knoppix might help recovering the data on the RAID5, is that true? (I am d/l Knoppx right now)


Please, if you are kind enough to help, give me instructions on what I should type. I tried "Dir" and "type" in the beginning (I know I know (NOW)), just so you know what my knowledge level with Linux is...
Consider me as your extended fingers and eyes.

Thank you very much.

Judging from your linux knowledge and the complexity of your problem, I would seriously consider starting looking for someone who knows linux and raid and inviting them over (IRL) for a cup of coffe & cake. (I'm a 36-year old Swede. Adjust menu according to age and cultural preference.)

I am sure the LQ community will do it's outmost to assist you, but unless there is a really simple fix out there which is easy to spot, it's going to take quite a while until you have been guided to provide all the relevant information necessary to diagnose and resolve our problem.

Best of luck!

Hi Govert,
thanks for the hint.
I'll be definitely awarding whoever can solve this. I'm in West Los Angeles.

It seems that a backup was made 10 days ago, so not all is lost.

That makes it not that urgent, but still necessary.

I read about mdadm (wow!) and am more lost than before.

After backing up the drives (none had a hardware error BTW) I tried several things, but again, none worked.

Do you have a suggestion for the first question, on how to look at the error messages which scroll by very fast?

That would be the first step, do you agree?

Again, I am open for any guidance, thanks!

Another member is asking a very similar question here
http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...e-11.1-736416/
so if any kind soul would help us, you'd help out two with one stroke.
Plus the many others who would search for this.


Meanwhile I continue searching/reading about similar issues, and tried out whatever (if at all) was suggested in each (roughly 10 approaches), but thus far none worked.

I am now trying to understand Vi (and they say aliens haven't been on this planet) to be able to access the output I had mentioned.

Again, any help on these questions would be great:

1) when the (failed) boot process stops (with the "repair filesystem" message) some lines had indicated some "failed" but they pass very fast and I cannot scroll back to see what they say. How can I see what was going on? I tried Ctrl-S etc. during the boot process to pause the messages in vain.


2) has anybody come across those "bitmap file is out of date" and "mdadm: device /dev/sdb not suitable for any style of array"?


3) correlation of sdb to the actual IDE port? Found that meanwhile, thanks.

4) Knoppix : tried that meanwhile, does not help, same issue.