Ubuntu 8.04 - Raid

[The Borg]

Hi all,

While I am a Linux noob, I was a Fedora fan. I have been having problems with an old dual P3 and tried to install FC8. Still problems. So I tried Ubuntu 8.04. Wow, what a nice package. Especially for Windows users.

Now to the problem. I have 3 drives on this machine. one 80 gig and 2 40 gig drives. After a few installs, I figured out how to do the partitioning properly so that I have Ubuntu installed on the 80 gig and 40 gig of it partitioned with the other 2 40's to give an 80 gig Raid 5 partition.

I used Partition Editor and get the 80 gig raid partition shown. However, if I try and allocate or format or whatever it is called (ext2, ext3, etc) I get an error.

The 'drive' is there as dev/md0.

Any help please.

 

[SleepWalkerX]

Do you have dmraid modprobbed?

 

[Nothinman]

dmraid is only needed if you're trying to use one those crappy onboard RAID setups. It sounds like he's trying to use Linux software RAID. If you've already setup the partitions and used mdadm to create the RAID5 set you should be able to use /dev/md0 as a regular device. What error(s) do you get and is there anything in the kernel log?

 

[The Borg]

Yes, I am trying to use SW Raid. I saw dmraid along the line but it is for the hardware raid.

I get the /dev/md0 but when I try to format it (Primary Partition, ext3) it gives me an error "create new ext3 filesystem - error". The partition is created ok.

Any more comments?

 

[Nothinman]

/dev/md0 isn't a partition, it's a full block device. What are you using that gives you that error because AFAIK mke2fs will actually give useful errors...

 

[The Borg]

I am using GParted. I greate a partition - /dev/md0p1 - which has not file system. That is when I get the error - trying to format.

As a Linux noob, I use the GUI stuff. How would I use mke2fs?

 

[Nothinman]

Frankly I wouldn't worry about partitioning the array, I always just use the full /dev/mdX. mke2fs is the command to create an ext2 or ext3 filesystem, run it without any parameters and it'll print the available options which should be pretty self-explanatory.

 

[The Borg]

Cool, thanks man. Seems to have worked.

Now just to mount it and I am away...

 

[Nothinman]

If you really think you might want to break up that array I'd probably suggest putting LVM on top of it instead of partitioning.

 

[Skiddex]

Originally posted by: Nothinman
If you really think you might want to break up that array I'd probably suggest putting LVM on top of it instead of partitioning.

I will always recommend LVM when going raid. i setup sw raid 5 on my box at home and have some notes i can send your way later tonight if you'd like

 

[The Borg]

Now I am a bit confused. Why would I want to do this LVM thing? I think I am confused about this partitioning terminology on Linux.

I made the RAID array for the obvious safety reasons. I want to make it available to my Windows box to save 'My Documents' to. Does that change anything based on your suggestions?

 

[Kakumba]

If you have already made a file system on there, then I would just stick with it. I am not an LVM fan myself, have never seen the point of it for my own use. Each to their own.

If you have the file system ready, and just need to mount it, then you need to create a place to mount the new filesystem, say, /data, so you would issue a "mkdir /data" on a terminal, and then issue a "mount /dev/md0 /data" (most likely have to be root, so maybe sudo it), and then you are good to go. if that all works, then add it to your /etc/fstab. Here is my fstab entry for my RAID array (5*500Gb in RAID 5 using Linux software RAID):

/dev/md0 /data ext3 defaults,noatime 1 0

That just means that when you start the system up, it will mount /dev/md0 at /data, and it wont do the auto checks after some amount of restarts (for me, that is annoying and pointless). It also has the noatime option, which tends to increase ext3 performance. Again, this is useful to me, but if you run mutt, or a couple of other specific things, then use relatime instead of noatime.

As for making it available to windows, do you want it to need a password? I would recommend using Samba, its really easy, and well supported. Happy to post my samba config if it helps.

 

[The Borg]

Guys,

Thanks once again for the help. Seems to be working. Some more questions:
1. I ran the mke2fs program to create a ext3 FS. However, to mount the device, I had to set it to ext2. Seems like it only created ext2 not ext3.
2. Now to the Samba stuff. I want the storage space to be accessible to my Windows machines. Not really necessary for passwords. I tried it once with Mandrake (?) and it was easy. FC6 was a nightmare and I gave up. I printed out a whole wack of stuff on Samba a while back and not much made sense. Any guidance there please?

BTW, properties for the /var/storage folder where I mounted the raid drives says 70 odd gig. SO I assume it is mounted correctly.

 

[Nothinman]

1. I ran the mke2fs program to create a ext3 FS. However, to mount the device, I had to set it to ext2. Seems like it only created ext2 not ext3.

Whether mke2fs creates an ext2 or ext3 filesystem by default depends on the settings in /etc/mke2fs.conf. But you can always add the journal option to mke2fs when you run it to create ext3.

 

[The Borg]

I am positive I did. You suggested I run mke2fs and check the options. I did this and made out what I think was right. As far as I know, it does not really make a difference.

 

[Nothinman]

It does, if you want a journal you need to use the -j switch.

 

[Kakumba]

for samba, as long as you have it installed, then you can either use the GUI to set things up, or edit your /etc/smbd.conf directly. Using the GUI, you should be able to set it up in a couple of minutes pretty easily. Just set security to "Share" instead of the default (think its User), and create a public share. That should do it all, if not then post your /etc/smbd.conf, and we can help

 

[The Borg]

Seems like this is a mini tutorial lesson here. Thanks guys, it is really helping. I have trued Linux in the past and having sumbled on these small issues have just given up. But with Ubuntu and your help, it is going much better. It really is a good OS environment.

OK, I installed samaba and smaba smbfs. Now what? How do I get the GUI running? Tried some searches but they were not helpful.

Basically, the large RAID drive of above is what I want to share - to all.

 

[Khyron320]

I would install webmin it is 10x easier to adjust samba shares/users withit than fumbling around the GUI or .conf files.

Download page:
http://www.webmin.com/download.html
You want the .deb file
http://prdownloads.sourceforge...n/webmin_1.410_all.deb
Just double click it from the ubuntu file browser and follow the prompts.

now go to https://127.0.0.1:10000 or whatever the IP is from another machine.
you should be able to log in with the root account.

 

[Kakumba]

In Ubuntu I am not sure which menu the GUI is in, but under something like "Administration" or "Servers" in your menu, you should find a samba option, which will open a GUI to configure the samba shares. Otherwise, give webmin a shot, as Khyron320 suggests.

 

[The Borg]

Not being able to connect. Either locally or over the network.

 

[Dravic]

Originally posted by: Kakumba
In Ubuntu I am not sure which menu the GUI is in, but under something like "Administration" or "Servers" in your menu, you should find a samba option, which will open a GUI to configure the samba shares. Otherwise, give webmin a shot, as Khyron320 suggests.

even easier...


in ubuntu go to places(menu bar on top)->computer, navigate your way to the folder you want to share, and much like windows right click on it and choose share. if samba wasn't installed, after choosing SMB it would install it for you. You will still need to create a samba user who can access shared folders.

smbpassword -a username(dont know if it HAS to be the same as the linux username, but i usually make it the same)

use that password when prompted on the windows server to access the share... after this is done look at the /etc/samba/smb.conf file.. its not terrible difficult to understand. at the bottom should be the shared drives, you can just add any other shares by adding more like those, and restarting samba (/etc/init.d/samba restart)

 

[The Borg]

Thanks guys.

Tried what you said, but there is a permissions problem I need to figure our.

BTW Dravic, I also have a 4800+ X2 OC'ed. I am strugling to get it over 2.9. even with cold water cooling (about 20 deg C), I cannot get more then 238 x 12). How are you doing it? Voltages? Multipliers?

 

[Dravic]

scythe mine HSF
vcore 1.45 (mmm Toasty)
asus A8N-E

240x12
2x1gig memory @ 192 (2.5, 2-3-5 11 2t)


mboard will do ~247, but flacky there

2940 is the edge, backed off for good measure.

was using a 3800+ @2.6 for the longest until this chip showed up on newegg months after having been out of stock, got lucky... higher multiplier also allowed me to stay away from that 247 limit the mboard was hitting.

 

[The Borg]

I have a gigabyte GA-K8NXP-9 mobo. Thermaltake cooling system - highly modified. Block on chip, 3 x 120-mm radiators, doubled up cooling fans all emptying into a water bucket and then punped back using a fish pond pump. the outlet of the radiators gives a water temp of about 18 deg C at the moment - about 3 deg above room temp (winter here at the moment).

I can get 242, but not stable for more than 5-min. Backed off to 238.

2 x 1 gig ram. Will check the timings etc when I re-boot. I think it runs ar 198, and 2.5T

Voltage set to 1.65. Speedfan gives me a temperature of 68 deg C. Core Temp gives 68 and 62. At a voltage of 1.55 I can run up to 236.