Debian Sarge server with RAID 5 [25 mn of reading - published 5/31/2006 12:48:24 AM - Target : Confirmé]

Author

Julien FRAISSE Student-Engineer Supinfo Paris SUPINFO graduate year  2008    Write to the person    All projects of the same author    Mini-CV of the author

3 Installation

3.1 Installation launch

Reboot your server by booting from the Debian Sarge CD chosen. You should have the following image:

Type “ENTER” to install the distribution. The installation will choose a core 2.4 by default, so if you choose a 2.6 core type “linux26”. You will find a installation parameters list and their meaning with the keys F3, F5, F6 and F7. Once yur choice is done, you will have to select your language, country and keyboard type ( you will be able to modify the installation after thanks to the “loadkeys”)

3.2 Hard disks preparation

We are coming to the important stage of the disks partitioning. We will choose a manual partition, the only way to prepare the hard disks for the RAID.

On each hard disk, you will have to create three partitions with the method “physical volume for RAID”.

• The first partition will be of 300MB to obtain in RAID0, 900MB for the swap.
• The second partition, for the boot in RAID1 with a reserve disk, will be of 500MB.
• And then you will leave the rest of the free space disk for the last partition which will be in RAID5 and will have to receive folders.

Once those partitioning table modifications done, your monitor has to look like this one:

Now that our disks are ready, we will have to configure the software RAID.

3.3 RAID software configuration

We are going in the menu on the top of the list: “configure software RAID”. Choose to keep the current partition layout and configure the RAID, you will obtain a new menu:

This is where we will really set up our RAID.

3.3.1 SWAP in RAID0

You have to create a multi-disks peripheral on the type RAID0, with 3 active peripherals and select the 3 partitions of the same size. In our example, they are the three first partitions of each hard disk.

3.3.2 /boot in RAID1

You have to create a multi-disks peripheral on the type RAID1 by specifying 2 active peripherals and 1 reserve one. Select the 2 corresponding partitions

and the third one as a reserve one.

3.3.3 Root partition "/" in RAID5

You have to create a multi-disks peripheral on the type RAID5 by specifying 3 active peripherals. Select the 3 corresponding partitions.

Our RAID are now installed and we just have to create folders systems and to attribute points of assembly for each raid.

3.4 Mount points and file system

You need to go back on the core menu and you will see that the RAID peripherals really appear in the list. Indicate "use as a swap area” for the RAID0 peripheral. Specify the ext3 file system for the 2 other peripherals and indicate the mount points “/boot” for the RAID1 and “/” for the RAID5. You should obtain an image like this one:

Now your disks are ready to welcome your Debian with your RAID5 data and your /boot in RAID1, what will allow to replace it easily if one of the hard disk doesn’t work anymore. Once the installation completed, you will obtain an image like this:

3.5 Different Problems

It is possible that you will be blocked at the 3.2 stage, if the Debian installer indicates you that it doesn’t find the hard disk. It is possible too that the partitioning software doesn’t recognize a RAID partition on your hard disk. These mistakes are frequent with the new materials, it indicates that the hard disk controller is still not recognized. You can try to download the last version of the Debian Image (at the moment 2.6.15) but if it still doesn’t work you don’t have any other choice than waiting. That’s the reason why I advise you to surf on the websites talking about the subject and to choose recognized and compatible material and having a good feedback.