Hi, I recently bought a new hard drive. I alread have another big hard drive for files so altogether they have 450 GB. I decided to set up LVM on my system to make it easy to access both together and be able to add more space in the future, but I am a bit wary because I know little about LVM. This is strictly for data, not the root partition. (note- I HAVE read the howto and other things online but don't find any of them all that user-friendly for the newbie. Things like "um... how to I actually access this LVM disc I have just created" or "how do I get the LVM discs to automatically show up on reboot" are NOT obvious from the howto.)
I am wondering if there is any downside about using LVM I should be aware of. Is my data any less safe? I ask because I didn't realizze (at first) how to get the LVM disc to show up on boot, so it appeared that everything just wasn't there. So I was thinking - what if I have some problem with my root partition in the future, is the data on an LVM share just as accessable as otherwise? (Stupid question perhaps, but I don't know much yet.) Also I am still uncertain about how to best make use of two discs with LVM. Do I HAVE to set up a RAID, or is it an option. Is there any benifit or danger to using a RAID or not with LVM. (I have never set up a RAID but my motherboard - ASUS Kv8 I think - can do that I think.) If I don't use a RAID how are the discs used? Does it just fill up one, and then start on the other or use space on both at the same time? Apologies for my ignorance in advance. Craig
