Jeremy Harris wrote:
On 12/24/2009 05:12 PM, Richard Neill wrote:
Of course, with a server machine, it's nearly impossible to use mdadm
raid: you are usually compelled to use a hardware raid card.
Could you expand on that?
Both of the last machines I bought (an IBM X3550 and an HP DL380) come
with hardware raid solutions. These are an utter nuisance because:
- they can only be configured from the BIOS (or with a
bootable utility CD). Linux has very basic monitoring tools,
but no way to reconfigure the array, or add disks to empty
hot-swap slots while the system is running.
- If there is a Linux raid config program, it's not part of the
main packaged distro, but usually a pre-built binary, available
for only one release/kernel of the wrong distro.
- the IBM one had dodgy firmware, which, until updated, caused the
disk to totally fail after a few days.
- you pay a lot of money for something effectively pointless, and
have less control and less flexibility.
After my experience with the X3550, I hunted for any server that would
ship without hardware raid, i.e. connect the 8 SATA hotswap slots direct
to the motherboard, or where the hardware raid could be de-activated
completely, and put into pass-through mode. Neither HP nor IBM make such
a thing.
Richard
- Jeremy
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