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Centos 7 on HP Proliant ML350P dont show all disk on array Raid 1

Posted: 2019/07/22 05:50:36
by pajafumo
Hi, I'm trying to install Centos 7.6.1810 on a HP Prolliant ML350P Gen8 but when selecting Installation Destination it shows only one Disk (1.2 TB) and I have two disk.
If I configure HP Smart Array P420i and create Logical Drive as Raid 1 Centos show only one disk of 1.2TB to select
If I configure HP Smart Array P420i and create Logical Drive as Raid 0 Centos show one disk of 2.2 TB to select

I was looking for information on how to load booth disk as Raid 1 for the ML350P but I found information to another servers.

I try this:
http://www.vassox.com/linux-general/ins ... -ml350-g5/

trying to add those kernel parameter hpsa.hpsa_simple_mode=1 hpsa.hpsa_allow_any=1 at install menu entry but intallation freeze
and trying to add just hpsa.hpsa_allow_any=1 and boot normally but still show just one disk

How can I see the two disk on Installation Destination to install as a Raid 1?

Re: Centos 7 on HP Proliant ML350P dont show all disk on array Raid 1

Posted: 2019/07/22 08:29:13
by TrevorH
That sounds like it's working correctly to me. If you configure the controller with a RAID 1 array made up of 2 x 1.2TB drives then it will and should present a single disk to the operating system that appears to be 1.2TB in size. If a disk fails then the hardware RAID controller will still report 1.2TB and will rebuild the array once the failed disk is replaced.

You do not need anything about cciss, that driver is for ancient unsupported controllers from about 10 years ago. Yours is a P420 and is supported by the hpsa driver already.

Re: Centos 7 on HP Proliant ML350P dont show all disk on array Raid 1

Posted: 2019/07/22 12:21:12
by pajafumo
Thank you for your answer.
Let me know if I am right:.
Let's suppose drive 1 fails and I pull out from the server while the server is power off, then if I power on the server with just drive two on position two this would boot normally, but don't. It shows error at boot.

Just for the record, at install (with Raid 1 and showed just 1 drive) Centos don't let set Raid 1 as I saw on a few tutorials.

Do I missing something?

Re: Centos 7 on HP Proliant ML350P dont show all disk on array Raid 1

Posted: 2019/07/22 12:31:10
by TrevorH
There is a difference between hardware RAID where you have a controller that does it all for you and just presents the RAID array to the o/s as a "disk" and linux software RAID where you see both disks and manage how those are presented to the operating system. You have a hardware RAID controller, an HP P420i, with its own on-board RAM and processor that does all the RAID work for you behind the scenes.

If you remove one of the disks from the RAID array and it fails to boot then that either sounds like a hardware problem or you created a RAID 0 array which has no redundancy at all and any disk failure is fatal.

Re: Centos 7 on HP Proliant ML350P dont show all disk on array Raid 1

Posted: 2019/07/22 14:15:30
by pajafumo
Ok thank you, I understand.
It's any way to disable HP controller and let Centos control the Raid array?
If not, how can check if it is a hardware fail? Both HD are brand new.
Sorry for my question but I'm new using Raids arrays.

Re: Centos 7 on HP Proliant ML350P dont show all disk on array Raid 1

Posted: 2019/07/22 14:19:57
by TrevorH
If you have a hardware RAID controller then you really want to use it. It has its own RAM and its own processor that are used to offload work from the server to the RAID controller so it makes sense to use them. It will make your system faster and more reliable.

You will need a manufacturer supplied utility to interrogate the RAID controller status. There are plugins for icinga/nagios to do that on HP RAID controllers but they will need the utility for your controller to be installed. You'll need to find out from HP which version of the utility you need as they regularly change its name and which controllers are supported - it used to be called hpacucli but I think that's at least one name old, maybe more.

Re: Centos 7 on HP Proliant ML350P dont show all disk on array Raid 1

Posted: 2019/07/22 17:58:17
by pajafumo
Well thank you
I will look for that utility

Re: Centos 7 on HP Proliant ML350P dont show all disk on array Raid 1

Posted: 2019/07/22 22:15:25
by pajafumo
Just One question: how many time take to make the mirror of the system after a fresh install? (Using the hardware Raid)

Re: Centos 7 on HP Proliant ML350P dont show all disk on array Raid 1

Posted: 2019/07/23 10:52:03
by tunk
None, it's done in hardware.
That said, the hardware creation will take hours depending on the size and type of drives.

Re: Centos 7 on HP Proliant ML350P dont show all disk on array Raid 1

Posted: 2019/07/23 10:58:12
by TrevorH
Hardware RAID duplicates all writes to all drives that are part of the array. You don't need to manually mirror it once the RAID array is set up, it does it all for you.