From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Wed Mar 29 20:06:58 2006 Return-Path: X-Original-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 4029516A429 for ; Wed, 29 Mar 2006 20:06:58 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from ml.diespammer@netfence.it) Received: from parrot.aev.net (parrot.aev.net [212.31.247.179]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id CB26F43D45 for ; Wed, 29 Mar 2006 20:06:55 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from ml.diespammer@netfence.it) Received: from soth.ventu (adsl-ull-183-192.51-151.net24.it [151.51.192.183]) (authenticated bits=128) by parrot.aev.net (8.13.6/8.13.6) with ESMTP id k2TKLvGN020291 (version=TLSv1/SSLv3 cipher=DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA bits=256 verify=OK) for ; Wed, 29 Mar 2006 22:22:03 +0200 (CEST) (envelope-from ml.diespammer@netfence.it) Received: from [10.1.2.18] (alamar.ventu [10.1.2.18]) by soth.ventu (8.13.6/8.13.3) with ESMTP id k2TK3fOm007843; Wed, 29 Mar 2006 22:03:42 +0200 (CEST) (envelope-from ml.diespammer@netfence.it) Message-ID: <442AE8D5.1020501@netfence.it> Date: Wed, 29 Mar 2006 22:06:45 +0200 From: Andrea Venturoli User-Agent: Thunderbird 1.5 (X11/20060130) MIME-Version: 1.0 To: Michael Hughes , freebsd-questions@freebsd.org References: <200603281234.11850.satyam@sklinks.com> <20060329071426.559a10de@logcabin.hem.com> In-Reply-To: <20060329071426.559a10de@logcabin.hem.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Scanned-By: MIMEDefang 2.53 on 212.31.247.179 Cc: Subject: Re: Why are so many people using 4.x? X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Wed, 29 Mar 2006 20:06:58 -0000 Michael Hughes wrote: >> PII machine. Am I better off using an older version for such old >> equipment? If so, do any particular versions stand out? > I use vinum on two of my machine and most of what I have seen on the > list about gvinum isn't good. That is the main reson I haven't > upgraded. > > Is there anyone out there using gvinum on 6.x that can shed some light > on how well it is working now? Finally an interesting point. vinum is not supported anymore after 5.3 or so and was bound to be replaced by gvinum, which AFAICT is not that ready for production use. I'd be happy if anyone could prove me wrong. There are alternatives, though: apart from hardware RAID, gstripe and gmirror provide RAID 0 and 1. We are still without any software replacement for RAID 5, AFAIK. Bear in mind that, in order to do an upgrade, you'll have to backup, start from scratch, and restore. So, to summarize: _ building a new machine only has a show stopper if you intend to use software RAID 5; in that case you might want to use 4.11, but this is gonna have many downsides; _ upgrading a 4.11 software RAID 5 machine is going to be some hell; _ upgrading a RAID 0 or 1 vinum box can really be done, but needs some times; _ upgrading an HW RAID/no RAID box or building a new RAID 0/RAID 1/HW RAID/no RAID box poses no problems at all. bye av.