From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Mon Jun 27 18:58:31 2005 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 21ED616A41C for ; Mon, 27 Jun 2005 18:58:31 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from drew@mykitchentable.net) Received: from relay04.roc.ny.frontiernet.net (relay04.roc.ny.frontiernet.net [66.133.182.167]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id A697143D53 for ; Mon, 27 Jun 2005 18:58:30 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from drew@mykitchentable.net) Received: from filter04.roc.ny.frontiernet.net (filter04.roc.ny.frontiernet.net [66.133.183.71]) by relay04.roc.ny.frontiernet.net (Postfix) with ESMTP id BA3D4358353 for ; Mon, 27 Jun 2005 18:58:29 +0000 (UTC) Received: from relay04.roc.ny.frontiernet.net ([66.133.182.167]) by filter04.roc.ny.frontiernet.net (filter04.roc.ny.frontiernet.net [66.133.183.71]) (amavisd-new, port 10024) with LMTP id 01479-09-81 for ; Mon, 27 Jun 2005 18:58:29 +0000 (UTC) Received: from blacklamb.mykitchentable.net (67-137-46-191.dsl2.elk.ca.frontiernet.net [67.137.46.191]) by relay04.roc.ny.frontiernet.net (Postfix) with ESMTP id 5DAD2358201 for ; Mon, 27 Jun 2005 18:58:27 +0000 (UTC) Received: from [165.107.42.217] (unknown [165.107.42.217]) (using TLSv1 with cipher DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by blacklamb.mykitchentable.net (Postfix) with ESMTP id 223293BF3B4 for ; Mon, 27 Jun 2005 11:58:26 -0700 (PDT) Message-ID: <42C04C0B.3020908@mykitchentable.net> Date: Mon, 27 Jun 2005 11:57:15 -0700 From: Drew Tomlinson User-Agent: Mozilla Thunderbird 1.0 (Windows/20041206) X-Accept-Language: en-us, en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: FreeBSD Questions Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Virus-Scanned: by amavisd-new-20040701 (2.0) at filter04.roc.ny.frontiernet.net Subject: Vinum & GVinum Recommendations 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: Mon, 27 Jun 2005 18:58:31 -0000 I am using 4.11 and have been a FBSD user since the beginning of version 4. I successfully used vinum to create concatenated volumes that have grown over time. Vinum has proved very stable as long as the drives were IDE or SCSI. However I outgrew the confines of my case and added a firewire enclosure that contains two IDE drives. This was somewhere around 4.6. Initially, the firewire drives worked well once I learned I needed to set the SCSI delay kernel config option back up to 15 secs from 5 (unfortunately I lost my volumes getting that education). But when I upgraded from 4.9 to 4.10, vinum and the firewire devices didn't play well. I posted about it here: http://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-questions/2004-December/069290.html Later, I discovered there was an spb timeout issue that might be part of the problem and I posted about it here: http://lists.freebsd.org/pipermail/freebsd-firewire/2005-February/000331.html Anyway, I've been using the delete/create vinum volume workaround after every reboot as I never found a solution. But this last time, I lost both vinum volumes performing that workaround. I don't know what happened exactly other than fsck started getting disk errors. At the first problem, I answered 'n' and aborted the fsck. I tried the delete/create workaround again but was unable to stop or rm the subdisks, plexes, drives, etc. Then I rebooted. did the delete/create thing, but no longer could fsck read the disks. Without going on and on, the bottom line is that now I've lost both vinum volumes again. Since the bulk of my system is gone (I sure hope the tapes I have are good), I've decided to consider moving up to version 5. I've googled for info on gvinum but see a lot of posts about it being "flaky". What's it's status at this time? I really like having one large concatenated drive for storing my digital pictures, video, etc. but at this point, stability is more important. Also, how does ccd work with 5? I'd appreciate hearing of your experiences with vinum, gvinum, and ccd, especially as they relate to firewire devices. Thanks, Drew -- Visit The Alchemist's Warehouse Magic Tricks, DVDs, Videos, Books, & More! http://www.alchemistswarehouse.com