[BlueOnyx:05055] Re: Broken drive

[Michael Stauber]

Hi Colin,

> [root at cluster1 ~]# mdadm --detail /dev/md1
> 
> 
>     Update Time : Fri Jul 16 14:37:22 2010
>           State : clean, degraded
>  Active Devices : 1
> Working Devices : 1
>  Failed Devices : 1
>   Spare Devices : 0
> 
>            UUID : 9b9ae805:a5b9cd9f:5daa085d:b14b2a40
>          Events : 0.6
> 
>     Number   Major   Minor   RaidDevice State
>        0       8        3        0      active sync   /dev/sda3
>        1       0        0        1      removed
> 
> 
> 
> 1. Am I correct in saying this will be the 2nd SATA drive? I presume that
> it will follow the BIOS allocation of SATA1 SATA2 etc.?
> 
> 2. I am unable to get a matching size disk, but I have a larger one. I
> assume I can just swap it out and it will rebuild the original partitions
> (so I will just 'lose' the extra space)?

Using a larger replacement drive is fine. In that case some space at the end 
of the disk will be unused. However: Make sure to only replace a failed disk 
with one that doesn't contain any partitions on it. 

Yes, your 2nd disk (identified as sdb) is bad and should be replaced. How to 
identify which disk it is? With luck the SATA ports on your board are numbered 
and the outlet with the lowest number connects to the 1st disk (sda), the one 
with the next higher number should be your faulty sdb. That's how it typically 
is, but who knows?

You could of course test it: Disconnect one drive and see if the box boots. If 
it doesn't, chances are that you disconnected the only good disk.


-- 
With best regards

Michael Stauber