raid 5 array fails to build and mount upon reboot

[hvidgaard]

I installed debian (sarge 2.6 kernel) and used the installer to make raid 1 on all partitions across 2 drives sda and sdb. Now I want to add 4 250gb drives to /home as an raid 5 array.

I installed a sata card (sil3114r chip) and the harddrives showed op sde-sdh.
Partitioned the drives with Linux Raid autodetect (0xFD)
I created the array: mdadm --create -l5 /dev/md7 -n4 /dev/sde /dev/sdf /dev/sdg /dev/sdh
The array started rebuilding. I made a partition with cfdisk /dev/md7 and a filesystem with mkfs.ext3 /dev/md7

I mounted the new drive /newhome and copied everything from /home to it.

and added the following line to /etc/fstab: "/dev/md7 /home ext3 defaults 0 2" and commented the other /home mount.

Now the problem is every time I reboot the drive woun't build or mount. I have to do that with mdadm -assemble /dev/md7 /dev/sde /dev/sdf /dev/sdg /dev/sdh and the array comes up just fine.

I suspect it might have to do with the array not beeing listed in /etc/mdadm/mdadm.conf, I could write it myself but I don't know the "UUID" of the drive.

But anyway, if I have the array up'n'running (but not mounted) and type:

marie:/etc/mdadm# mdadm --examine /dev/md7
mdadm: No super block found on /dev/md7 (Expected magic a92b4efc, got 00000000)

Does that mean that there is no superblock?

I would really appriciate if someone could help me get this array up and mounted at /home upon reboot.

Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: md: raid0 personality registered as nr 2
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: raid5: automatically using best checksumming function: pIII_sse
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel:    pIII_sse  :  2044.000 MB/sec
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: raid5: using function: pIII_sse (2044.000 MB/sec)
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: md: raid5 personality registered as nr 4
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: device-mapper: 4.1.0-ioctl (2003-12-10) initialised: dm@uk.sistina.com
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: md: md1 stopped.
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: md: bind<sdb2>
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: md: bind<sda2>
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: raid1: raid set md1 active with 2 out of 2 mirrors
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: kjournald starting.  Commit interval 5 seconds
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: EXT3-fs: mounted filesystem with ordered data mode.
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: Unable to find swap-space signature
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: EXT3 FS on md1, internal journal
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: Capability LSM initialized
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: md: md6 stopped.
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: md: bind<sdb8>
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: md: bind<sda8>
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: raid1: raid set md6 active with 2 out of 2 mirrors
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: md: md5 stopped.
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: md: bind<sdb7>
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: md: bind<sda7>
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: raid1: raid set md5 active with 2 out of 2 mirrors
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: md: md4 stopped.
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: md: bind<sdb6>
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: md: bind<sda6>
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: raid1: raid set md4 active with 2 out of 2 mirrors
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: md: md3 stopped.
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: md: bind<sdb5>
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: md: bind<sda5>
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: raid1: raid set md3 active with 2 out of 2 mirrors
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: md: md2 stopped.
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: md: bind<sdb3>
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: md: bind<sda3>
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: raid1: raid set md2 active with 2 out of 2 mirrors
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: md: md0 stopped.
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: md: bind<sdb1>
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: md: bind<sda1>
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: raid1: raid set md0 active with 2 out of 2 mirrors
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: kjournald starting.  Commit interval 5 seconds
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: EXT3 FS on md3, internal journal
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: EXT3-fs: mounted filesystem with ordered data mode.
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: kjournald starting.  Commit interval 5 seconds
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: EXT3 FS on md4, internal journal
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: EXT3-fs: mounted filesystem with ordered data mode.
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: kjournald starting.  Commit interval 5 seconds
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: EXT3 FS on md2, internal journal
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: EXT3-fs: mounted filesystem with ordered data mode.
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: kjournald starting.  Commit interval 5 seconds
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: EXT3 FS on md5, internal journal
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: EXT3-fs: mounted filesystem with ordered data mode.
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: EXT3-fs: unable to read superblock
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: Adding 505912k swap on /dev/md0.  Priority:-1 extents:1
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: libata version 1.02 loaded.
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: sata_sil version 0.54
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: ACPI: PCI interrupt 0000:00:07.0[A] -> GSI 23 (level, low) -> IRQ 201
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: ata1: SATA max UDMA/100 cmd 0xE0A11080 ctl 0xE0A1108A bmdma 0xE0A11000 irq 201
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: ata2: SATA max UDMA/100 cmd 0xE0A110C0 ctl 0xE0A110CA bmdma 0xE0A11008 irq 201
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: ata3: SATA max UDMA/100 cmd 0xE0A11280 ctl 0xE0A1128A bmdma 0xE0A11200 irq 201
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: ata4: SATA max UDMA/100 cmd 0xE0A112C0 ctl 0xE0A112CA bmdma 0xE0A11208 irq 201
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: ata1: dev 0 cfg 49:2f00 82:346b 83:7d01 84:4023 85:3469 86:3c01 87:4023 88:207f
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: ata1: dev 0 ATA, max UDMA/133, 488397168 sectors: lba48
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: ata2: dev 0 configured for UDMA/100
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: scsi3 : sata_sil
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: ata3: dev 0 cfg 49:2f00 82:346b 83:7d01 84:4023 85:3469 86:3c01 87:4023 88:207f
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: ata3: dev 0 ATA, max UDMA/133, 488397168 sectors: lba48
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: ata3: dev 0 configured for UDMA/100
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: scsi4 : sata_sil
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: ata4: dev 0 cfg 49:2f00 82:346b 83:7d01 84:4023 85:3469 86:3c01 87:4023 88:207f
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: ata4: dev 0 ATA, max UDMA/133, 488397168 sectors: lba48
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: ata4: dev 0 configured for UDMA/100
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: scsi5 : sata_sil
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel:   Vendor: ATA       Model: ST3250823AS       Rev: 3.01
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel:   Type:   Direct-Access                      ANSI SCSI revision: 05
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: SCSI device sde: 488397168 512-byte hdwr sectors (250059 MB)
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: SCSI device sde: drive cache: write back
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel:  /dev/scsi/host2/bus0/target0/lun0: unknown partition table
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: Attached scsi disk sde at scsi2, channel 0, id 0, lun 0
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel:   Vendor: ATA       Model: ST3250823AS       Rev: 3.03
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel:   Type:   Direct-Access                      ANSI SCSI revision: 05
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: SCSI device sdf: 488397168 512-byte hdwr sectors (250059 MB)
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: SCSI device sdf: drive cache: write back
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel:  /dev/scsi/host3/bus0/target0/lun0: unknown partition table
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: Attached scsi disk sdf at scsi3, channel 0, id 0, lun 0
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel:   Vendor: ATA       Model: ST3250823AS       Rev: 3.01
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel:   Type:   Direct-Access                      ANSI SCSI revision: 05
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: SCSI device sdg: 488397168 512-byte hdwr sectors (250059 MB)
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: SCSI device sdg: drive cache: write back
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel:  /dev/scsi/host4/bus0/target0/lun0: unknown partition table
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: Attached scsi disk sdg at scsi4, channel 0, id 0, lun 0
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel:   Vendor: ATA       Model: ST3250823AS       Rev: 3.03
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel:   Type:   Direct-Access                      ANSI SCSI revision: 05
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: SCSI device sdh: 488397168 512-byte hdwr sectors (250059 MB)
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: SCSI device sdh: drive cache: write back
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel:  /dev/scsi/host5/bus0/target0/lun0: unknown partition table
Feb 18 11:17:03 localhost kernel: Attached scsi disk sdh at scsi5, channel 0, id 0, lun 0

[Oddly]

Don't know if it will help but there are instructions on how to write /etc/mdadm/mdadm.conf here http://www.math.ias.edu/doc/mdadm-1....m.conf-example

You should be able to do it without the UUIDs