[CentOS] Some 3Ware questions

Sean O'Connell
2005-09-09T20:31:35Z

On Fri, 2005-09-09 at 13:08 -0700, Todd Cary wrote:
> I have not used RAID controller boards to date since I have relied on
> the built in RAID on the motherboards.  Thanks to the informative
> message Byron, I realize the deficiencies of doing RAID 1 this way,
> especially now that the builtin is out of date with Kernel used by
> Centos.
>
> I have 4 ATA drives that were configured in two pairs.  I assume that
> I need a 3Wave controller that has 4 ports like the
> 7506-4LP...correct?
>
> Do I need to install any software during the installation of Centos?

Todd-

The installation will recognize the 3ware card and the arrays that you
build on it (you do this in the card bios Alt+3 at boot). As Peter said,
you'll want to make sure the card is using the latest firmware (you'll
need a dos boot disk and a floppy with the firmware utility on it, comes
as a zip file from the 3Ware site) -- iirc, the latest version is 7.7.1
for 7xxx and 8xxx cards. You also probably want to get run the 3dmd
utility as it will notify you about failed disks and other issues by
email and can do background media checks... very nice.

Sean