Nice, Ubuntu just wiped out my RAID array...

[Dano]

So, I decided I'd have a play with Ubuntu and grabbed the iso image, burned it and threw it in my main pc, it then went on to destroy my RAID0 array. First I knew of it was when it listed the individual drives in the partitioning section during setup, goodbye everything...

Glad I keep 99% of my junk on a backup drive

Be warned.

 

[Dano]

Onboard Jmicron controller on my DS3.

 

[Dano]

You need a spare disk outside the RAID array to install Ubuntu on.

Which is exactly what I was going to do, it was in there ready to be used, Ubuntu destroyed the array before I got that far.

 

[Dano]

When you installed Ubuntu how did you do it? Manually partitioning and telling it to install to the disk outside the RAID?

This was what I was atttempting, it got as far as displaying the list of drives and had both my raided drives showing, at which point I became concerned and exitied the installer to find it had destroyed the array.

 

[Dano]

Well I made the point because it might be that he just lost the bootloader and not the RAID array itself. In which case it can be recovered by booting from the Vista install disc, opening up a cmd prompt, and then Bootrec/fixboot and Bootrec/fixmbr commands.

No, the array is gone.

 

[Dano]

Oh look a working array...

I'll select the dvd-rom that the Ubuntu disc is in to boot from...

Install in text mode sounds good to me...

English please...

yup, I'm in the UK...

Nah, I'll choose that...

Yes, I have a US Keyboard...

Yes, it's US English...

Loading modules and DHCP and stuff...

 

[Dano]

Ubuntu sounds good to me...

Manual please...

Ho hum... what's this, the 80GB drive I want to install Ubuntu on and those two 164.7GB drives sure look like the two that should be in my array...

Hmmm... yes that one there... think I'll quit out of this...

Yup, abort please...

Yes please...

What was that you say? it doesn't touch the array?

oooops... lets try a reboot...

Nope, it's destroyed the array...

 

[Dano]

and you don't think at this stage you should have selected "undo changes to partitions"?

What changes? it hasn't been asked to make any changes at this point, all it's done is show the list of available drives and partitions and in fact jumped past that menu option to the <Go Back> option as there was nothing to undo.

Different partitioning tools work differently (oddly enough). If you compare this to the Windows installer - you don't get a "undo changes" option - once you select the option, it gives you a warning saying that the changes are irreversible and that's it.

True, but windows at least warns you...

Personally, if I had noticed that my raid array looked screwed, I would have clicked every "undo" button until it was fixed.

Also, I would have backups.

From my very first post...

Glad I keep 99% of my junk on a backup drive

 

[Dano]

Ive tried replicating it with silicon ATA software RAID array 2x200GB drives and it changed nothing

Different hardware = different issues.

Instead of just moaning about it, report the problem to help improve support or go search the ubuntu help to see if anyone else as had it.

Who's moaning?

RAID 0 is very intolerant anyway and shouldnt be relied upon, no doubt why you have back ups.

Doesn't matter wether it's RAID 0, 1, 5 or JBOD, backups are essential period.

 

[Dano]

Yah, typical text based misunderstanding, I'm not moaning

 

[Dano]

Agreed to a certain extent but the principal is the same.
Did you read any documentation as to how ubuntu would behave when you tried to install it on your particular hardware? Does ubuntu fully support your hardware? Have the vendor indicated it should be ok or supplied drivers for your hardware?

I didn't read enough apparently.

You are! You haven't asked for help you just made a statement on your bad experience.

No, I'm not, starting the discussion is effectively asking for help if anybody had seen the issue before. Other than that it was a warning as backed up by my last line in the initial post.

RAID 1 is a back up

No, it's redundancy, a backup is a very different thing, maybe you need to do some reading too?

 

[Dano]

Redundancy - having a back up in case the primary fails.

Which part of a RAID1 array is the primary? Both drives are equal partners and as such your comment is invalid.

Any network admin using your idea of a backup would be fired I hope.

 

[Dano]

Try just re-adding the two disks to the RAID array, without attempting to re-format or anything else, looks to me like the array & its data should still be there

It is, which is why I re-did the process and took photos.

I'd also avoid the JMicron controller like the plauge, its not a proper hardware solution, and there are plenty of forum posts about odd issues with it when trying to install. You might also try reading Bugzilla, massive post on issues with its drivers here https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/linux-source-2.6.17/+bug/57502
For that matter, I don't know why you chose to use it for your RAID array as opposed to the Intel ports (I wouldn't- The Intel drivers are more mature and much better supported both under Linux & Windows), but more importantly I'd try with the CD drive on one of the Intel ports, as I suspect that this is probably somewhere at the root of your issue


Cheers

-Leezer-

The DS3 Intel ports don't support RAID as far as I am aware. My optical drives are both IDE.

That is NOT a hardware RAID array, its a FAKERAID controller, requiring drivers to be installed in Windows for it to work.

YES the Ubuntu installer shouldn't have touched your partitions until you committed to the changes, but it seeing two individual disks has nothing to do with it. No matter what, none of those fakeraid controllers show up under Linux as one drive because all they do is present a drive controller with a funky bios to the driver in Windows - Linux just sees that as a plain old HDD controller.

Does not change the fact that it did and continues to change something.