> On 11/30/18 3:39 PM, dsavage--- via users wrote:
>>
>>> On 11/30/18 2:24 PM, dsavage--- via users wrote:
>>>> Does Fedora 29 support the Intel RST (Rapid Storage Technology) chip
>>>> for
>>>> hardware RAID? My new ThinkPad P72 came with an RST chip set up with
>>>> two
>>>> 2TB PCIe M.2 SSDs in a RAID1 config. The Fedora-29-MATE-Compiz spin
>>>> DVD
>>>> doesn't "see" it. Nor does Clonezilla.
>>>>
>>>> There's a BIOS mode setting for the Intel RST: "RST" mode
for RAID,
>>>> and
>>>> "AHCI" mode for separate SATA drives. Changing that setting to
AHCI
>>>> will
>>>> probably break the RAID1 array and render the P72 unbootable. I
don't
>>>> know
>>>> if that would a destructive, irreversible change, or if changing the
>>>> mode
>>>> setting back to RST would restore everything.
>>>>
>>>> I've only tried the MATE spin. One purpose of this question is to
>>>> find
>>>> out
>>>> if the full installation DVD supports the Intel RST chip.
>>>
>>> Yes, you can use RST with Fedora, but you have to import the RST
>>> metadata into mdadmin before you partition and install the OS. There
>>> are
>>> a number of articles out there you can read that describes the
>>> process.
>>> Google is your friend. Note that you'll use mdadmin to manage the RST
>>> stuff when running Linux and the RST tools that come with Windows when
>>> running Windows..
>>>
>>> That being said, I've never done this in the installer as I never dual
>>> boot Windows and Linux using the same physical disks. For the (very)
>>> few
>>> times I must share a machine between the two, I have one set of disks
>>> for Windows and a separate set of disks for Linux.
>>>
>>> In my world, Windows gets run in VMs with Linux as the host OS. Thus,
>>> I
>>> use mdadmin and its metadata natively for my RAID stuff as I don't
>>> have
>>> to share that metadata with Windows. Preferably, I use a _real_ RAID
>>> controller--but they can be expensive.
>>> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>>> - Rick Stevens, Systems Engineer, AllDigital ricks(a)alldigital.com -
>>> - AIM/Skype: therps2 ICQ: 226437340 Yahoo: origrps2 -
>>> - -
>>> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
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>>
>> Thanks Rick. Ultimately I plan to run this pre-installed Win10 in a VM
>> under F29. The trick is to get a forensic copy of the existing
>> pre-installed OS that I can read back into a VM using P2V. I'm not
>> planning to dual boot. Note that this is a laptop (on steroids!), so
>> using
>> a "real" RAID controller is not feasible.
>
> Oh, hmmm. Yeah. See? There's still a place for desktop machines for
> doing weird stuff like this.
>
> You should be able to use the Windows Security panel. There's a
> mechanism to do a disk image of the Windows 10 install. Here's a link:
>
>
https://www.windowscentral.com/how-make-full-backup-windows-10
>
> If that won't do what you want, I'd still use it to make a backup
> in case of disaster (DVDs are cheap, a spare hard drive in a USB
> box isn't that much, either).
>
> The next step would be booting a live image of Fedora (whatever desktop
> you want) and use the command line to import the RST metadata into mdadm
> and create the RAID for Linux. You could then "dd" that new volume to
> media somewhere. Like I said, you need to be careful so you don't break
> the RST RAID, but it can be done. If you do break the RAID, you'd have
> the backup from the
windowscentral.com website instructions to recreate
> it.
>
> Oh, the wonders of technology!
And there's the problem, Rick. When I boot with the F29 MATE-Compiz live
spin, it can't see the RAID1 array. There's nothing but the 'control'
entry in /dev/mapper directory. There's no SSD (/dev/sda or /dev/sdb)
visible to fdisk. And the only devices available in /dev/disks/by-* are
those of the live image. I'm looking for any doorknob in the dark.
Yes, Doc, I get it. Having never done this myself, I can only suggest
things. I believe you'll need to run "mdadm --auto-detect -v" to see if
it can find the RST RAID metadata. If it finds the RST data, it should
create a container device that represents the RST array. You should then
be able to create a device from that container (and I'd suggest a read-
only device) using "mdadm -A" would represent the RST array.
Again, I've never done this with an Intel RST array and I'm not sure
any of my machines lying about have this "feature" enabled so I can't
do any investigation myself. mdadm says it can deal with it and a google
search reveals some results with Mint and Scientific Linux.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
- Rick Stevens, Systems Engineer, AllDigital ricks(a)alldigital.com -
- AIM/Skype: therps2 ICQ: 226437340 Yahoo: origrps2 -
- -
- "You think that's tough? Try herding cats!" -
----------------------------------------------------------------------