Issues with multiple disks and R63/Unslung6

[sansp00]

No, no, no …
I guess I was not very clear … I was responding to both posts 8) The one where you mention the post from Ped Xing and mine.

In my case, I did format the flash and the HDD with the web interface. So both my drives had the 3 partitions. You look like you would be more apt to help me than the yahoo forum. I browse the wiki and there is much clear info on this except that it exists 🙄

To recapitulate, flash port 1, hdd port 2, both formatted with the web interface, unlsung to port 1 = Mount issue. From what I understand, I would have needed to keep synchronized all the /opt and /conf from both drives ? As for the mounts, do I do it via the /unslung script dir or with a init.d/rc script ? Any help is appreciated, I would like to the bottom of this one …

Patrick S.

[davesanti]

I have the same setup as Patrick. If I reboot, I always turn off the HDD, and boot that way. After it is up, I turn on the HDD and it mounts no problem.

I have noticed that occasionally (more like every 2nd or 3rd time) if I boot that way, it doesnt boot “unslung” and says that it is running from flash memory. If I reboot, it seems to clear that.

I try not to re boot that often.

Dave

[S80_UK]

Strange….

I always power up my hard disk first – it just seemed the right thing to do – and the slug always goes to the stick first, so I have never seen this issue. I wonder if it is due to the differences between sticks or something. Maybe I just got lucky.

[davesanti]

I think booting it up with the HDD on is the right way to do it.

I initially unslung to flash at port 1. After it was all done I formatted the HDD on port 2 as ext3.

Before this though, I caused a big mess on an old Slug by swapping the HDD from port 2 to 1 with no flash. At that point I was unlsung to HDD at port 2 though.

At this point I am overly cautious and leave the HDD it off it is booting. I am not certain if there is any connection to the Slug not booting unslung occasionally..

Dave

[fizze]

Hm, strange.
Here’s parts of my /etc/mtab

/dev/sdb1       /share/hdd/data ext3    defaults,usrquota       1       1

/dev/sdb2       /share/hdd/conf ext3    defaults        1       1

/dev/sdb3       swap    swap    defaults        0       0

/dev/sda1       /share/flash/data       ext3    defaults,usrquota       1      1

/dev/sda2       /share/flash/conf       ext3    defaults        1       1

/dev/sda3       swap    swap    defaults        0       0

sdb is port 1, and sda2 is port 2. Incidently, this matches my drives.
And, its just 2 partitions that the linksys firmware creates.
The third one is swap, which is futile on a flash drive anywho 😉

[davesanti]

Fizze, here is the data from mine:

#/dev/ram0 / ext2 defaults 1 1
#none /proc proc defaults 0 0
#none /dev/pts devpts gid=5,mode=620 0 0
/dev/sdb1 /share/hdd/data ext3 defaults,usrquota 1 1
/dev/sdb2 /share/hdd/conf ext3 defaults 1 1
/dev/sdb3 swap swap defaults 0 0
/dev/sda1 /share/flash/data ext3 defaults,usrquota 1 1
/dev/sda2 /share/flash/conf ext3 defaults 1 1
/dev/sda3 swap swap defaults 0 0

Our data matches, but I have flash on port 1 and HDD on port 2. I have to remember this when I am inputing file location that /share/flash is actually the HDD and vice versa.

Dave

[sansp00]

So I am not nuts ! 😆
The guys over at the linksys yahoo group where saying that I screwed things up ! The wiki does document that such a behavior can happen, rarely, but that as much info I found.
The problem almost never occurred at first, but then I hit that wall 3 times in a row. Before I moved to another setup, it was 9 out of 10 that would boot HDD before flash. It’s annoying since I have a shit load of power failures lately and having to manually do the start sequence is out of the question for me.
Any *nix linksys slug guru could shed some lights ?
Patrick S.

[fizze]

well, reslingin isnt the tough part once you know what packages you need.
Anywho, here’s what I’d do:
Swap both drives, and see what it comes up with.
I guess you have to re-sling, but if you retain the data on the stick it should be fine.

All programs refer to /opt/ only, and not to something like /share/hdd/conf/opt anyhow.

[pedxing]

I understand and recognize that two natively-formatted (meaning through the web GUI) drives can work. But I’m trying to let folks know that sometimes, repeatedly, and not just for me, it fails.

Here’s how it fails:
Unsling a fresh NSLU2 to a flash drive using the instructions
Reboot and plug in a second USB drive – maybe a hard disk
Format that through the web interface
Reboot a few times with everything plugged in and powered on
Check your DF – you may find (as I did) that the conf partition for the flash disk is mounted twice – once for the flash and once for the hard disk
Create some shares and users and reboot a few times – watch the havoc as the slug creates “~1” shares, forgets the hard disk’s shares, etc…

Now I’m not sure WHY this happens with some slugs and not with others, but it does happen every time for me. And I’ve tried it many times, wiping the conf partition, all sorts of things… So I posted a workaround that does work and avoids the trouble.

Ped Xing

[sansp00]

Like Ped said, for me, I was up and running perfectly fine for 4 months with the dual native setup on flash and HDD. But in the last month or so, had the issue numerous times.

Patrick S.

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