Set up mirror after install?

[Robin Laing]

James Pifer wrote:
> I have a system I'm trying to rebuild. I have four 160 Gig WD drives all
> of the exact model. I want to install FC5 using two drives and mirror to
> the other two drives(I don't have a hardware IDE controller for
> mirroring). I'll probably use LVM since I really want it to show up as
> one big drive, ie approx 320 gig. 
> 
> The problem I'm having is I can't get the system to boot off anything to
> run the setup. I've tried two types of external DVD's (basically
> external enclosures) and although the boot menu sees the DVD drives, it
> refuses to boot of them. 
> 
> I've also tried a flash drive, based on suggestions from another thread,
> but I can't get it to boot off the boot.iso that is setup on the flash
> drive. (dd if=boot.iso of=/dev/[flash drive])
> 
> Short of booting like this, can I setup the install on two of the drives
> with the other two unplugged and a DVD temporarily plugged in? Then,
> after the install, remove the DVD drive, plug in the remaining hard
> drives, and then go in and somehow setup mirroring?
> 
> Any suggestions are appreciated. 
> 
> James
> 

Are there options in your BIOS that may be preventing one of these boot 
option from working?

Are you going to use the mirror for your boot partions as well?

I have a similar install.  I have four SATA drives mirrored and LVM'd. 
I have an IDE drive for the OS.   I would suggest you setup the two 
drives as depreciated raid and then install the LVM.  Then when you have 
the system installed, then add the extra drives and rebuild the 
particular drive arrays.  This way you can setup the LVM before the 
install and you don't have to grow the partition.

Make sure that the RAID drives are on split between controllers.

-- 
Robin Laing