Sil 3114 RAID controller issues with FreeBSD 5.3 Release AMD-64

[Erik Trulsson]

On Fri, Jan 07, 2005 at 01:16:35PM +0100, Olaf Greve wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> A client of mine asked me to install their AMD-64 machine as a MySQL 
> database server. Totally against my strong suggestion to use a proper 
> SCSI hardware RAID 10 solution (or at least a hardware SATA RAID 
> solution), they insist on using the internal Sil 3114 software RAID 
> controller in RAID 1 mode.
> 
> Now, this 'cost reduction' from them backfires, as FreeBSD 5.3 Release 
> AMD-64 does not properly recognise this controller. First, it locks up 
> when booting with ACPI enabled (easily fixable by either disabling ACPI 
> in the BIOS, or by booting without ACPI), then the bootstrap loader 
> first seemingly does recognise the RAID 1 array (at least it states 
> something to the effect of "Drive C from BIOS...", but when the 
> installation CD-ROM has booted, lo and behold! It does not see both 
> drives as an array, but as separate drives!
> 
> I looked around a bit on the Internet, and seemingly this issue started 
> to occur around mid june last year with FreeBSD 5.3 versions for these 
> type of Silicon RAID controllers.
> 
> Now, of course I am still trying to get my client to do it properly and 
> forget this el-cheapo RAID solution and simply buy a hardware RAID 
> controller, but if I can't succeed in convincing them, I'd really like 
> to enable the RAID array of this controller after all.
> 
> Does anyone know how this can be achieved? Is it possible to patch the 
> device driver once FreeBSD is installed, and somehow get FreeBSD to 
> build the RAID array?

I don't think FreeBSD supports the SiI 3114 as a RAID controller, but
only as a normal controller.  All the RAID stuff for that controller is
done in software anyway, but FreeBSD needs to know what format the BIOS
uses for a RAID setup, and it doesn't.

I guess you could set up a pure software RAID-1 solution using vinum,
but not having done that myself I can't say for sure. See
http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/handbook/vinum-vinum.html
for information on how to use and setup vinum.



-- 
<Insert your favourite quote here.>
Erik Trulsson
ertr1013 at student.uu.se