Intrepid boot fails on 2.6.27 with software RAID1

Bug #269411 reported by Alan Ferrier
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This bug affects 1 person
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linux (Ubuntu)
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Bug Description

I can't boot into 2.6.27-2 or -3 with my software raid setup. It's an ASUS P5N-E SLI MoBo, and the disks look like this:

Disk /dev/sda: 500.1 GB, 500107862016 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 60801 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x3a86cbf3

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 1 243 1951866 82 Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/sda2 244 30637 244139805 fd Linux RAID autodetect
/dev/sda3 * 30638 60800 242284297+ 7 HPFS/NTFS

Disk /dev/sdb: 500.1 GB, 500107862016 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 60801 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes
Disk identifier: 0x3a86cbf3

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sdb1 1 243 1951866 82 Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/sdb2 244 30637 244139805 fd Linux RAID autodetect
/dev/sdb3 * 30638 60800 242284297+ 7 HPFS/NTFS

However, on boot I'm dropped into BusyBox with messages:

ALERT! /dev/md0 does not exist
and
md0 : inactive dm3[0](S)

At this point I thought I'd try "mdadm --assemble --scan" which does, in fact, activate md0 - but only with one of the two raid partitions active. If I try to mdadm --add the other one, I get "mdadm: Cannot open /dev/sda2: Device or resource busy"

I've checked initrd and both md and raid1 modules are included.

Note: booting into 2.6.24-21 (and other earlier kernels) works absolutely fine, so that's what I'm running at the moment.

Booting into 2.6.27-3 recovery mode gives more details on the console. Both sda and sdb disks (and partitions thereof) are detected ok, but just prior to being dropped into BusyBox there's a load of messages like this:

md: md0 stopped
md: bind<dm-2>
md: md0 stopped
md: unbind<dm-2>
md: export_rdev(dm-2)
md: bind<dm-2>
md: md0 stopped
md: unbind<dm-2>
md: export_rdev(dm-2)
md: bind<dm-2>
md: md0 stopped
md: unbind<dm-2>
md: export_rdev(dm-2)
md: bind<dm-2>
Done.
** WARNING: There appears to be one or more degraded RAID devices **

(However, both drives are fine, as I can boot earlier kernels without problems).

Then, I'm offered an option to start the degraded device. If I choose "Y", md0 starts but with only one drive active (similar to the result I got from mdadm --assemble --scan)

Some kind of race condition on drive detection, maybe?

Update - 15th September

Ok - I think I may be getting to the bottom of this. I *think* kernel 2.6.27 is picking up a FakeRAID mirror set up on my NVIDIA chipset motherboard. This is a change in behavior from previous kernels which didn't detect the NVIDIA mirror and instead I could use software raid on the two softraid partitions, sda2 and sdb2. Now, however, the kernel is picking up a dm device and attempting to boot from that. Of course, as it's a RAID-1 mirror, the kernel sees it as only one device and complains as the original softraid mirror appears to have only one device rather than two.

Maybe if I disable fakeraid support until after boot then manually modprobe dm-mirror... ?

description: updated
Revision history for this message
brazzmonkey (brazzmonkey) wrote :

i'm having similar trouble event though i'm not sure if this is related :
- i use a fakeraid 0+1 array (intel matrix)
- i installed intrepid beta using install guides to set it up on a pre-partitioned raid configuration
- my system and OS are 64-bit

my system fails to boot using a kernel that's newer than 2.6.27-5. On both 2.6.27-6 an -7 i don't get the (traditional?)
"kernel alive
Kernel really alive"
message.

And after a while i also get this "device does not exist" alert and busybox (initramfs) prompt.

Revision history for this message
brazzmonkey (brazzmonkey) wrote :

(by "fakeraid 0+1 array" i actually meant one partition is stripped (/) and one partition is mirrored (/home), on a 2-HD setup)

the following bugs *could be* related to this one :
bug #262588
bug #244608

Revision history for this message
kernel-janitor (kernel-janitor) wrote :

Hi Alan,

This bug was reported a while ago and there hasn't been any activity in it recently. We were wondering if this is still an issue? Can you try with the latest development release of Ubuntu? ISO CD images are available from http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/releases/ .

If it remains an issue, could you run the following command from a Terminal (Applications->Accessories->Terminal). It will automatically gather and attach updated debug information to this report.

apport-collect -p linux 269411

Also, if you could test the latest upstream kernel available that would be great. It will allow additional upstream developers to examine the issue. Refer to https://wiki.ubuntu.com/KernelMainlineBuilds . Once you've tested the upstream kernel, please remove the 'needs-upstream-testing' tag. This can be done by clicking on the yellow pencil icon next to the tag located at the bottom of the bug description and deleting the 'needs-upstream-testing' text. Please let us know your results.

Thanks in advance.

[This is an automated message. Apologies if it has reached you inappropriately; please just reply to this message indicating so.]

tags: added: needs-kernel-logs
tags: added: needs-upstream-testing
tags: added: kj-triage
Changed in linux (Ubuntu):
status: New → Incomplete
Revision history for this message
Jeremy Foshee (jeremyfoshee) wrote :

This bug report was marked as Incomplete and has not had any updated comments for quite some time. As a result this bug is being closed. Please reopen if this is still an issue in the current Ubuntu release http://www.ubuntu.com/getubuntu/download . Also, please be sure to provide any requested information that may have been missing. To reopen the bug, click on the current status under the Status column and change the status back to "New". Thanks.

[This is an automated message. Apologies if it has reached you inappropriately; please just reply to this message indicating so.]

tags: added: kj-expired
Changed in linux (Ubuntu):
status: Incomplete → Invalid
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