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On my system I want to replace my RAID bus controller: LSI Logic / Symbios Logic MegaRAID SAS 2108 [Liberator] (rev 05) with a PERC H310.

Will it be possible to import the existing RAID5 configuration with the new controller?

My system boots from a separate SSD and the raid provides the /home directory. Is there a possibility to ex- and import the raid configuration and via linux tooling?

I already found this answer: Reconfiguring RAID 1 Array after Replacing RAID Controller But this is the replacement of an PERC controller with another one.

The megacli tool has the commands 

-CfgSave -f filename -aN
-CfgRestore -f filename -aN

Could that be of any use?

The perccli also has some interesting parameters:

/cx/fall import [preview] [securityKey = xxx]
/cx show foreignautoimport
/cx set foreignautoimport=<on|off>

Does someone have experiences with these?

Timothy Truckle
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2 Answers2

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There is no standard RAID configuration for the metadata. As such you have no guarantee that your configuration will be carried over. Honestly you should just backup and restore, even if you are reusing the same disks.

Tim Brigham
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  • Thanks for the answer. I hoped I could avoid the full backup (i's a private system). Looks like there is no chance :o( – Timothy Truckle Jan 18 '19 at 21:31
  • How do you mean private system? and also if these are even remotely large disks you really shouldn't be using R5, it's dangerous – Chopper3 Jan 18 '19 at 21:35
  • @Chopper3 it is my private "MainFrame". All family members work on it and store data. I'm using the RAID5 configuration to have a large disk and safety against disk failure. – Timothy Truckle Jan 18 '19 at 21:47
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    A) we make it very clear this site is for professional systems not home ones and B) R5 is staggeringly dangerous and not used by storage pros, please stop using it if you care about your data, it’s been ‘dead’ for a decade now. – Chopper3 Jan 19 '19 at 23:17
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die PERC H310 identifies itself in the lspci output as 

RAID bus controller: LSI Logic / Symbios Logic MegaRAID SAS 2008 [Falcon] (rev 03)

The cable set from the old controller (in terms of "the one to be replaced") fit to the PERC H310, so I reused it what saved me from reconnecting the disks. It also immediately recognized the RAID configuration. In the Controller BIOS the "operation" for the virtual disk was Back Init.

But by system did not boot.

When starting the system from a live system fdisk -l did not show the virtual disk.

So I'm not sure if the "import" was successful or not since there seams to be more dependencies at least in my system.

Currently I triggered an "initialization" of the array and then I'm going to do a fresh install of the operating system.

Timothy Truckle
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