Re: [gentoo-user] NAS and replacing with larger drives

[Wol <antlists@youngman.org.uk>]

On 09/12/2022 01:15, Dale wrote:
> Given the size of one of the directories I have, it takes two drives, or
> soon will, and the use of LVM or something similar.  I can't do that as
> it is now.  I've even wondered if I hooked two eSATA drives up and gave
> both plenty of time to spin up if LVM would see them both and me be able
> to use two drives as one that way.  Thing is, I don't know how LVM
> reacts if the two drives become available at separate times, maybe even
> many seconds or a minute or so apart.

If you're using LVM to link them together, it will wait until they 
become available. Okay, not quite the same, but I run raid over 
dm-integrity, and it always unnerves me when systemd fires up this job 
and it says "waiting for lvm/home". But the system just sits there while 
dm-integrity checks its drives, makes them available, raid spots and 
loads them, and then the raid is there, lvm spots it, makes lvm/home 
available, and the system is up and running ...
> 
> My problem is a growing directory.  I admit, It's not increasing as fast
> as it was.  When I was on DSL, it limited my speed a lot.  With this new
> fiber internet, I can download huge amounts of data in a really short
> period of time.  I can download it faster than I can verify it.  I'm
> still checking things I downloaded over a month ago.  I'm having fun
> doing it tho.  😉
> 
> I thought about breaking up that huge directory.  Split it into two
> parts, the 'a' through 'l' and 'm' through 'z' thing.  Then use two
> drives to back it up. 

I think you're going to have to ...

> Thing is, the external drive enclosures that I
> really like and trust, I can't buy anymore.  They are Rosewill eSATA
> drive enclosures.  It has a fan to keep things cool and a display on the
> front.  They are really nice and rock solid.  All the USB type drive
> enclosures I've tried caused all sorts of problems.  I bricked a couple
> hard drives and eventually, the enclosures wouldn't work at all.  The
> Rosewill enclosures are the most stable things I've ever seen.  I wish I
> could find a few more of them, as spares if nothing else.

Yup, that's my experience of USB, too. It just isn't reliable. And 
anything that works and you like, they discontinue!

Cheers,
Wol