Recovering MySQL db from failed RAID array

English Hardware
#1

I recognize that this isn’t the typical question, but I have a problem with my OpenSUSE webserver, and I thought I would prevail on the community for some guidance.

I have this webserver with an important MySQL db on it. The RAID array seems to have died while I was moving. (did someone drop it? dunno) Now it can’t find any boot device.

It has 4 old SCSI drives.

So, I know how to mount a IDE or SATA drive as a slave, in a Linux environment to read data off of it (to copy the MySQL files off of it.)

But, how do I do that with a SCSI drive?

Also, I have an additional (identical) server to the crippled one. What will happen if I just slide one of the scsi drives into the operating server? Is this second identical server going to help me at all? I don’t even know what is on it. Can I reconfigure the RAID, so it’s not using a drive, and then slide in a disk from the crippled server, and copy the data off of it?

How shall I configure the good server? Its pretty important that I recover the files.

Thanks in advance.

Zoomiest

#2

The DB is simply held in files in the filesystem. So you have to get the RAID going first so that you can mount the filesystem.

SCSI disks are mounted just the same way as IDE or SATA disks, only the hardware is different, and the Linux driver talks to the hardware.

If the RAID controller on the old machine went bad, then you could put all the disks on the spare machine and assemble the RAID there.

#3

On Fri, 01 Jul 2011 01:36:03 +0000, zoomiest wrote:

> I have this webserver with an important MySQL db on it. The RAID array
> seems to have died while I was moving. (did someone drop it? dunno) Now
> it can’t find any boot device.

What RAID level is it?

If it’s RAID-5, the data is spread across three of the drives, so all
except one of the drives need to be working. If it’s only RAID-1
(unlikely with 4 drives), then it’s mirrored so only one of each pair
would need to be functioning.

Jim

–
Jim Henderson
openSUSE Forums Administrator
Forum Use Terms & Conditions at http://tinyurl.com/openSUSE-T-C