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How to fix broken OS installation in a RAID 0 array?

us flag

I had Ubuntu server 16.04 installed to run a media server in my house in a RAID 0 array (3 hdd). After upgrading to Ubuntu 20.04 many problems occured in the OS and some ofthe features I installed just stopped working. I want to install Ubuntu 20.04 from scratch but cannot lose the array (lots of TB of data I cannot relocate temporarily). So I was wondering about two possible solutions: 1- reinstall Ubuntu (overritting existent OS) maintaining the array and all the data. 2- Add a 4th (smaller) hdd just to run the OS, from there "search" for an existing RAID array as is, keeping the data. Is any of this solutions possible?

Thank you!

Terrance avatar
id flag
Your second choice would probably be your best choice to try to get it back up and going. However, if you can at anytime it probably would be better to backup all that info off of that RAID0 and consider making it a RAID5 or RAID6 for redundancy in case one of your drives dies. RAID0 has no redundancy at all and one drive hiccup or goes bad you will lose all the data in that RAID0.
Jeff avatar
mx flag
@Terrance Consider posting this comment as an answer?
Raul Bartolomeu avatar
us flag
@Terrance thanks for the warning. I'm aware of the risks, but for now I'll keep it in RAID 0. I'm kind of a noobie (can see for the array choice!), can you point out for a tutorial or something? Found lots to add drives to the array but not one on adding the OS to the existent array... Thanks!
Terrance avatar
id flag
@RaulBartolomeu As long as you don't touch the array drives at all, there should be info in the `/proc/mdstat` after you boot to the OS. You might need to install `mdadm` after the fact. You can try booting to a Live USB and see if it sees your array and shows it to you in that file.
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