VG Recovery off multiple PV's
Well... I've got myself in a bit of a bind, and spending close to 24 hours trying to fix a problem I have with LVM, and browsing the internet, I've come to the conclusion that I need some expert help!!
Problem: Disk died in LVM... I madly tried to move the PE's off the drive, and managed to get all but teh offending PE's off to new drives i added to the system. (no 42 wouldn't you know it... thought it was the answer not the question...) . Thought I was ok, until the drive locked again, and I had to reboot.
When it came back, I had a vg which wouldn't be recognised after vgchange and vgscan, with lots of various errors, most of which I've seen similar examples for here. I upgraded the lvm to lvm2 and kernel to 2.6 to see whether I could get it all going using the partial mount. Anyways, here is what I get from the various outputs.
[root@wren pictures]# lvm pvscan
4 PV(s) found for VG data: expected 5
VG data differs between PVs /dev/hde1 and /dev/hdg2
VG data differs between PVs /dev/hde1 and /dev/hda8
VG data differs between PVs /dev/hde1 and /dev/hdh1
2 PV(s) found for VG pictures: expected 3
Logical volume (lv_pictures) contains an incomplete mapping table.
PV /dev/hdg1 VG data lvm1 [60.50 GB / 0 free] PV /dev/hde2 VG data lvm1 [68.75 GB / 0 free] PV /dev/hdb VG data lvm1 [55.84 GB / 0 free] PV /dev/hdf2 VG data lvm1 [53.06 GB / 0 free] PV /dev/hde1 VG pictures lvm1 [2.75 GB / 0 free] PV /dev/hdf1 VG pictures lvm1 [2.75 GB / 0 free]
Total: 6 [0 ] / in use: 6 [0 ] / in no VG: 0 [0 ]
Now I can quite happily see the volumes in the missing vg (in this case pictures).
# lvm pvdisplay /dev/hde1 --- Physical volume --- PV Name /dev/hde1 VG Name pictures PV Size 2.79 GB / not usable 45.55 MB Allocatable yes (but full) PE Size (KByte) 32768 Total PE 88 Free PE 0 Allocated PE 88 PV UUID uJqHOZ-puzh-6m8D-04dP-v3np-0Fj5-dh1CDY
# lvm pvdisplay /dev/hdf1 --- Physical volume --- PV Name /dev/hdf1 VG Name pictures PV Size 2.79 GB / not usable 45.55 MB Allocatable yes (but full) PE Size (KByte) 32768 Total PE 88 Free PE 0 Allocated PE 88 PV UUID FJh4Dl-2KPf-LyHK-8I3F-LAsk-hJ0x-0svzu4
# lvm pvdisplay /dev/hdh1 --- Physical volume --- PV Name /dev/hdh1 VG Name pictures PV Size 4.66 GB / not usable 32.77 MB Allocatable yes (but full) PE Size (KByte) 32768 Total PE 148 Free PE 0 Allocated PE 148 PV UUID 63LnM2-4MsC-Lg7I-st7o-xKcX-LHNy-BFYPtz
# lvm pvdisplay /dev/hdg2
--- Physical volume ---
PV Name /dev/hdg2 VG Name pictures PV Size 13.99 GB / not usable 51.58 MB Allocatable yes PE Size (KByte) 32768 Total PE 446 Free PE 445 Allocated PE 1 PV UUID KW087O-c77n-k7Hf-4TCn-6MpM-Kf6L-izuYBv
And when I try a vgchange this is what happens:
# lvm vgchange -P -a y pictures Partial mode. Incomplete volume groups will be activated read-only. VG data differs between PVs /dev/hde1 and /dev/hdg2 VG data differs between PVs /dev/hde1 and /dev/hda8 VG data differs between PVs /dev/hde1 and /dev/hdh1 2 PV(s) found for VG pictures: expected 3 Logical volume (lv_pictures) contains an incomplete mapping table. VG data differs between PVs /dev/hde1 and /dev/hdg2 VG data differs between PVs /dev/hde1 and /dev/hda8 VG data differs between PVs /dev/hde1 and /dev/hdh1 2 PV(s) found for VG pictures: expected 3 Logical volume (lv_pictures) contains an incomplete mapping table. VG data differs between PVs /dev/hde1 and /dev/hdg2 VG data differs between PVs /dev/hde1 and /dev/hda8 VG data differs between PVs /dev/hde1 and /dev/hdh1 2 PV(s) found for VG pictures: expected 3 Logical volume (lv_pictures) contains an incomplete mapping table. 1 logical volume(s) in volume group "pictures" now active
But I can't get it mounted, although the entry exists in /dev/mapper
ls -l /dev/mapper
total 0
crw------- 1 root root 10, 63 Jan 24 13:49 control brw------- 1 root root 254, 0 Jan 24 14:11 data-lv_data brw------- 1 root root 254, 1 Jan 24 14:11 pictures-lv_pictures
The logical link is connected to /dev/data/lv_data, but none for /dev/pictures/lv_pictures
Now my main question is, and I'm hoping this is possible. Can I list the PE's on the drives in question and then rebuild the VG in some way by manually specifying these LE/PE's? When I did a vgcfgbackup I got a file with a lot of missing segments. I'd like to manually specify the extents and rebuild the vg.
The reason for persisting?? My wife is a photographer and you can imagine what's on this lvm.....
Hoping someone can help I can provide further information if need be.