Install in VirtualBox running in Linux Mint

[xtracold]

hi there,

I've ran Freenas successfully for months on a Windows desktop, in a virtual machine.

Following the loss of a my windows hard drive, i've moved to Linux Mint and would like to bring Freenas back online, incl a migration to ZFS and implementation of a RAID setup (which is new for me!).

My system is running the latest release of Linux Mint, and VirtualBox.

I have created the vmdk's for the raw disks as root.

I have chmod'd to 777 those vmdk's, such that files can be accessed as a user config virtual machine.

I have chmod'd to 666 the /dev/sdb and /dev/sdc1 that the vmdk's relate to so the VM can access them.

I have added those disks as SATA drives avail to the Virtual Machine

The drives appear to be accessible when first added to the config of the machine, but once the machine is running they don't appear as available volumes/disks. Also, after shutting down the machine it is clear that the drives are no longer accessible unless I sudo chmod them again.

Has anyone experienced these problems? Perhaps Linux Mint is accessing the drive too, preventing the VMaccess?

I'm no Linux poweruser so any advice is much appreciated..i've been googling for answers all day, all my data is on one of those disks so I need to get Freenas back up and running.

Thanks

xtracold

 

[sgk]

Yes I have. I installed legacy FreeNAS 0.7.x series in VirtualBox on a CentOS server and it was running just fine as long as I used the IDE disk for FreeNAS storage virtual disk. But, when I installed a SATA drive (1 TB WD) I had similar problems with you. I think either the CentOS substrate or the FreeNAS has problems with SATA virtual controllers or the SATA disk itself. Probably some kind of head alignment problem. I found some comments about it on the Internet. I think it might have to do with the Linux kernel's drivers on the new SATA 3 disks and maybe the new kernel versions will deal with it (hopefully).

 

[xtracold]

Hey,

Thanks for the reply. I never did get this working so i'm still on the lookout for a solution.

The key point for me was that the privileges seemed to be reverted back to default for some reason. The chmod commands etc would have to be repeated to have the disks appear available to the virtual machine again.

I am inclined to think that something is resetting the access priveleges on the files /dev folders but i'm at a loss how to track that down.

Any linux experts out there I am open to your ideas!

 

[xtracold]

I got his working in the end. The permissions on the files are what I recall as being the problem. Sorry I can't remember exactly but i've just started playing around with Freenas again and realised that I never listed my solution to this. chmod and chown the vmdisks and everything should work in the virtual machine. Email me if you have similar issues and i'll try to remember more of what i did, check my filesystem permissions for you etc.