I am using a iXsystems Certified FreeNAS device. One of the most common annoyances I have run into is when trying to use a disk that was once used in another FreeNAS box. Of course whenever I do a Google search on what to do I run into the typical stuff that you see all over this forum:
Give yourself absolute power:
sysctl kern.geom.debugflags=0x10
Wipe out the disk header:
dd if=/dev/da6 of=/dev/null bs=1m count=100
dd if=/dev/da16 of=/dev/null bs=1m count=100
Destroy the multipath:
gmultipath destroy -v disk6
Reboot
I have performed the above steps in many different ways (different combinations of the above steps). Really long story short, I have collectively at least 8 hours of experience in trying to get FreeNAS to see particular disks the same way that it saw them the first time I plugged them in. It's almost as if, "Once a FreeNAS disk, always a FreeNAS disk".
Obviously another solution would be to wipe the disk using some utility on another box. Well, that would be fairly easy to do if these were not SAS drives.
The problem with this scenario is that I cannot add a VDEV of disks (in any particular ZRAID configuration) to a ZPOOL if the VDEV contains a mixture of *new hard drives and **old hard drives.
*new - Drives that are brand new out of the box and have never been introduced into a ZPOOL on a FreeNAS system.
**old - Drives that were once a part of a ZPOOL on a FreeNAS system.
Can anyone shed some light on my troubles and possibly point me in the right direction so that in the end I can successfully add 5 mixed status (old and new) drives to an existing ZPOOL?
Give yourself absolute power:
sysctl kern.geom.debugflags=0x10
Wipe out the disk header:
dd if=/dev/da6 of=/dev/null bs=1m count=100
dd if=/dev/da16 of=/dev/null bs=1m count=100
Destroy the multipath:
gmultipath destroy -v disk6
Reboot
I have performed the above steps in many different ways (different combinations of the above steps). Really long story short, I have collectively at least 8 hours of experience in trying to get FreeNAS to see particular disks the same way that it saw them the first time I plugged them in. It's almost as if, "Once a FreeNAS disk, always a FreeNAS disk".
Obviously another solution would be to wipe the disk using some utility on another box. Well, that would be fairly easy to do if these were not SAS drives.
The problem with this scenario is that I cannot add a VDEV of disks (in any particular ZRAID configuration) to a ZPOOL if the VDEV contains a mixture of *new hard drives and **old hard drives.
*new - Drives that are brand new out of the box and have never been introduced into a ZPOOL on a FreeNAS system.
**old - Drives that were once a part of a ZPOOL on a FreeNAS system.
Can anyone shed some light on my troubles and possibly point me in the right direction so that in the end I can successfully add 5 mixed status (old and new) drives to an existing ZPOOL?