ZFS pool disappears after adding disk to system

[schlegel]

Ok, so I'm running FreeNAS-8.0.2-RELEASE-amd64 (8288) and have a single ZFS pool set up on a RAIDZ1 array consisting of four 2TB disks. I just bought four more new 2TB disks intending to create a new array and add it to the pool. However, connecting even one of the new disks to the system causes the existing ZFS pool to disappear.

The motherboard has five SATA ports, so I started by just connecting one new disk to the spare port. The system also has a PCI SATA controller and I later tried connecting the new disk to that as well. I've tried all sorts of combinations of physical SATA connections (e.g. put the new disk first or last on motherboard, new disk on SATA controller and existing on motherboard, new on motherboard and existing on SATA controller, etc.) Each time upon booting back up the FreeNAS admin interface gives me those "Error getting available space" errors and my ZFS pool is gone.

I have checked /var/log/messages and it looks like the existing drives are being assigned the same ad0/1/2/3s as before (although I can't tell them uniquely apart). Once in the Storage section of the FreeNAS admin interface I can confirm that the ad0/etc. and serial numbers of the disks making up my pool are in the same order and the new disk isn't getting mixed up in it.

The only way I've been able to add the new disk without messing up the existing pool is by hot-plugging it after the system is booted, but the same problem occurs after a reboot.

Am I missing something? Thanks for any assistance!

 

[ProtoSD]

Hi Schlegel,

Take a look at this thread below, it sounds very similar to your problem. The steps for diagnosing your problem are the same.

http://forums.freenas.org/showthread.php?3526-Disks-from-volume-quot-disappeared-quot-even-though-the-system-still-sees-them.

 

[schlegel]

Thanks for the suggestion. It seems similar to my problem but didn't help. gdisk reported that all the GPTs were fine for my four existing drives. I tried several forms of wiping on the new drives: the recommended method of writing zeros to the MBR and GEOM sectors, completely reformatting to FAT32 using GParted, and just deleting everything and leaving them unformatted/unallocated. The same problem happened after each with my ZFS pool disappearing upon booting back up with one of the new drives connected either on the motherboard or a PCI SATA controller.

I did come up with a solution, though. I ended up hot-plugging the four new drives after booting up FreeNAS and then immediately adding them to my pool. This seemed to do the trick and I can now reboot without the previous problems. Doesn't seem like an ideal solution, though...

 

[ProtoSD]

Yeah, that's a horrible solution, but even horrible solutions have their advantages because they offer a clue to fixing the problem properly.