Work around for 2TB install limit?

[isparks_curtis]

I'm installing Proxmox 1.7 on a system with raid 10 (adaptec 2405) and 4 2TB drives. I plan on using the system for OpenVZ containers and therefore will need to find a way around the 2TB limitation.

At least one person on this forum got around this limitation by carving out a 30GB volume to install proxmox to:

http://forum.proxmox.com/threads/5228-partition-size?p=29761#post29761

However, since I'll be using OpenVZ, this post from Tom concerns me a bit:

http://forum.proxmox.com/threads/5692-RAID-on-Proxmox-VE-1.7?p=32279#post32279

KVM supports multiple storages, OpenVZ just one. So you need to decide how much you need for your OpenVZ containers as its hard to change this later.

The default setup mounts /dev/mapper/pve-data to /var/lib/vz (this is the default local storage for KVM disk images and OpenVZ).

To get around the limitation Tom mentions above, would it work to relocate /var/lib/vz to sdb (assuming I assign the rest of the space to this volume, which would be almost 4TB in size)? Or is there a better way?

Thanks,

Curtis

 

[udo]

I'm installing Proxmox 1.7 on a system with raid 10 (adaptec 2405) and 4 2TB drives. I plan on using the system for OpenVZ containers and therefore will need to find a way around the 2TB limitation.

At least one person on this forum got around this limitation by carving out a 30GB volume to install proxmox to:

http://forum.proxmox.com/threads/5228-partition-size?p=29761#post29761

However, since I'll be using OpenVZ, this post from Tom concerns me a bit:

http://forum.proxmox.com/threads/5692-RAID-on-Proxmox-VE-1.7?p=32279#post32279

To get around the limitation Tom mentions above, would it work to relocate /var/lib/vz to sdb (assuming I assign the rest of the space to this volume, which would be almost 4TB in size)? Or is there a better way?

Thanks,

Curtis

Hi,
the easiest way is to create two raidsets (or volumesets - i don't know the adaptec speech). The first of 2TB (or less) and one for the remain.
Installation on the first (boot param maxroot and cachesize) and after the installation expand the volumegroup pve with the big volume.
Then you can online resize pve-data (/var/lib/vz).

Udo

 

[isparks_curtis]

Thanks for the reply, Udo. Your mention of the maxroot parameter got me to do a little more searching and discovered that the 30GB volume that the first thread I linked to suggested is probably too small. I think I'll instead go with a 100GB volume and not limit the default root partition. As for cachesize, I couldn't find any mention of that parameter on this forum (outside this thread).

As for the idea of using LVM to add the larger volume afterwords... would that be required if I simply created a partition on the larger volume and moved /var/lib/vz there?

Curtis

 

[udo]

Thanks for the reply, Udo. Your mention of the maxroot parameter got me to do a little more searching and discovered that the 30GB volume that the first thread I linked to suggested is probably too small. I think I'll instead go with a 100GB volume and not limit the default root partition. As for cachesize, I couldn't find any mention of that parameter on this forum (outside this thread).

Hi,
sorry my mistake (it's to late) i mean swapspace!

As for the idea of using LVM to add the larger volume afterwords... would that be required if I simply created a partition on the larger volume and moved /var/lib/vz there?

Curtis

If you use local-storage for kvm-disks, they will be snapshotet during backup (lvm-snapshot). But i don't know what happens if this is a simple partition with filesystem...
and the expandation of a vg/lv is very easy ;-)

Udo

 

[udo]

... little more searching and discovered that the 30GB volume that the first thread I linked to suggested is probably too small...

Hm,
i had one cluster since over one year in production and the the root-vg is very empty - i use app. 2GB space on the lv!
With 30GB you have plenty of space, and if you not use all space in the vg you can easiely expand an logival volume if you need more space. Even the root-lv.
Expanding is easy - shrinking not!

Udo

 

[isparks_curtis]

Very good... my main point was that I wasn't painting myself into a corner by installing proxmox on a smaller volume. As long as I know that I can still get to the rest of the space on the drives after the install, then I'm good (the server is going to a remote data center, making it pretty inconvenient to re-install). And you're probably right... I should just use LVM to do it.

Thanks again,

Curtis

 

[isparks_curtis]

Hm,
i had one cluster since over one year in production and the the root-vg is very empty - i use app. 2GB space on the lv!
With 30GB you have plenty of space, and if you not use all space in the vg you can easiely expand an logival volume if you need more space. Even the root-lv.
Expanding is easy - shrinking not!

Udo

All good points... thanks!