So, reinstall the whole stuff from scratch. Yes, and not once, but still with the same failure result when trying to enable logical RAID5 drives. Chill out guys, I’m not going to tell the whole story from the very beginning, though there were quite a few rakes that I’ve luckily avoided during my first install, but did not miss later on. Just the solution. Turned out to be not soft but hard related. One of the physical SCSI hard drives failed. Took some efforts to figure out which of twelve. So, finally I have ended up removing two and replacing one. Besides I’ve changed NetRAID configuration to 1xRAID1 and 1xRAID5 logical drives. After this I did the base system installation already by heart. As to the final system, I’ve done it a little bit different. Instead of installing prepackaged Apache+MySQL+PHP+GD bundle, I got the latest releases of each and did three steps configure – make – make install for each. A bit time consuming and no automatic updates. But it will serve for awhile.
Seems as if that’s the end. Unless I recall something worth telling

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So, the next task is to enable remaining two RAID5 logical drives. And I want do it from the comfort of my chair. OK
On the Debian box open SU terminal and do
#ssh user@192.xxx.xxx.xxx // to connect to the server
No problems, just supply the password and you are in. Now, to partition the disk you have to have admin rights. Should not be difficult.
$su //Switch to super user mode, worked fine on my Debian machine

Responce is ...Well, no responce and no SU. OK, once more... No responce, no SU. RTF1300pagesM. Found the reason on page 428. Turns out that in FreeBSD to be able to switch to SU mode, the user must belong to WHEEL group. Fine. Now, How to assign my User to the WHEEL group? Turns out 1300 pages are not enough to explain. Read the f****g pw manual page. Took some time to make up sense out of 100 or so switches options and what else and several runs to the server to log-on as root to came up with the command I need. (See some of you smiling).
#pw usershow -n User -P //to see human description of User's properties
#pw usermod -n User -g wheel //To assign Users to wheel group

Good, done. Back to my chair and back to configuring the drives. Handbook comes handy. Chapter 16.3 at page 536 lists three options to add disks, one for dummies, and two for users. Who am I? Well, after all I've gone through definitely not a dummy. So, go to section 16.3.2.2 "Dedicated" and look at method 1. Easy, I can do it. Strictly follow the steps... No luck. OK, may be method 2 is better. Try it. No luck. Well, probably I've overestimated myself a little bit. Go back to Section 16.3.1 "Using sysinstall" (For dummies). Follow the guidance to configure both my RAID5 drives, commit changes, reboot.

What a surprise! After spitting at me quite a few error messages, my so well behaving so far server went into single user mode. After 20 min of trying to make use of it, I've decided that 30 min installation is not that bad after all. So, one more installation. Though next time...

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So, what did I finally get after all the above? Here is the layout.
Decommissioned HP NetServer LH3000U, with two P4/1.2GHz processors, RAM 4GB, NetRaid SCSI controller and 12 SCSI physical hard drives configured into three logical drives, 5GB RAID1 and 2x90GB RAID5 drives, connected to a small test w2K3 LAN. (You might guess that I have thrown in quite a few of available resources scattered around in a Network Center).
The server has been happy with FreeBSD6.0.The Apache2.4+MySQL+PHP4+GD bundle has been installed, slightly configured and properly serving test pages. X server has been running serving as Gnome so KDE. SSHD has been running giving me an option to access the server from a remote workstation. The only tail to cut was those 2x90GB RAID5 logical drives. As one might guess I have installed everything on one 5GB RAID1 logical drive planning to enable other two later on.
That’s where the problems started…

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^^^ Agree
Good addon. Thanks. Though if you want the latest version of Apache+mysql+php+perl+gd +Whatever else you want Bundle, you will have to download and install it manually. The shadow site of this kind of installation is that you would not be able to update it using BSD pkg system.

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For future reference points for folks, might want to consider buying the SAMS FreeBSD book. Last version I own covers the 5.x series and comes with a single FreeBSD disc to conduct a basic install onto most system.

Installing FreeBSD does not take 3 discs, just disc 1. Typically the other discs contain the actual ports system and sometimes might have some really odd device drivers. But mainly all the drivers and core functions you'll need (like X11 & KDE) are including on disc 1. Now if you do not have access to a high speed internet connection, then you will want to purchase or have someone download all the ISO because your going to need them. FreeBSD works best when it has a fast connection to the internet.

For a light FreeBSD install, grab the ISO to disc 1 and install normally. Hopefully you've got all your hardware detected. Persionally, I keep a coupleolder jumper ISA (not much use anymore) and PCI 10Mbs ethernet cards around just incase.

Once the primary installation is set, it is time to get to know cvsup and the ports system. By default Apache is installed, but now you need PostgreSQL, Python, PERL, PHP, and MySQL.

Go in to usr/bin/ports/

type ls

now see all those directories? Each is an appliaction that has basically an automatic installer. What is even better is that it searches out, finds, and downloads EVERYTHING you need to get that package to work. PHP needs the GD library? Then the install scripts goes through a list of mirrors, finds the package, downloads, it and then continues with the PHP installation.

You want MySQL then do this:

type: cd /usr/bin/ports/mysql and then hit return

type: make && make install and then hit return

Sit back and let the Ports system do its job. It downloads everything it needs and then installs the package.

By doing it this way, you really save in download and set up time because your downloading only what you need and by default, the ports tree searches for updates and fetches the latest version of mysql and installs.

So you installed FreeBSD 5.2 and want to up grade to 6.x.

Just type CVSUP and let the system go fetch the latest stable kernal build and install. You can also update the ports system in a similar fashion too.

We have one database server in the office running on a dual Pentium Pro 200 system. It has an uptime of over 6 years now and it's running FreeBSD 3.4 still. It is the only non-macintosh system left other than the two Windows boxes we keep just because.

FreeBSD is still my fav. server operating system on the market today. Unlike Linux, BSD is more standardized and has been far easier to maintain and manage thanks to the ports tree. For the longest time the ports system was the only way I ever got PostgreSQL to actually intall without issue.

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