MCE 0710 won't install

[PaulH]

I am new to lot of things with Linux although I read alot in this forum. Having seen the video I am determined to get this machine  running. My problem is that I am trying to install MCE 0710 (DVD) on a HP Proliant DL580 server that has a raid controller. MCE goes thru upto installing on to the disk and says cannot install yet it sees my primary and logical disk. On this same machine, I have no problem installing Kubuntu 9.04. Same MCE disk I used on another computer and it works like a charm. I intend to dedicate this server purely for MCE. Question is why wouldn't MCE install on this? Out of 4 disks that I have in this raid, the first disk was partitioned as primary with 8Gb for boot, 3 Gb for Linux Swap and 25Gb as logical. Boot and Logical formatted to Ext3. The other 3 disks partitioned as extended logical. Can Linux gurus here show me the path please?
Thanks

[colinjones]

Firstly, if you use LMCE 0810 beta instead of 0710 you probably won't have an issue.

Your problem likely is that the 0710 kernel doesn't have a driver for that RAID chipset. You could disable the RAID hardware completely and allow the motherboard to see the SATA drives directly. Or you could try the CD install method to install Kubuntu 0710 first by manually adding drivers for that kernel (if they exist). But you are better off just using 0810 instead.

BTW, partitions and filesystems are irrelevant with the DVD install, it just blows away the partitions and creates its own.

I don't understand what you mean by the first disk in the RAID is one partition and the others are other partitions. You don't get to choose that with RAID, that's the point. The RAID controller aggregates the disks into 1 "virtual" disk, which you can then partition how you like, but you don't see the individual disks so you can't assign a particular one to be something specific. You can configure the RAID system to have several RAID containers across different disks, so that you can choose to place a partition on a particular set of disks, but if you did that for a single (first) disk, then it wouldn't be a RAID array at all, thus pointless.

A RAID 0 or 1 requires at least 2 disks (and RAID 1 requires an even number of disks), RAID 5 requires at least 3 disks. Personally, I would recommend you keep your media on a separate device like a NAS, in which case the need for RAID at all on your core is fairly low..;.

[PaulH]

Firstly, if you use LinuxMCE 0810 beta instead of 0710 you probably won't have an issue.
I was contemplating to use 810 but the beta word held me back since I didn't want to complicate my matters even further. I will try it.

Your problem likely is that the 0710 kernel doesn't have a driver for that RAID chipset. You could disable the RAID hardware completely and allow the motherboard to see the SATA drives directly. Or you could try the CD install method to install Kubuntu 0710 first by manually adding drivers for that kernel (if they exist). But you are better off just using 0810 instead.

BTW, partitions and filesystems are irrelevant with the DVD install, it just blows away the partitions and creates its own.
Thanks. I should have realized it!

I don't understand what you mean by the first disk in the RAID is one partition and the others are other partitions. You don't get to choose that with RAID, that's the point. The RAID controller aggregates the disks into 1 "virtual" disk, which you can then partition how you like, but you don't see the individual disks so you can't assign a particular one to be something specific. You can configure the RAID system to have several RAID containers across different disks, so that you can choose to place a partition on a particular set of disks, but if you did that for a single (first) disk, then it wouldn't be a RAID array at all, thus pointless.
I am new to RAIDs. I bought this specifically for MCE in E-bay for $82. Array Controller Utility gave me the option to turn off 3 disks and just partition 1 disk (primary-RAID 0) and I went back in and added other 3 as a logical volume as RAID5. I have to learn a lot but I will do it.

A RAID 0 or 1 requires at least 2 disks (and RAID 1 requires an even number of disks), RAID 5 requires at least 3 disks. Personally, I would recommend you keep your media on a separate device like a NAS, in which case the need for RAID at all on your core is fairly low..;.
Using a NAS was/is a consideration. Now I am going for it once I get CORE running. Thank you very much for your input. I learned today.