Note: "permalinks" may not be as permanent as we would like,
direct links of old sources may well be a few messages off.
> -----Original Message----- > From: Gerry Reno [mailto:greno at verizon.net] > Sent: Sunday, February 25, 2007 12:46 PM > To: Ross S. W. Walker > Cc: drbd-user at lists.linbit.com > Subject: Re: [DRBD-user] Re: heartbeat 2.0.8: lockups kerneloops > > Ross S. W. Walker wrote: > > What driver problems did you experience with it? I'm interested in > > knowing possible problem areas before I hit them. One thing > I did notice > > is for drivers that use dkms to compile I had to do a > couple of tweaks > > to get them to recognize the CentOS kernel version as > RHEL4, but they > > were simple sed macro changes. > > > > I tried FC5 for a while, but I couldn't keep up with all > the kernel and > > libc updates, so decided for my SAN server to use something > more stable. > > > > -Ross > > > > > > > For us having good hardware support is paramount. We are a small > business that cannot afford to have a stockpile of hardware lying > around. When something breaks we need to be able to run down to the > local computer store and buy some replacement hardware, plug > it in, and > have it work. For an example, we needed to install gigabit nic cards > because our nightly network backups were beginning to exceed > our backup > window and we determined that it was the network that was the > bottleneck. So we went and purchased some gigabit nic cards and > installed them and no matter what driver we told CentOS to load in > /etc/modprobe.conf it just refused to recognize the cards. Now after > about two weeks of posting on the forums we finally found a > recommendation for gigabit nic card to we could go buy that > had a driver > that would work with CentOS. But by that time we had already > loaded FC6 > on the boxes and had everything running with no problem. And > this wasn't > the only problem we had had. We had video driver problems and had to > switch the video cards as well as usb problems. It seemed like CentOS > could not work with any of the newer hardware. You had to > hunt around in > flea markets and eBay to find hardware that it would support. Nothing > you could buy at the local computer store would work with it. This is > somewhat of a problem with Linux in general though. There > needs to be an > effort to add support for newer hardware into existing kernels on an > ongoing basis. Anyway, it just became too much of a headache so we > decided we didn't want to wait for some other similar hardware/driver > problems to appear so we moved over to FC6. Yes, there are a lot of > updates that come down the pipe with FC6 but you don't have to take > them. I wait about a month and then on a test machine I'll accept all > the new updates and test them out on that machine before I update the > production machines. I also check all the forums to see if anyone is > reporting any new problems with recent updates. All in all I > would say > that our experience with FC6 has been very good. Yes, well 2.6.9 doesn't have the well honed plug-and-pray hal system that the later distros have. It means you will have to manually kick off kudzu or some other older plug-and-pray method to get new hardware recognized, or know what driver it is that needs to be installed. I personally use the manufacturer's latest linux drivers, I don't care about kernel GPL taint just want the best performance from my hardware, so normally I replace the kernel versions with the manufacturer's latest. CentOS helps because most manufacturers directly support RHEL4 which means their drivers will just work as-is 90% of the time. I try to avoid CompUSA or Staples hardware as it is mostly designed for consumer use and doesn't have the enterprise level performance characteristics that I like to deploy on my servers. Of course if it were a desktop deployment then Fedora or Ubuntu would work out fine, that is where all the fancy bells and whistles help. -Ross ______________________________________________________________________ This e-mail, and any attachments thereto, is intended only for use by the addressee(s) named herein and may contain legally privileged and/or confidential information. If you are not the intended recipient of this e-mail, you are hereby notified that any dissemination, distribution or copying of this e-mail, and any attachments thereto, is strictly prohibited. If you have received this e-mail in error, please immediately notify the sender and permanently delete the original and any copy or printout thereof.