[ILUG] Grub, lilo, RAID1

[Niall O Broin]

On 30 Jun 2005, at 10:14, Colm MacCarthaigh wrote:

> On Thu, Jun 30, 2005 at 09:01:42AM +0100, Andrew McCarthy wrote:
>> How do you mean "lilo is much better at it"? Do you mean grub 
>> sometimes
>> doesn't work on s/w RAID1, or that lilo's easier to set up?
>
> I find lilo much easier to configure in general

LILO is easier to configure, no doubt, but grub is really more 
powerful. Esp. if you're used to systems with OpenBoot firmware, grub 
is just a breath of fresh air after LILO.

> I've found that grub isn't as reliable.

Just for this RAID issue, or in general? I've been left in the lurch by 
LILO on numerous occasions, but only once by grub.

> I've never managed to get grub to work properly when only the
> second disk from the pair is online. If you google for "grub software
> raid" - it's the first problem.

I never actually tried, I must confess, but I'd have expected that the 
issue with grub is much the same as with LILO - you need to install the 
boot record onto both disks, and have a slightly different boot entry 
for each drive, which is where unattended recovery becomes a problem. 
This

http://www.linuxsa.org.au/mailing-list/2003-07/1270.html

claims to work, and is exactly how I'd have expected to do it. 
Additionally, I think that newer grubs might be even better, with the 
ability to try a second entry if the first fails.

However, this is pure speculation, as I haven't tried it.


Niall