Replacing defective disks when the cluster is offline
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Replacing defective disks when the cluster is offline

If the disk becomes defective or inoperable and you want to switch to a new diskgroup in a cluster that is offline, then perform the following procedure.

In a cluster that is online, you can replace the disks using the vxfenswap utility.

See About the vxfenswap utility

Review the following information to:

• Replace coordinator disk in the coordinator disk group
• Destroy a coordinator disk group

  Note   Adding or removing coordinator disks requires all services be shut down.

Note the following about the procedure:

• When adding a disk, add the disk to the disk group vxfencoorddg and retest the group for support of SCSI-3 persistent reservations.
• You can destroy the coordinator disk group such that no registration keys remain on the disks. The disks can then be used elsewhere.

To remove and replace a disk in the coordinator disk group

1. Log in as superuser on one of the cluster nodes.
2. If VCS is running, shut it down:

   # hastop -all

3. Stop I/O fencing on all nodes:

   # /etc/init.d/vxfen stop

   This removes any registration keys on the disks.

4. Import the coordinator disk group. The file /etc/vxfendg includes the name of the disk group (typically, vxfencoorddg) that contains the coordinator disks, so use the command:

   # vxdg -tfC import 'cat /etc/vxfendg'

   where:

   -t specifies that the disk group is imported only until the node restarts.

   -f specifies that the import is to be done forcibly, which is necessary if one or more disks is not accessible.

   -C specifies that any import blocks are removed.

5. To remove disks from the disk group, use the VxVM disk administrator utility, vxdiskadm.

   You may also destroy the existing coordinator disk group. For example:

   # vxdg destroy vxfencoorddg

6. Add the new disk to the node, initialize it as a VxVM disk, and add it to the vxfencoorddg disk group.
   • On any node, create the disk group by specifying the device names:

     vxdg init vxfencoorddg rhdisk75 rhdisk76 rhdisk77

     vxdg init vxfencoorddg c1t1d0 c2t1d0 c3t1d0

     vxdg init vxfencoorddg sdx sdy sdz

     vxdg init vxfencoorddg c1t1d0 c2t1d0 c3t1d0

   • Set the coordinator attribute value as "on" for the coordinator disk group.

     vxdg -g vxfencoorddg set coordinator=on

     See Veritas Cluster Server Installation Guide for more information.

7. Test the recreated disk group for SCSI-3 persistent reservations compliance.

   See Testing the coordinator disk group using vxfentsthdw -c

8. After replacing disks in a coordinator disk group, deport the disk group:

   # vxdg deport 'cat /etc/vxfendg'

9. On each node, start the I/O fencing driver:

   # /etc/init.d/vxfen start

10. If necessary, restart VCS on each node:

    # hastart