Hello! I don't know a lot at Linux and have a stupid question! On my box (Centos 7) I have 2 hard drives. One is used for the system and websites (I assume) and the second should be empty. When I program a virtualserver backup in Virtualmin I am asked to select the backup directory. And I see the usual catalog of the disk where all files are "bin boot dev etc home......" But I would like to save the files to the other hard drive. How to do this?
The 2 hard disks are the same and partitioned in the same way (that was done by the hosting company):
SATA device A Disk size: 953.84 GB | Make and model: ATA TOSHIBA DT01ACA1 | Cylinders: 121602 | Partition format: MSDOS Number Type Size Start End Used by 1 Linux RAID 2.06 GB 1 262 /dev/md1 2 Linux XFS 265.06 MB 262 294 /dev/md0 3 Linux RAID 951.54 GB 294 121602 /dev/md2
SATA device B Disk size: 953.84 GB | Make and model: ATA TOSHIBA DT01ACA1 | Cylinders: 121602 | Partition format: MSDOS Number Type Size Start End Used by 1 Linux RAID 2.06 GB 1 262 /dev/md1 2 Linux XFS 265.06 MB 262 294 /dev/md0 3 Linux RAID 951.54 GB 294 121602 /dev/md2
Thank you!
Your disks seem to be set up in a raid 1 array. Generally, that is a good thing as if one fails, your system should continue to run so that you have time to make sure your backups are safe and you can schedule downtime in an orderly fashion to facilitate replacement and rebuilding of the array.
But, don't just take the word of some random guy on the Internet when it come to your backups. Check directly with your host to be sure.
Yes those 2 disks are raided together. But the info above doesn’t specify the raid level. Most likely it is 1 though, if the data center set it up for redundancy. Which they probably did if its their hardware. Go to webmin, hardware, Linux raid and your should see those three "raid" partitions listed. md0, md1 and md2. md1 is most likely swap space. md0 is boot, and md2 will be root. It will also list the raid level for each partition. Most likely they are raid1.
So to answer your question. No, you cant use the second disk as storage. Both disks are combined and being used as is. Best you can do is create a folder on the md2 partition to store your backups. Either in your home partition or in /media/'whatever you want' are good places.