Move system partitions to another volume on a HP Proliant server

In this tutorial, I will show you how to perform the following steps on your HP Proliant server:
create a new volume with hpssacli
create the physical volume, volume group and logical group with lvm
transfer the system from the old to the new volume

This tutorial can be useful if you do not want to reinstall the system from scratch and restore a backup.

Create a new volume with hpssacli
First step, update your /etc/apt/sources.list and add the repository :
deb http://downloads.linux.hp.com/SDR/repo/mcp trusty/current non-free

Run the following commands :

apt-get install add-apt-key && add-apt-key FADD8D64B1275EA3
apt-get update
apt-get install hpssacli

Create a new volume with hpssacli. In the following example, I will create a simple RAID1 volume :

> hpssacli
=> ctrl all show status

Smart Array P440ar in Slot 0 (Embedded)
   Controller Status: OK
   Cache Status: OK
   Battery/Capacitor Status: OK

=> ctrl slot=0 pd all show

Smart Array P440ar in Slot 0 (Embedded)

   array A

      physicaldrive 1I:1:1 (port 1I:box 1:bay 1, SAS, 600 GB, OK)
      physicaldrive 1I:1:2 (port 1I:box 1:bay 2, SAS, 600 GB, OK)
      physicaldrive 1I:1:3 (port 1I:box 1:bay 3, SAS, 600 GB, OK)
      physicaldrive 1I:1:4 (port 1I:box 1:bay 4, SAS, 600 GB, OK)
      physicaldrive 2I:1:5 (port 2I:box 1:bay 5, SAS, 600 GB, OK)
      physicaldrive 2I:1:6 (port 2I:box 1:bay 6, SAS, 600 GB, OK)

   unassigned

      physicaldrive 2I:1:7 (port 2I:box 1:bay 7, SAS, 300 GB, OK)
      physicaldrive 2I:1:8 (port 2I:box 1:bay 8, SAS, 300 GB, OK)

=> ctrl slot=0 create type=ld drives=2I:1:7,2I:1:8 raid=1
=> ctrl slot=0 pd all show

Smart Array P440ar in Slot 0 (Embedded)

   array A

      physicaldrive 1I:1:1 (port 1I:box 1:bay 1, SAS, 600 GB, OK)
      physicaldrive 1I:1:2 (port 1I:box 1:bay 2, SAS, 600 GB, OK)
      physicaldrive 1I:1:3 (port 1I:box 1:bay 3, SAS, 600 GB, OK)
      physicaldrive 1I:1:4 (port 1I:box 1:bay 4, SAS, 600 GB, OK)
      physicaldrive 2I:1:5 (port 2I:box 1:bay 5, SAS, 600 GB, OK)
      physicaldrive 2I:1:6 (port 2I:box 1:bay 6, SAS, 600 GB, OK)

   array B

      physicaldrive 2I:1:7 (port 2I:box 1:bay 7, SAS, 300 GB, OK)
      physicaldrive 2I:1:8 (port 2I:box 1:bay 8, SAS, 300 GB, OK)

=> ctrl slot=0 ld 2 show

Smart Array P440ar in Slot 0 (Embedded)

   array B

      Logical Drive: 2
         Size: 279.4 GB
         Fault Tolerance: 1
         Heads: 255
         Sectors Per Track: 32
         Cylinders: 65535
         Strip Size: 256 KB
         Full Stripe Size: 256 KB
         Status: OK
         Caching:  Enabled
         Unique Identifier: xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
         Disk Name: /dev/sdc          Mount Points: None
         Logical Drive Label: lllllllllllllllllllllllllllll
         Mirror Group 0:
            physicaldrive 2I:1:7 (port 2I:box 1:bay 7, SAS, 300 GB, OK)
         Mirror Group 1:
            physicaldrive 2I:1:8 (port 2I:box 1:bay 8, SAS, 300 GB, OK)
         Drive Type: Data
         LD Acceleration Method: Controller Cache

=> quit

In the last command you can see the new disk name that will be used under lvm (Disk Name: /dev/sdc)

> ls -l /dev/sdc*
brw-rw---- 1 root disk 8, 32 Mar xx 11:36 /dev/sdc

Partition creation with cfdisk (fdisk do not support gpt disks)

                                                                                   Disk: /dev/sdc                                                                                   
                                                               Size: 279.4 GiB, 299966445568 bytes, 585871964 sectors
                                                            Label: gpt, identifier: 12345678-1234-1234-1234-123456789123
                                                                          
    Device                                             Start                          End                      Sectors                      Size Type                               
    /dev/sdc1                                           2048                      1050623                      1048576                      512M EFI System
    /dev/sdc2                                        1050624                      1550335                       499712                      244M Linux filesystem
>>  /dev/sdc3                                        1550336                    585871930                    584321595                    278.6G Linux LVM

Do not forget to write the partition table and validate by typing “yes”.

LVM part

> lvm
lvm> pvcreate /dev/sdc3
lvm> vgcreate sysvg /dev/sdc3
  Volume group "sysvg" successfully created
lvm> lvcreate -n swap_1 -L 64G sysvg
  Logical volume "swap_1" created
lvm> lvcreate -n root -l 100%FREE sysvg
  Logical volume "root" created
lvm> quit

Transfer your system to the new created volume

Format the new volume
mkfs -t ext4 /dev/mapper/sysvg-root

Mount it and copy files

mount /dev/mapper/sysvg-root /mnt
rsync -avP --numeric-ids --exclude='/dev' --exclude='/proc' --exclude='/sys' / /mnt/

Install grub on the new volume

sudo mount --bind /dev /mnt/dev
sudo mount --bind /dev/pts /mnt/dev/pts
sudo mount --bind /sys /mnt/sys
sudo mount -t proc /proc /mnt/proc
sudo chroot /mnt /bin/bash
mount -a
apt-get install grub-pc
update-grub
grub-install /dev/sdc

And reboot !

My Powershell script categories

Move system partitions to another volume on a HP Proliant server

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