LVM HOWTO
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9.1. Initializing disks or disk partitions

Before you can use a disk or disk partition as a physical volume you will have to initialize it:

For entire disks:

  • Run pvcreate on the disk: 

    
# pvcreate /dev/hdb
    This creates a volume group descripter at the start of disk.

  • If you get an error that LVM can't initialize a disk with a partition table on it, first make sure that the disk you are operating on is the correct one. If you are very sure that it is, run the following:

    Warning DANGEROUS
     

    The following commands will destroy the partition table on the disk being operated on. Be very sure it is the correct disk. 

    
# dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/diskname bs=1k count=1
# blockdev --rereadpt /dev/diskname

For partitions:

  • Set the partition type to 0x8e using fdisk or some other similar program.

  • Run pvcreate on the partition: 

    
# pvcreate /dev/hdb1
    This creates a volume group descriptor at the start of the /dev/hdb1 partition.

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