 Hello everybody! Watch this video to find out how to recover data from a software GVNUM RAID 5RA based on FreeBSD operating system. I'll show you how to install the latest version of FreeBSD with the GNOME graphic interface, and also how to create and configure a software RAID 5 with three hard disks. GVNUM is a control utility of a logical volume manager, and this is how the VINUM volume manager is implemented in GEOM. It underwent many changes since the initial import in FreeBSD version 5. However, as of early 2020, GVNUM has been deprecated. At this time, it is seen as mostly unmaintained and inferior to ZFS for most purposes. Yet, some people do use it to organize their data storage systems. For starters, let's explore how to install FreeBSD. Just as for any other operating system, you need to download an installation image. On its official website, you can find different versions, both 32-bit and 64-bit. Download the version which suits you best depending on the amount of system memory. At the moment, the latest FreeBSD version available is 13. Create a boot USB drive with a specialized utility, for example, Rufus or Acher. Connect it to the computer where you want to install this operating system and boot from the USB drive. When the computer starts booting, press again to select the first item on the list, the installer. Then you will see the installer window, so choose Install and press Enter. At the next stage, you can choose a keyboard layout. I'll keep the default option and press Select. Specify the hostname for the server. When choosing system components, these two items will suffice for a typical server build. Leap 32 and Quartz. To select an item, press Space and OK to continue. The next step is disk partitioning. I choose UFS, Automatic and click OK. Since I have allocated a separate hard disk for the operating system, I choose the option EntireDisk. If you need to create a separate partition, choose the corresponding option. Select a partition scheme from the list, check the FutureDisk setup and click Finish. Agree to override the disk. This will raise all the existing data on that disk. After that, the operating system will be installed without any user actions, so just wait until it is complete. Give the superuser or root password and type it again to confirm. In the network settings, choose the network interface you need and press OK. Now you should give your network options for IPv4. Yes, use DHCP, yes, use IPv6, no. Use Origin, country, setup date and time. Now you should select the services which run at boot – SSHD and APD – Power ID. Select security options 3, 4, 7, 8. To add a new user at this stage, press Yes. When FreeBSD reboots and starts, you will see the command line. With too few people enjoying working with it, I will also show you how to install GNOME, the graphic interface. GNOME is a free open-source desktop for Unix-type operating systems. However, you also need to install Xorg to make the graphic interface work. Xorg is a free and open-source implementation of the XWindows system display server that allows users to organize graphic work in environment. To install Xorg, type this command. And then, yes, to confirm your decision. It starts the installation process. After Xorg is installed, you can move on to installing GNOME. Time the following command. And then, yes, to confirm your decision. The graphic interface will not boot automatically after you have installed the components. To have it booted automatically at startup, you need to change some settings. Type this command in the console. It will open the configuration file where you should add a line like this. After that, press Escape. In the window that opens, select Live Editor and press Enter. Then choose Save Changes and press Enter again. To restart the system, type Reboot. After the restart, you will no longer see the console but a graphic interface. Now type the login and password that you have given before. After the password is provided, the GNOME desktop will boot. At this stage, the installation of FreeBSD and GNOME interface is complete. Alright, we have installed the operating system and added a graphic interface for Kenwinians. Now let's explore how to build a software 8.5 with 3 hard disks connected to this PC and organize a storage for important files. To begin with, you need to identify the names of connected disks and determine which of them will be used to build a RAID system. Type the command. As a result, here is what you see. CD0 is the optical disk drive, DA0 is the system drive, and DA3, DA2 and DA1 are the disks that we will use to build RAID 5. In the card system, they are located in the folder If you are in doubt, you can check the disk size. You can do it with this command. As a result, you will see this information. Later, we will need it because this is the disk size. For your convenience, I will highlight it on the screen. Now you should create a directory where the RAID is going to be mounted. Let's give it this name – Server. After that, create a configuration file for the RAID system by typing disk command. And fill in the required information. Disk names, RAID configuration and size for every disk. Drive RAID 51 is the name for the physical disk, but you can use any name you like. Dash dev slash DA1 – the disk itself in this system. We mentioned it before. Volume RAID 5 is the name of the virtual disk, which is going to make up our RAID 5. Plex is the set that provides the entire address space. Since we are going to build RAID 5, type the following – org RAID 5. And the stripe size will be 256K, as recommended by the manual. SDR sub-disk. We will use 3 disks, 30GB each, but we'll specify the size as follows – the figure I have highlighted before. Press escape and save changes to the file. Now you can create the RAID 5 system itself. As a result, a new device will be created – slash dev slash gvnome slash RAID 5. Now you should create a file system for it. After that, let's make the vendor module boot automatically. At the next stage, the array should be mounted. As the mount point, we will use the folder server, which you have created at the beginning. Finally, restart the computer. That's all. We have built RAID 5, and let's use another command to check it. You can see the 3 disks and the new volume of the corresponding size. RAID 5 is quite a reliable solution in terms of safely keeping important data, but just like any other storage, it is not perfect. As a result of many factors, its operation may be interrupted, and some information may be lost. If your server is down, a one or several distancing in the array are no longer functional, and as a result of that you have lost access to some critical data, use a specialized data recovery tool – Headman RAID Recovery. This program supports most popular file systems and RAID times. It will read all the necessary information on the fly and rebuild the damaged RAID automatically. All you need to do is to scan it and restore the files you need. Click the disks out of the server, where the RAID was built, and connect them to a Windows computer. If your motherboard does not let you connect all of them at once, use special adapters and expansion cards. As you can see, the program has rebuilt the RAID without effort, and now it displays all the data inside it. Here is our RAID 5 with the UFS file system. Right-click on the disk and select Open. Select the scan type. For example, Fast Scan will quickly search the disk and display all the information it has found. If the Fast Scan can't find the necessary files, then go for Full Analysis. Go back to the Drive Manager, right-click on the disk and choose Analyze again. Select Full Analysis, choose the file system and click Next. In most complicated cases, we recommend searching files by their signatures, by checking the box next to Content Aware Analysis. As a result, the program will display the files and folders, which are still on the disks. Select the files you want to recover, click Recovery, and select where you want to save them. Before you save anything, you need to make sure that you have as much disk space as the amount of data you are planning to recover. Having chosen the directory, hit Recovery. In the end, you will find the recovered files in the folder you have chosen. In very complicated cases, where critical service data was erased from the disks, the program may fail to rebuild the array automatically. Luckily, for such cases, this program features a manual way for rebuilding the array in a special constructor mode. To use this mode, you need to know all the information about the damage to array. Open Rate Constructor, select Manual Mode, click Next, and fill in the array data. Select the type, block order, block size, add the disks included into the array, and specify their order. As a result, it should appear in this window. If you got all the properties right, you will see the directory tree. If you see none, it means the properties are incorrect or this information is insufficient to identify the rate. You may have to specify the offset, which tells you where the beginning of the disk is located. You can find this information with the help of Hacks Editor. When all the properties are ready, click Add. After that, the array will appear in the Drive Manager. Scan it using fast scan of full analysis and recover the files you need to restore. And that is all for now. Hopefully, this video was useful. Remember to click the Like button and subscribe to our channel. Leave comments to ask questions. Thank you for watching. And good luck.