[OmniOS-discuss] sudden loss of networking

[Michael Mounteney]

Straight after the thermal diagnosis, a more definite culprit arose.
Since April 2013 when the server was commissioned, it's had a
three-way rpool mirror: two built-in SATA drives and one external
'cigarette packet' USB-2 drive. I know, I know, not blistering
data-centre performance but the idea is that if we go on holiday, or
the house is burning down, I can grab the external drive and not lose
all our data. This is a Supermicro SYS 5017C-LF so the drives are not
removable or hot-swappable.

Anyway, I'd been using the USB-2 drive elsewhere but this morning,
when it was still quite cool, I plugged it in and re-attached it to the
rpool mirror.  Within 1/2 hour the machine had locked-up again.  It
would have performed only a few % of the resilvering.

This comes into the category of 'wounded soldier' mentioned elsewhere
in this list but I wonder if anyone can recommend what to do next.  The
USB-2 drive had been used on a 'live' booted from a Bloody installation
USB stick for about 36 hours without problems, so I don't understand
why it should suddenly be causing the server to lock up, when it seems
to behave properly elsewhere.

The goal is to have an easily-removed mirror of the server, so maybe
someone can suggest a better way.  USB-2 is obviously crippling the
machines performance even when it's running properly.

Thanks in expectation of any assistance and suggestions.

Michael.