Linux Archive - SATA hotplug in Etch?

I'm running Etch on a SuperMicro 6024H 2U server. Specs on it can be
viewed here:
http://www.supermicro.com/products/system/2U/6024/SYS-6024H-T.cfm

The system has a Marvell 88SX6081 8-port SATA controller attached to a
6-port backplane. I currently have two drives in it, using _software_ RAID
1 and LVM in Linux. I'm no longer sure why I didn't just use the onboard
hardware RAID system; I think I assumed it would be easier to
monitor/manage the RAID using the existing Linux software tools. Maybe I
was wrong about that...

Earlier this year one of the drives in the system failed. No big deal - I
got a replacement, went down to the datacenter, yanked the old one and put
in a new one. The system didn't seem to mind this at all, but with the new
drive in place I couldn't make the system recognize it. dmesg seemed to
show that a drive was present, but no amount of fiddling would allow me to
add the drive to the array and get the rebuild started. After awhile I
read the FAQ here: http://linux-ata.org/software-status.html This seemed
to indicate that full hotplug support wasn't in the Linux kernel until
2.6.19. Of course, I happen to be running 2.6.17.

I ended up rebooting the box, and as soon as it came up it noticed the new
drive, and I was able to add it into the RAID and get the rebuild started.
I would have preferred not to have to do this though.

My question is this: Can anyone confirm that full SATA hotplug support is
present in the newer 2.6 kernels? Is it present in Etch, or do I need to
upgrade to testing or unstable?

Bonus question: Can you point me to a set of instructions for what
exactly I need to do on the software side to swap a drive?

--
Owen B. Mehegan (owen@nerdnetworks.org)

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