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Connect and disconnect the disk
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Connect and disconnect the disk

Replace the boot disk⁠

With a cloud server, you can only replace the network boot disk — with another network boot disk.

  1. in control panels from the top menu, press Products and select Cloud servers.
  2. Open the server page → tab Network disks.
  3. Check which disk is bootable — you'll see a tag in the line with it Loading.
  4. If the cloud server does not have a boot disk, then the first plug in the desired disk — it will automatically become bootable.
  5. If the cloud server already has a boot disk, shut down the server and disconnect the boot disk. First plug in the desired disk — it will automatically become bootable.

Connect a network drive to the server⁠

Only network disks can be connected to the cloud server (up to 255 disks per server).

If the cloud server does not have a boot disk, the first disk connected will automatically become the boot disk.

The attached disk and the cloud server must be on the same pool segment.

  1. Verify that the disk is not connected to other servers, and if necessary turn it off.
  2. We recommend shut down the server. You can also connect the disk to a powered-on server, but make sure the operating system is fully booted.
  3. in control panels from the top menu, press Products and select Cloud servers.
  4. Go to the section Disks.
  5. On the disk row, in the column Connected to click Connect.
  6. Select the server to which the disk will connect. The disk and server must be on the same pool segment — if necessary move the disk to another segment of the pool.
  7. Click Connect.
  8. If you have connected the disk as an additional disk, be sure to set it up — format and mount it.

Prepare the optional disk drive for operation after connection⁠

If you have connected an additional disk to the cloud server, it must be formatted and mounted — the order of configuration depends on the operating system.

  1. Connect to the server.

  2. Look up the name of the additional disk connected to the server:

    lsblk

    In reply to. sdb — it's an extra disk:

    NAME    MAJ:MIN RM  SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINT
    sda       8:0    0    8G  0 disk
    ├─sda1    8:1    0    8G  0 part /
    └─sda14   8:14   0    8M  0 part
    sdb       8:16   0    5G  0 disk

  3. If the attached disk was created from a source (image, snapshot, backup, or other disk), go to step 12.

  4. If the disk is empty, run the utility parted to create the file system and partitions of the additional disk:

    parted /dev/sdb

    Here sdb — additional disk.

  5. Create a partition table with GPT partitioning:

    mklabel gpt

  6. Create partitions using the utility mkpart, specify the beginning and end of the section:

    mkpart primary 0 1GB
    mkpart primary 1GB 3GB

    The example creates a 1 GB first partition and a 2 GB second partition (1 GB to 3 GB sector).

  7. Check the created partition table:

    print

    The response will show a list of partitions, start and end sectors, and partition sizes.

  8. Exit the utility parted:

    quit

  9. If, upon exiting parted a warning appeared Information: You may need to update /etc/fstabCopy the IDs of all partitions on the additional disk (parameter PARTUUID):

    blkid

    In reply to. sdb1 and sdb2 — disk partitions, PARTUUID — Section IDs:

    /dev/sdb2: PARTLABEL="primary" PARTUUID="bd032abc-8f4e-4723-8ffd-a39544e97e36"
    /dev/sdb1: PARTLABEL="primary" PARTUUID="123e46a1-61a4-3a53-77d7-14a02fbc98bc"

  10. Open the file /etc/fstab:

    nano /etc/fstab

  11. Add the ID of each section to the file:

    UUID=<block_id> /mnt ext4 defaults 0 0
    UUID=<block_id> /mnt ext4 defaults 0 0

    Specify <block_id> — Partition IDs of the additional disk copied in step 9.

  12. Format each disk partition using the utility mkfs (ext4 partitioning format is used):

    mkfs.ext4 /dev/sdb1
    mkfs.ext4 /dev/sdb2

    Here sdb1 and sdb2 — partitions of the additional disk.

  13. Create a directory to mount the additional disk and mount each partition to it:

    mkdir -p /mnt
    mount /dev/sdb1 /mnt
    mount /dev/sdb2 /mnt

    Here sdb1 and sdb2 — disk partitions.

  14. Check the result:

    lsblk

    The partitions of the additional disk will appear in the response:

    NAME    MAJ:MIN RM  SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINT
    sda       8:0    0    8G  0 disk
    ├─sda1    8:1    0    8G  0 part /
    └─sda14   8:14   0    8M  0 part
    sdb       8:16   0     5G  0 disk
    ├─sdb1    8:17   0 953.7M  0 part /mnt
    └─sdb2    8:18   0   1.9G  0 part /mnt

Disconnect the network drive from the server⁠

You can only disconnect a network drive — boot or secondary — from the cloud server.

  1. If the disk is bootable, shut down the cloud server.
  2. If the disk is optional, we also recommend shutting down the server. You can disconnect the disk from the powered on server as well, but make sure the operating system is fully booted.
  3. in control panels from the top menu, press Products and select Cloud servers.
  4. Go to the section Disks.
  5. On the menu of the disk, select Disconnect from the server.