Multiple USB drives with Fedora Core 8

I ran into a problem recently with needing more external storage for my home server and hopefully the solution will help someone else.

Being the packrat that I am, I ran out of disk space to store my Mythtv recordings, pictures, and backups. No problem, a quick run down to Costco and an hour later I had two shiny new 500GB USB drives to go with the old 150GB USB drive I already had.

I plugged them in, slapped an OS on them, and threw some data on them for testing. It was just happenstance that I had just updated my kernel and had to reboot. Damned if the drives didn't change places and end up on the wrong mount points. MythTV doesn't record well when it can't find its directories. I first blamed the Scotch, but luckily found a solution that didn't involve my quitting drinking.

1. Get the volume’s UUID (universally unique identifier) for the drive (e.g. /dev/sdd1):

/lib/udev/vol_id –uuid /dev/sdd1

2. Use that UUID in /etc/fstab to identify the drive(s) and mount point(s):

UUID=a2c0a99e-e70d-476d-ae34-c5154f451182 /usr/local/mythtv ext3 defaults 1 2

3. Mount the drives to test your fstab entry.

mount -a

I haven't had any problems with the correct drive on the proper mount point since. I was a little worried about using MythTV on external USB drives, but it still works great.