[root@02 ~]# mkfs.ext4 /dev/sdb1
mke4fs 1.41.12 (17-May-2010)
mkfs.ext4: No such device or address while trying to determine filesystem size
All the usual stuff by playing around with df -h, mount , cat /proc/swaps, /etc/mtab , lsof did not yeild any results.
Checking out some forums suggested that it is related to low level raid stuff and can be found by help of dmsetup and dmraid.
List device name
[root@02 ~]# dmsetup ls
ddf1_4c5349202020202010000411100010044711471181ddbcc4 (253, 0)
Get some more information about the device
[root@02 ~]# dmsetup info ddf1_4c5349202020202010000411100010044711471181ddbcc4
Name: ddf1_4c5349202020202010000411100010044711471181ddbcc4
State: ACTIVE
Read Ahead: 256
Tables present: LIVE
Open count: 0
Event number: 0
Major, minor: 253, 0
Number of targets: 1
UUID: DMRAID-ddf1_4c5349202020202010000411100010044711471181ddbcc4
Discover all software raid devices in the system
[root@02 ~]# dmraid -r
/dev/sdb: ddf1, ".ddf1_disks", GROUP, ok, 123045888 sectors, data@ 0
Get the property of the raid disks
[root@02 ~]# dmraid -s
*** Group superset .ddf1_disks
--> Subset
name : ddf1_4c5349202020202010000411100010044711471181ddbcc4
size : 123045888
stride : 128
type : stripe
status : ok
subsets: 0
devs : 1
spares : 0
Tried to deactivate the raid device
[root@02 ~]# dmraid -an
ERROR: dos: partition address past end of RAID device
The dynamic shared library "libdmraid-events-ddf1.so" could not be loaded:
libdmraid-events-ddf1.so: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
Remove all raid devices metadata
[root@02 ~]# dmraid -r -E /dev/sdb
Do you really want to erase "ddf1" ondisk metadata on /dev/sdb ? [y/n] :y
ERROR: ddf1: seeking device "/dev/sdb" to 32779907366912
ERROR: writing metadata to /dev/sdb, offset 64023256576 sectors, size 0 bytes returned 0
ERROR: erasing ondisk metadata on /dev/sdb
Format the entire disk with zeros so that it does not get detected as raid device and cause further problem.
dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/sdb