Installing Proxmox VE: Fix Volume Group Creation Error

Proxmox Virtual Environment (VE) is a powerful platform for virtualization, facilitating the management of virtual machines and containers. However, during installation, you may encounter a specific issue that can hinder progress – the “Volume Group Creation Error.”

This error often arises when configuring essential components in Proxmox VE, preventing you from moving forward smoothly. Addressing this issue is crucial for a successful installation. It also ensuring the proper setup of storage volumes and smooth execution of virtual environments.

In this discussion, we’ll explore the steps to diagnose and resolve this “Volume Group Creation Error,” allowing you to install Proxmox VE without hindrance, enabling you to harness the full potential of this versatile virtualization solution.

When installing Proxmox VE 4.1, it fails right at the begining of installation with messages and prompted “unable to create volume group at /usr/bin/proxinstall line 519”. Error as follow below.

 Device boot Start End Blocks Id System
 /dev/sda1 * 32 524319 524208 83 Linux
 /dev/sda2 524320 293033631 292509312 0e Linux LVM
 /dev/sda3 0 - 0 0 Empty
 /dev/sda4 0 - 0 0 Empty
 Successfully wrote the new partition table
 [..]
 Physical volume /dev/sda2" successfully created
 A volume group called 'pve' already exists
 unable to create volume group at /usr/bin/proxinstall line 519
 umount: /target/boot: not found
 umount: /target/var: not found
 umount: /target/tmp: not found
 umount: /target/proc: not found
 umount: /target: not mounted

Solution
– I resolved this problem by simply installing Proxmox VE the RAID option to 0 and the file system to ZFS to overide the existing block (volume).
– After this i reinstalled, haven reverted back to the existing file system and reinstalled Proxmox and it worked.