Windows 2000 RAID 5

[Guest]

Hi, I am currently running a w2k sp4 server with 3 18.2 gig HD set up with
software RAID 5. We are now running out of space and I ordered 3 36.4 gig
Hot swap drives to replace the 18.2s. Is there a way to swap these out one
at a time, letting
it rebuild between drives? If it is, what needs to be done to incorporate
the remaining space into the logical drive. This RAID volume is set up as
one logical drive. Thanks for any help.

 

[David H. Lipman]

No, I don't think that'll work. You'll have to recreate the RAID 5 using the larger drives
then restore your data.

--
Dave




| Hi, I am currently running a w2k sp4 server with 3 18.2 gig HD set up with
| software RAID 5. We are now running out of space and I ordered 3 36.4 gig
| Hot swap drives to replace the 18.2s. Is there a way to swap these out one
| at a time, letting
| it rebuild between drives? If it is, what needs to be done to incorporate
| the remaining space into the logical drive. This RAID volume is set up as
| one logical drive. Thanks for any help.

 

[Martin]

This wont work as raid 5 will configure the new drive to the same usable
size as the disk you are replacing.

 

[Jeff Whitehead]

As David and Martin both said, this will not work.

On putting in the first 36.4 GB drive, it'll be re-configured so that only
18.2 GB is available, to match the other two.
The rebuild will then take place, but you've still effectively got 3 x
18.2GB drives.

Besides, adding one disk at a time and causing a rebuild, will take hours.
In my experience a 36GB drive can take approx 3 hours to rebuild.
You are doing this with 18GB drives, so it may be quicker, but you're going
to do this 3 times.... forget it.

I would recommend a full backup (maybe on a Friday night). Replace all the
disks with the 36GB ones and recreate a single RAID 5 array.
Then restore the data.

In the long run, you'll get what you wanted, but probably a lot quicker....

PS... Maybe somebody can correct me here, but in my experience, although
your disks might be hot-swappable, the backplane (esp. if you have an older
server) might not.
I always think it's a good idea to shut the server down completely (wherever
possible) before adding/removing disk drives.

HTH Jeff.

 

[Guest]

Hi,
Even if we swap these 20gb drives by 40 gb drives one by one, we will only
get the 20 gb raid-5 partition on each 40 gb drive and the rest will be
unavailable. There is no way, then, to extend these three partitions,
simultaneously. The only way to accomplish is to take the backup, create the
new LUN and restore from backup.

lukesh