Need some help with what things are!

[Stormfront Tech]

Hi,

 

I got some drives donated to my non-profit and I need some illumination on some definitions!

 

1. SAS what is SAS (Or SASS Idk which)? Why does it need a seperat PCI controller? Can I use SATA drives hooked up to a SAS controller normally without it?

 

2. What is RAID? How do the raid Levels work? How do i use different RAIDs?

 

I tried reading online tutorials and stuf but the were not helpful. A simple explanation would be much appreciated!

 

Thanks,

Andrew

[VIVO-US]

SAS drives are typically used for business, where speed and reliability are a concern.  Their capacity is lower, but they're more reliable.  The interface is different from SATA, which is why they need a separate controller if the computer doesn't already have one.

 

RAID is a system that basically makes multiple hard drives work as one.  By dividing data into multiple drives, you can get faster read and write speeds, and you have some redundancy for in case one of the drives should fail.  I haven't used it myself though, so I can't give you the details of all the different levels or how to use it.

[minibois]

26 minutes ago, Stormfront Tech said:

1. SAS what is SAS (Or SASS Idk which)? Why does it need a seperat PCI controller? Can I use SATA drives hooked up to a SAS controller normally without it?

I don't really know this one, so I'll just post the TechQuickie video:

All I know most people wouldn't use SAS.

26 minutes ago, Stormfront Tech said:

2. What is RAID? How do the raid Levels work? How do i use different RAIDs?

Redundant Array of Independent Disks.

It's a way to have individual disks run in an array (together) to create redundancy.

 

To explain the different types:

Raid 0: doesn't actually have any redundancy. makes two or more drives work together, so if you have two 1TB drives, they are 2TB together, with twice the speed. If one drive fails, all data is gone.

 

The other raid types I will reference how much data you have left. As an example, let's say you buy 4 drives, 2TB each. So that's 8TB together.

Raid 1: see it as a mirror. Two (or more) drives work together. Half of them contain data, half contain the same data. So you have 4TB actual room, as the other 4TB is redundancy. Two drives max can fail.

Raid 5: redundancy where each of the 4 disks contains a bit of data from another disk. So from the 8TB, you retain 6TB. Only one disk at most can fail.

Raid 6: same as Raid 5, but with 5 disks.

Raid 10: it's like raid 0+1. Two disks work together for added speed (but with more risk, since one drive dead = raid 0 dead), but with raid 1 above it, so it's kinda protected.

 

So basically the different raid variants (excluding Raid 0) add some redundancy in your drive setup, so you can be up and running quicker if a drive fails. How many drives can fail and how much storage you give up to redundancy depends on which raid you choose. Which you should choose depends on your use-case.

 

P.S. Raid is not a backup solution, it's a redundancy solution. With the '3-2-1 backup formula' this is still just one place for saving data. It just makes it easier to get your server back up.

Please do your research before buying a storage array. What is best for someone else, might not work for you.