RAID 5 expandability

[Th3ArCh0n]

If i create an array with 4 WD Reds now in RAID 5, can i later add additional drives (either 1 or 2) without losing the data on the array? 

[scottyseng]

If i create an array with 4 WD Reds now in RAID 5, can i later add additional drives (either 1 or 2) without losing the data on the array? 

 

Usually no, but it depends on the RAID controller. Some may support it, but you'd have to read the manual first.

[Th3ArCh0n]

Usually no, but it depends on the RAID controller. Some may support it, but you'd have to read the manual first.

 

 

Thanks, i will be using the Intel Z87 chipset most likely for the raid set up

[EmeraldFlame]

Thanks, i will be using the Intel Z87 chipset most likely for the raid set up

In that case it is almost assuredly a no. Expanding or changing a RAID type without formatting is typically a feature seen on only higher end dedicated RAID cards. To change anything about a RAID on an integrated chipset like that it almost always requires a format. 

However, if you are going to be using RAID 5 I would really suggest finding a used hardware RAID card of ebay. RAID 5 is pretty calculation intensive on writes because of the need to calculate the parody data. RAID 5 write performance is typically pretty abysmal on integrated chips.

[scottyseng]

Thanks, i will be using the Intel Z87 chipset most likely for the raid set up

 

Yeah, then no. Usually integrated doesn't support it. Even on my LSI MeagRAID card, very few RAID levels support expansion (I know RAID0, 1, and 10 don't). I think only RAID 5, 6, 50, and 60 support expansion.

[wpirobotbuilder]

Yeah, then no. Usually integrated doesn't support it. Even on my LSI MeagRAID card, very few RAID levels support expansion (I know RAID0, 1, and 10 don't). I think only RAID 5, 6, 50, and 60 support expansion.

It stinks that RAID 10 doesn't support expansion. I love that FreeNAS does allow you to do so.

[Th3ArCh0n]

In that case it is almost assuredly a no. Expanding or changing a RAID type without formatting is typically a feature seen on only higher end dedicated RAID cards. To change anything about a RAID on an integrated chipset like that it almost always requires a format. 

However, if you are going to be using RAID 5 I would really suggest finding a used hardware RAID card of ebay. RAID 5 is pretty calculation intensive on writes because of the need to calculate the parody data. RAID 5 write performance is typically pretty abysmal on integrated chips.

 

 

Thank you for the info, is there a different RAID type that you would suggest for the z87? I would like 6 x 2TB drives and at least 1 drive of redundancy? I'm thinking RAID 10 looks intriguing 

[scottyseng]

Thank you for the info, is there a different RAID type that you would suggest for the z87? I would like 6 x 2TB drives and at least 1 drive of redundancy? I'm thinking RAID 10 looks intriguing 

 

Keep in mind RAID10 makes you lose half the space. You can lose up to two drives in RAID10 (If they're in different pairs).

[braneopbru]

RAID 10 is fast. It's also fairly safe. But it's extremely wasteful.

If you have six drives of 2TB each in RAID 10, that means that three drives would be in a RAID 0 striped array and another three would be in another stripe array mirroring the first. Which means that out of the 12 TB of total capacity you have, only 6TB would be useable.

But here's the other thing - right now on Newegg.ca, 6x 2TB reds will cost you $690 while 2x 6TB reds will cost you $640. So you'd be better off just getting the bigger drives and going RAID 1. There's also the added cost of a bigger power supply to spin 6 drives instead of two and all that extra money on energy over the life of the drives. Plus, does your motherboard even have enough SATA ports for the six 2TB drives and your boot drives? If it doesn't, you're going to need an HBA or hardware RAID card.

[Th3ArCh0n]

RAID 10 is fast. It's also fairly safe. But it's extremely wasteful.

If you have six drives of 2TB each in RAID 10, that means that three drives would be in a RAID 0 striped array and another three would be in another stripe array mirroring the first. Which means that out of the 12 TB of total capacity you have, only 6TB would be useable.

But here's the other thing - right now on Newegg.ca, 6x 2TB reds will cost you $690 while 2x 6TB reds will cost you $640. So you'd be better off just getting the bigger drives and going RAID 1. There's also the added cost of a bigger power supply to spin 6 drives instead of two and all that extra money on energy over the life of the drives. Plus, does your motherboard even have enough SATA ports for the six 2TB drives and your boot drives? If it doesn't, you're going to need an HBA or hardware RAID card.

 

 

Interesting thought. Yes the board i have has 6 x Sata 3.0 on the Z87 chipset and 2 on an ASmedia chipset. SO my next question. 

 

If i went with the 2x 6tb drives in RAID 1, how would the speeds compare to 6 x 2tb drives in either RAID 10 or 5?

[scottyseng]

Interesting thought. Yes the board i have has 6 x Sata 3.0 on the Z87 chipset and 2 on an ASmedia chipset. SO my next question. 

 

If i went with the 2x 6tb drives in RAID 1, how would the speeds compare to 6 x 2tb drives in either RAID 10 or 5?

 

Six 2TB drives in RAID 10 would be the fastest. RAID5 depends more on the speed of the RAID controller.

[Th3ArCh0n]

Man now i don't know what to do? What would you guys do? Budget under $1,000, Windows is a must, best balance of storage, and speed, redundancy is a must also

[scottyseng]

Man now i don't know what to do? What would you guys do? Budget under $1,000, Windows is a must, best balance of storage, and speed, redundancy is a must also

 

So you have six SATA coming off the Intel controller and two coming off of the ASmedia controller?

 

You might consider four 4TB Western Digital Reds in RAID 10 off the Intel RAID controller. 4TB seems to be the sweet spot for price to GB.

 

I had four 4TB Red drives running off of my LSI MegaRAID card and I was getting roughly 350 MB/s sequential write and read.

 

You can also consider RAID 6, though not sure how the speed will be (I'm on the overly paranoid side so I go for RAID 1 or RAID 10 with my data...I wish I could do ZFS, but my server needs to be Windows since I use it to render).

[michrech]

If you're in Windows, and want a big storage pool with available redundancy and expandability, take a look at StableBit's DrivePool.  

 

You have redundancy on a per-folder basis (you can set each folder to be duplicated on two, or more, disks in the pool), and you *don't* have to deal with RAID.  The drives are all NTFS formatted, so if the PC dies, or you decide you hate DrivePool, you can remove them from the system and still access the data.  Best of all, you can increase / decrease the pool as needed.  Even better, the drives don't all have to be the same size!  Lastly, the pool shows up as a single drive letter.  

No, I don't work for StableBit, but I do have three licenses.  I'd be glad to answer any questions you have, if any, to the best of my ability.  

 

Man now i don't know what to do? What would you guys do? Budget under $1,000, Windows is a must, best balance of storage, and speed, redundancy is a must also

[Th3ArCh0n]

If you're in Windows, and want a big storage pool with available redundancy and expandability, take a look at StableBit's DrivePool.  

 

You have redundancy on a per-folder basis (you can set each folder to be duplicated on two, or more, disks in the pool), and you *don't* have to deal with RAID.  The drives are all NTFS formatted, so if the PC dies, or you decide you hate DrivePool, you can remove them from the system and still access the data.  Best of all, you can increase / decrease the pool as needed.  Even better, the drives don't all have to be the same size!  Lastly, the pool shows up as a single drive letter.  

No, I don't work for StableBit, but I do have three licenses.  I'd be glad to answer any questions you have, if any, to the best of my ability.  

 

 

This sounds interesting... What is the speed like? Is it just the speed of a single SATA 6gbps? Or is it slowed down by the software?

[michrech]

I use it for large media storage (TV shows / movies) primarily, so that's never been a concern to me.  That said -- all of the disks in the pool are NTFS formatted, so you don't have overhead of a new FS added into the mix.

 

Whatever performance you get on a particular disk *should* be pretty much the same performance you'd get if it were in the pool, though there are things that can affect that like, for example, if the balancer is currently spreading files / performing (folder/file) duplication / etc.  There are also a few 'plug-ins' that can be added, one of which is an "SSD Optimizer".  With this plugin, you designate one (or more) disks in the pool as an SSD (preferably / generally at least one SSD), which will help write performance.  All files written to the pool will be first written to the SSD, and then the balancer will take care of moving the files where they belong as pool disk I/O is low / idle.  I'm unaware of any plugins that can help with read performance, but like I said, high performance was never a goal for me.  Basically, DrivePool allows you to create a DIY Drobo NAS...

 

DrivePool is free / fully functional for 30 days, so you can always try it out and see if it'll perform in a way that is acceptable for whatever plans you are hatching.  

If you're looking for both read *and* write performance, you're probably going to be best served with a RAID array of one level or another...

 

 

This sounds interesting... What is the speed like? Is it just the speed of a single SATA 6gbps? Or is it slowed down by the software?

[Beskamir]

As others have said you can't. Actually I think the only raid you could easily add drives to would be raid 1 otherwise you need a fancy raid card. 

 

Also I strongly advise against using raid 5 since basically,  (at least as I understand it) data corruption will make the raid reconstruction after a HDD failure unsuccessful which makes raid 5 basically useless. Get one more drive and use raid 6 instead.

[michrech]

Data corruption can hit any RAID level.  Besides, with RAID6, you further kill your write performance since each parity stripe has to be calculated separately.

 

As others have said you can't. Actually I think the only raid you could easily add drives to would be raid 1 otherwise you need a fancy raid card. 

 

Also I strongly advise against using raid 5 since basically,  (at least as I understand it) data corruption will make the raid reconstruction after a HDD failure unsuccessful which makes raid 5 basically useless. Get one more drive and use raid 6 instead.

[Beskamir]

Data corruption can hit any RAID level.  Besides, with RAID6, you further kill your write performance since each parity stripe has to be calculated separately.

This explains it best:

 

Although this video is not the first to point it out as I first found out about this form an article.

[Th3ArCh0n]

Data corruption can hit any RAID level.  Besides, with RAID6, you further kill your write performance since each parity stripe has to be calculated separately.

 

 

LOL this isn't getting any clearer for what i should do. I think i am set on 4 x 4tb drives with something like a core i3 and 8gb of ram (to run game servers on) but does the Z87 chipset support RAID 6? I am not seeing that anywhere