z0de Posted January 21, 2006 Posted January 21, 2006 Hi, im conidering making a small server for my house so i can acess my data from anywhere in the house. I would like to use Raid but i would also want the option to add drives as i get them without having to reset the Raid. from what ive read this can be done in Raid 5. am i correct? or would it better to use sepret drives or a diffrent type of raid? and is there any special hardware i would need? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
red930 Posted January 21, 2006 Posted January 21, 2006 The SIL RAID controller on the DR boards does not support dynamic drive additions. To do what you are looking for you will have to buy a third party controller. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
VirtualFriction Posted January 21, 2006 Posted January 21, 2006 Correct me if I'm wrong, but you should be able to swap out drives and add a fourth disk to a Si3114 RAID 5 array created using your on-board Silicon Image raid controller: Silicon Image Product Brief PDF It does say hot-swap capable in there and I'm fairly sure I read reviews of people actually successfully ripping live disks out when reviewing the DRs RAID capabilities. Of course, this is still pretty limited. RAID 5 requires at least three disks and you can connect max 4 to the Si3114...so you can have three or four disks and also swap out existing disks if they break etc. You have hot-swap capability but with pretty limited parameters. That...or I'm just plain wrong : ) I have RAID 5 running on Win XP x64, but as I need the machine for work I'm a tad reluctant to do any "testing" on it right now : ) Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
red930 Posted January 21, 2006 Posted January 21, 2006 Hot Plug is part of the SATA spec. You will have to destroy and rebuild the array to add or subtract drives. Correct me if I'm wrong, but you should be able to swap out drives and add a fourth disk to a Si3114 RAID 5 array created using your on-board Silicon Image raid controller: Silicon Image Product Brief PDF It does say hot-swap capable in there and I'm fairly sure I read reviews of people actually successfully ripping live disks out when reviewing the DRs RAID capabilities. Of course, this is still pretty limited. RAID 5 requires at least three disks and you can connect max 4 to the Si3114...so you can have three or four disks and also swap out existing disks if they break etc. You have hot-swap capability but with pretty limited parameters. That...or I'm just plain wrong : ) I have RAID 5 running on Win XP x64, but as I need the machine for work I'm a tad reluctant to do any "testing" on it right now : ) Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
VirtualFriction Posted January 21, 2006 Posted January 21, 2006 Mmm...so what is the point of doing raid 5 at all then? If one of my three disks blow, I lose my data and have to rebuild my array from scratch? The whole point of raid 5 is that I CAN lose a drive and replace it without data loss. I'm not saying you're wrong, but if you're right I'm switching to the nF4 controller since data redundancy does not exist on the 3114 and the nF4 has better performance and SATA II. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
red930 Posted January 21, 2006 Posted January 21, 2006 For Clarity: The question was... I would like to use Raid but i would also want the option to add drives as i get them without having to reset the Raid. from what ive read this can be done in Raid 5. am i correct? or would it better to use sepret drives or a diffrent type of raid? and is there any special hardware i would need? NO! You can not increase or decrease the size of the array without rebuilding the array. RAID-5 will allow you to replace a failed drive. You must do this in the RAID BIOS. Since you're replacing a failed drive you are not changing the size of the array. The array will rebuild its self on the replacement drive. Mmm...so what is the point of doing raid 5 at all then? If one of my three disks blow, I lose my data and have to rebuild my array from scratch? The whole point of raid 5 is that I CAN lose a drive and replace it without data loss. I'm not saying you're wrong, but if you're right I'm switching to the nF4 controller since data redundancy does not exist on the 3114 and the nF4 has better performance and SATA II. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
z0de Posted January 22, 2006 Posted January 22, 2006 thanks, although its not the anwser i was hoping for . my plan was to get 2 maby 3 drives in a raid and add to it as i fill the space. My plan now is to not use raid and just add as i please. aside from not having and falut torlance is their a downside to this method? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
red930 Posted January 22, 2006 Posted January 22, 2006 I only use RAID-0 for my boot array. Everything else goes on drives that are kept offline for storage. I have multiple copies of everything on different drives for extreme fault tolerance. I buy large drives when they are on sale for ridiculously low prices. I recently got a Seagate 300GB 16MB 7,200RPM ATA-100 drive for $99.99 at Office Max after the rebate. I have a mess of Maxtor 160GB 8MB 7,200RPM ATA-133 drives from Staples for $59.00 each last year. thanks,although its not the anwser i was hoping for . my plan was to get 2 maby 3 drives in a raid and add to it as i fill the space. My plan now is to not use raid and just add as i please. aside from not having and falut torlance is their a downside to this method? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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