DL360 - Increasing disk size of a mirrored set with a bigger disk.

[Tom Mayer]

Server is a Proliant DL360 w/hot pluggable 18.2 drives. Using a Smart Array controller
RAID-1+0 Mirror

Can anyone tell me how to replace my two 18.2 gig mirrored disk drives with two new 72.8 gig drives and with out losing my data?

I understand I will need to break the mirror on the smaller drives and and then rebuild it with one of the new larger drives and then go through the process again with the second new larger drive. But I am not sure what I need to do to insure the mirror does not retain its original "small" size. I need it to expand to the maximum size it can using the larger drives.

Thanks Ahead for your help
tom

[e4services]

Tom,

While expanding the array is as simple as failing, removing and replacing one drive at a time, allowing the controller to rebuild the array BEFORE you replace the other disk, after the second drive has been incorporated into the array by the controller, the array will have been â expandedâ with out losing your data. Unfortunately the OS Logical Drives (or Partitions, what you want to â extendâ ) will not be effected, only the RAID controllers Logical Drive has been made larger, you will simply end up with additional â Free Spaceâ on the RAID logical drive.
This is a common misconception, but it is what the novice user is expecting from the process. I cannot count the number of times we have had customers purchase disks expecting the controller to take care of this. The concept that is lost is the use of the terms "Logical Drive", â Expandâ and â Extendâ .
The RAID controller produces a Logical Drive, a created drive from a set of Physical Drives. To the rest of the computer, including the OS, there is a single physical hard drive. The term "Logical Drive" is also use for a formated partition created by the OS to resemble a seperate HD. When you combine the 2 together, you have 2 levels of Logical Drives.
But for most users, it is the OS level, there "C:" that they want to "Extend". This logical drive or partition is controller by the OS and therefore can only be changed by the OS, and therefore is OS dependent. Microsoft has address this in Windows 2000 and above with abilities and tools with in the OS. Windows NT had limits to the boot partition size, most installs â C:â . There are partition mangement tools, we offer one to our customers, to manipulate the installed partition sizes and 2000 and above can extend logical drive (â C:â ) across partitions. So what you can