I recently was forced to add a 36.4GB 10K Ultra3 drive to an existing array of 3x9GB drives (configured as RAID 5, 1 Logical Array and 2 Partitions (DOS and Novell 5x) with NetRAID-1M controller on a HP NetServer LC2000. I understand why my 36GB drive was truncated to 9GB. Therefore, I believe my best plan for the future is to swap out the 3 9GBs for two more 36GBs (one at a time, restriping each time?). Can this be done? And how exactly do I do this so that eventually I end up with striping across a 3x36GB array? Along the way, when will Novell recognize the actual physical size of the larger drives allowing me to assign the free space?
You have it exactly correct. Replace one 9GB with a 36GB, the controller will race of and rebuild, restriping the data. Once that is complete, takes a few hours depending on the data, you and replace the next and so on. Once all the drives in the array have been replaced and rebuilt, one at a time, the you will end up with your original partition and free space for the balance of the RAID Logical Drive. Now you can use the OS or software to put the free space to use in whatever manor is best for you.
