Help

[Doliveira]

ML 350 G5

I intend to create a raid 0 of the boot disk, by hardware. The Windows 2003 server is already installed.

Can I do it without destroing the disk data

Thnaks in advance

[Bijl]

Hi Doliveira,
It is my understanding that that when creating hardware RAID the controller would write the RIS tables information on the drives. Because of this the information that was originally on the disk will no longer be accessible. The information continues to be there before it gets over written but the drive is not told where to find it. I would back the data up and start over.

Regards,

[Doliveira]

Hi

Correct if I am wrong.

I should not create the Raid 0 with the Boot Disk. The information in it will be not avaiable. The server will not boot.

And if I create by software (Windows 2003 server) ?

Thanks in advance

[Bijl]

Correct, if you create the RAID using the hardware you will have to install the OS once again. As far creating a software RAID, I believe you are able to keep the info (won´t have to re-install the OS for sure) but that would mean that you would have to purchase software to do it correctly. Your server already comes equipped with what you need to be able to create a hardware RAID.

I found this in www.raidrecoveryguide.com

Pros and cons

Software RAID is more flexible than Hardware RAID. Software RAID is also considerably less expensive. On the other hand, a Software RAID system requires more CPU cycles and power to run well than a comparable Hardware RAID System. Also, because Software RAID operates on a partition by partition basis where a number of individual disk partitions are grouped together as opposed to Hardware RAID systems which generally group together entire disk drives, Software RAID tends be slightly more complicated to run. This is because it has more available configurations and options. An added benefit to the slightly more expensive Hardware RAID solution is that many Hardware RAID systems incorporate features that are specialized for optimizing the performance of your system.

Hope it helps but keep in mind that this is just the opinion of a hardware kind of guy

Regards,

[Doliveira]

Hi
You are correct.
But I can do a mirror of a boot disk using the Disk Manager of the Windows 2003 server (If you want consult article (Q323432) in Microsoft.)
And I agree with the benefits of the raid by hardware.
The scenario is:
Our new costumer has a ML 350 G5 with a Smart Array E200i Controller on system Board, with 5 SAS Disks connected ( but no array is created).
The Hp survey running is reporting imminent failure in 3 disks. One of them is the (boot disc (c:). The server has one year and those 3 disks will be substituted. (Guarantee on Site)
What I thought to implement was:
With that application (F8, bla, blaâ ¦.) on the serverâ s boot, I mirror the boot disk with one new Disk. Then I would break the mirror and put the server booting with the new disk. But if is not possible remains to mirror the system and boot partition (RAID1) in Windows Server 2003

Sorry for my bad english

[Jimmy Vance]

An array of some type has to be created to use the disks. From your description it sounds as though they created 5 seperate RAID 0 arrays, so the have Just a Bunch Of Disks (JBOD). One option is to add another disk to the system (there should be at least one open slot) and use the Array Configuration Utility (ACU) to migrate the drive that is considered "Drive C:" from RAID 0 to RAID 1. The Smart Array Controller configuration guide explains how to do this on page 36

http://bizsupport2.austin.hp.com/bc/docs/support/SupportManual/c00729544/c00729544.pdf

As the guide suggeste, backup your data first in case something goes wrong during the migration process.

[Doliveira]

Hi

I have one free slot.
But with those process i do not lose the informatioc em C?
The Server will boot with no problems?

Best Regards

[Jimmy Vance]

Using the migration process in the guide you should not lose any data. As the guide suggests backup you data before you start just in case something fails during the process.

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