Installing RAID 1

[Mikkel Jørgensen]

Hi,

In our company we have a plain standard ML110 G5 with only one harddrive of 160 GB.

Our wish now is to replace this single harddrive with two new harddrives of 500 GB and connect these two harddrives in a RAID 1 setup.

What I would like from You is some guidelines on how to do this upgrade without the need of reinstalling the OS and software from scratch.

Thanks!

[Jurgen Verhelst]

Hi Michael,

I don't know of any way to create the raid with the installation unchanged. I tried that a couple of times and although you can probably create the RAID and let the controller copy the content from the original disk to the new one, Windows always BSOD because it cna't hande the storage controller change.

Enough from what didn't work:

You could create a image based backup with Symantec Backup Exec System Recovery to a USB Hard disk. Then add the second drive and create the array which will destroy your original logical drive. Then restore your backup using 'restore anywhere option' to get your installation back running gain. The restore anywhere option will ask or install the storage drivers for you so windows will happely run. more info http://h18004.www1.hp.com/products/quickspecs/13013_div/13013_div.HTML and www.symantec.com BESR

I said 'you could...' because we always ask the customer to spend the couple of hundred â ¬ to invest in a Smart Array adapter from HP. It will handle the array better and report if one of the drives fail via email and if you have a hot plug bay, indicate the failing drive with a LED. It will also make your array faster then with embedded SATA RAID controllers. it seems the Smart Array E200 is compatible

Smart Array E200 Controller

HP Smart Array E200/128 BBWC Controller
NOTE: Supports RAID 0,1,1+0, 5/BBWC.
NOTE: Please see the QuickSpecs for Technical Specifications and additional information:
http://h18000.www1.hp.com/products/quickspecs/12460_div/12460_div.html
(Smart Array E200 Controller)

Part number 411508-B21

please check the url's.

Let me know if you need any more help, jurgen

[Jurgen Verhelst]

You can use the same procedure when you decide to install the E200 Smart Array adapter.

Backup your server with your normal routine
Install a image based software (Symantec Backup Exec System recovery (60 day trail available)
Reboot and attach a extranal USB or network disk.
Make sure nobody is working on the server and that mailflow is stopped(to prevent data change)
Create the backup.
Shut down the server
Plug in the e200 and your second disk and attach the cables to the e200
Boot and configure the Smart Array Controller with the two disks and create an array (it will create the logical drive as well)
Boot from the BESR recovery disk and recover the server from the usb or network location using the restore anywhere option
Let it reboot and provide the storage drivers if neccesarry (normally the symantec disk knwows the e200).
See your server boot in to windows and smile.

you might need to reenter you IP config

[TTr]

Is the 160GB disk now connected to a raid controller? If yes there might be a way, otherwise you have to use a "save and reload" method. Also depending on the i/o adapter and raid controller you may be able to do disk copying from the 160GB disk to the new raid1 disks.