Adding additional drives to an array to increase total storage

[dajonx135]

Hi,

I have an AF5000 with 12 drives (out of 24 drive bays) and I'm looking to purchase additional drives.  I was wondering if I could purchase a small set of drives (for example, four additional drives to a total of 16 drives out of 24 drive bays) to increase my total storage pool size.  

Thank you.

[Nick_Dyer · Accepted solution]

Hello!

The enterprise AFAs supports RAID sets in packs of 24 drives, for a total of 48 drives per 4u enclosure. Therefore, you must have 24 drives populated today.

It is not possible for you to insert another 4 drives, you must buy an upgrade drive pack of 24x SSDs from HPE Nimble Storage in order to expand your capacity. They must all be the same size drives (as we create another Triple+ Parity RAID schema on those drives) - but they do not have to be the same size as the drives you already have. (ie you could have 24x 1.92TB today, and you could add in a further 24x 3.84TB drives if you like).

[dajonx135]

Ah, yes!  You are correct about 24/48 drives!  My apologies.  

Thank you for the clarification.  I thought it was possible to add drives as you go sort of thing.