Smart Array Controller 4200

[Ayman Altounji]

Have just built a compaq ml370 for a customer with 3 x 36gb drives on 4200 array controller in raid 5 config plus 1 x 36Gb online spare.
Now, after migrating all the data, they want me to make the online spare part of the array.
The one logical drive that had been created from the 3 x 36Gb disks (Raid 5) of 72Gb has currently three partitions.
4gb for win2000 system (c) 4Gb for logs (D) and remainder(E)

What are the pitfalls of expanding the array - indeed can it be done at all ?.
Can this be done using the ACU from smartstart 5?
What will this do to my exisiting windows 2000 partitioning
will windows 2000 still exist ???HELP !!!

Noone seems to know for sure and i cannot get an answer from compaq

[Ayman Altounji]

Hopefully, you have created your disks initially as "Dynamic" under windows 2000 disk manager (this needs to be the case if you want to extend a volume into free space which will be created by expanding array). Note: search on keyword "extend" under Windows 2000 Disk Manager Help screen for rules on extending volumes Simple vs Dynamic. If you have, you should be able to unassign your online hot-spare drive from the existing array. Then, expand the array with the drive that used to be your spare, but, will now show up in the array configuration utility as an available drive to be added. After successfully expanding the array, it will create a second logical drive in the array (do not be alarmed by this. you can have up to 32 logical drives per array). Now when you open up disk manager, you will notice another physical disk which will show up as free space. You should be able to allocate the free space by creating volume sets under disk manager. Usually, all you have to do is highlight whatever drive letter you want to make bigger (D) or (E) and hold down the ctrl key while right clicking on one or more areas of free space. You should get a pop-up box, with the volume extention as an option, at this time you simply assign how much of the free space you want to allocate to this volume. Repeat this procedure for other drive letters.