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RAID migration and setup questions

T

Technit

n00b
Joined
Jan 22, 2012
Messages
14
I currently have a RAID 5 array over 7 sata hdd's on a rocketraid 2680 card (software raid). I just purchased a LSI 9265-8i (hardware raid) which Im hoping to migrate the array over to. Ultimately, I want to add an additional drive and run the array in RAID 6 on the LSI card, so would it be possible to do a straight swap of the drives from the rocketraid -> LSI without data loss, add an additional drive and then convert to RAID 6?

I also have an intel 520 ssd which is not in an array at the moment. Im considering also getting a LSI 9266-4i with cachecade and building a second array with the 520 and either 4 of the same 5,400rpm sata hdds used in the large array described above, or 4 of the new larger capacity veloicraptors which are soon to come out. I will run the sata hdd's in RAID 6 also, with the ssd for caching. Will partition this in half and move my more frequently accessed server data to one partition and use the other partition for general win7 use (gaming, media etc). Since the 9266-4i is 4 port, I will likely use a sas to sata breakoutcable to connect the sata hdd's to the raid card with a direct connection for the ssd. Probably a difficult question to answer, but Im worried that performance will not be great under general win7 use on this setup. What likely profrmance drop will I see in comparison to running just the intel 520 stand-alone? Would there be a huge benefit in going velociraptors over 5,400rpm hdds?
 
I want to say no, you will not be able to just move the drives to a new controller, and in this case you will change from software raid, to hardware raid, it will not be possible.
 
No you will have to create a new raid array on the new controller then move your data. There is generally no migration between raid controllers of different brands or at least I have never heard of this.
 
jeeze, had a feeling that it wouldnt be that simple...

Does anyone know if it is easy enough to transfer from JBOD to RAID 6 on a 9265-8i?

Thinking that I could get away with just buying 4 new sats hdds, plugging them into the LSI and running them as JBOD. After transferring everything over, I will transfer over enough drives to build a RAID 6 on the LSI which has the existing data.

Not sure if that will even work though....
 
yeah, unfortunately there (usually) isnt a way to migrate between controllers unless they use the same chipset / metadata (I believe)

I know my Dell PERC cards try to import "foreign" raid configs but I havent been successful importing configs from other vendors/chips. It did import another PERC version's raid config successfully though.

Right now Im migrating from an Adaptec 5805 to a JBOD (for ZFS) and this involves:
-moving all the data to some safe storage off the raid array
-destroying the raid array and using the member disks in a JBOD
-copying data back to KBOD disks from the Safe storage location in step 1.

Technit said:
Thinking that I could get away with just buying 4 new sats hdds, plugging them into the LSI and running them as JBOD. After transferring everything over, I will transfer over enough drives to build a RAID 6 on the LSI which has the existing data.

Not sure if that will even work though....
Click to expand...

Setting up a jbod on the LSI, transferring data to that, then moving the (now) empty drives onto the LSI and craiting a raid 6 out of them, transferring the data to the raid6 from the JBOD and expanding the raid 6 with drives from the JBOD as they become empty should work. Assuming the controller allows all that.
 
How much data do you have to copy?
Click to expand...
About 7TB, but I have some spare drives of the same type, so buying a few more 2TB drives will allow me to transfer over under a JBOD setup.

Assuming the controller allows all that.
Click to expand...
Yeah I guess thats want I want to find out. I will track down the manual for the controller/talk to the manufacturer and see what I can find out. Was hoping someone out there has had a similar experience and could give me an easy answer.
 
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