Novell 6 and Raid 5

[ataylor44]

We have an HP proliant with a hardware raid 5 running Novell 6 sp5 Groupwise 6.5 and we are running out of disk space.Was wondering if with a raid 5 if we could buy bigger drives and one by one switch them out and change the size in netware.Just a thought.Have done the purge and trash cleanup in groupwise.Thanks

 

[marvhuffaker]

That strategy can and will work, but it is also pretty dangerous. Make sure the RAID is completely rebuilt and fully functional before removing the next one. Also, you'll have to to into the RAID config tools and expand the array there, then allocate the space to netware.

 

[terry712]

that's no problem.
i've done this lots of times -
as marv says make sure it is rebuild fully before swapping next disk

i always like to check with cpqonlin first

you will need this at the end anyway to expand the array

 

[ataylor44]

I will be purchasing the drives soon but thanks for all the help.

 

[9iron]

Wow! I was just about to post this exact question with all the same info! We've got a Proliant ML350 here with 4 72GB drives. My GroupWise is on Vol1, and I'm running out of space fast. I'd love to just throw bigger drives in and triple the size of my Vol1, but I've never done this before and I obviously want to keep my data safe. I'm not even sure what type of RAID array I've got. How can I tell?

 

[marvhuffaker]

You need to install the Compaq Proliant Support Pack (PSP), which will update all the drivers and put some utilities on the server. You can run a tool from the command line called "CPQONLIN" to view the configuration and status of your arrays right from the NetWare server. It will also show you the models of array controller that you have.

 

[goombawaho]

Guys - a big caution here. If you're not familiar with your RAID controller/drives/Raid type, etc., you might not want to take a chance. This is the type of thing that if you don't know a huge amount and it goes well - no problem.

BUT... If you don't know a huge amount about your hardware and your environment and things don't go well - disaster.

 

[9iron]

While battling my low space problem, I discovered that my four 72GB drives are set up as follows:

3 for the RAID 5 array
1 spare

The CPQONLIN utility tells me that my array is 138GB, but when I check the volume sizes in Windows Explorer, it reports:

SYS: 10GB
VOL1: 75GB
VOL2: 26GB

That only totals out to be 111GB. Where's my other 27GB???
I could really use this space right about now!

 

[marvhuffaker]

You probably have a 2GB DOS partition. It's also possible you have unpartitioned space. If that is the case, you should be able to go into NSSMU.NLM and expand the NSS Partition/Pool onto the free space. It's pretty straightforward.

It's also possible that you have quotas on the volumes, which will cause the sizes to report differently. Go into NSSMU and check there to see what the actual values are.