RAID 1 EXPANSION

[w7zr]

I currently have a RAID 1 system running with 2 110G hard drives. I would like to expand the system's storage capabilities by changing the 110G drives to something larger. However, I do not want to have to install everything again. Is this possible by changing one drive at a time or some other scheme?

 

[LawnBoy]

This is a little tricky but it can be done. Make good backups first.

(1)Remove one of the Raid disks and let the controller put the array into a degraded mode.
(2)Put your larger disk in place of the removed one. Let the RAID rebuild as normal. (it will only partition 110 GB of the drive, but don't worry)
(3)Rinse and repeat for the other drive.
(4)You will now have 110 GB partitioned on your larger drives. Use a partition resizing utility, such as Partition Magic, to expand a partition to include the additional space.

Good luck.

 

[kmcferrin]

If you have connections available on the RAID controller, just plug in the new drives and make a second array. Then use Ghost/TrueImage/whatever to clone the first array to the second array.

 

[wahnula]

...or, you can clone the array to a single external/internal drive, make sure the clone is good by booting from it(if boot disk, if not, verify the files). Then set up the new RAID I array, then recover from the image.

Tony