upgrading RAID-0

[AntonKouzoub]

Hi,

Recently decided to upgrade disk space on one of our servers Dell PowerEdge 2600. and found out that the only thing we got there is RAID-0, thats right the system and Lotus mail server all are on raid-0. it consists of 3 68.24GB SCSI’s BUT for some stupid reason whoever did the config of RAID didn't use the whole 68.24G and used only 45.42 on each disk... so i got 22.83 unused space on each and can create lets say another Raid-0 with 68.48.

Now i really want and even have to migrate it to RAID-5. NOW the question is---> how to do it ? Just buy another SCSI of the same size, partition it and reconfigure it to RAID-5? or is it gonna be more difficult with a strange setup we got?

And another question. IS it safe to do the migration or is there a big chance of loosing data ?

the RAID controller is PERC 4/Di and everything is configured through it.

Please let me know what you guys think.

 

[technome]

You are out of luck on the raid migration with a 3 drive raid 0, see link below.

I would get a cheap IDE and use Acronis Server or equal to clone the present array to it, then configure the raid 0 to raid 5, then clone the raid 5 from the IDE clone. The obvious, backup first.

Percs are Lsilogic adapters, migration...

http://lsionline2.lsil.com/eSupport...uickSearch&bnewsession=false&selecttype=match

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[AntonKouzoub]

thats what i figured... already tried Acronis didnt have much luck with it though - said that backup would take 3 days, going to try GhostCast today see if that makes any difference

 

[wahnula]

Ghost 2003 (around $30 online) will work on Windows servers, and will do the task you require. I know this because I have done it, not RAID 0 but RAID 1 to RAID 5, did as technome said and used a cheapo IDE to ping-pong data. Cloned the RAID 1 array, booted from the clone to make sure it was good. Then built the RAID 5 array, formatted it, and cloned the IDE over to it no problem.

Tony

"Buy what you like, or you'll be forced to like what you buy"...me