Mega Geek Question

Will this work? I've never tried it and the hardware is in Leeds so I can't get my paws on it, but I still need to write the design. It's for a backup to disk volume on an MSA20. We require a 1TB RAID1, then a backup to disk volume basically as big as we can get it, but still needs some resilience as the data may be staged here for a week or so before archiving to tape. The hardware is already bought so I have to use what I have, can't attach to an MSA1500 or anything like that. I have an MSA20 starter kit populated with 12 x 1TB disks. The MSA doesn't do 64bit LBA, does this matter if I'm doing the GPT and RAID5 at windows level?

MSA20 Configuration

Install HP Storage Manager from the MSA20 Starter Kit CD and configure the following RAID partitions on the MSA20.

Storage - Disks - RAID Level - LUN ID - LUN Size
MSA20 - 1-2 - RAID1 - 0 - 1TB

Rescan Disks in Disk Management and Initialise and format as follows.

Basic Disk
Disk1
Partition
Disk Type Basic
Partition Type Extended
Partition Size Use maximum available (~1TB)
Logical Drive
Drive Size Use maximum available (~1TB)
Drive Letter E:
File System NTFS
Allocation Unit Default
Volume Label Applications

Return to HP Storage Manager and configure the following RAID partitions on the MSA20. The MSA has a partition limit of 2TB so we will configure the remainder of the MSA for maximum capacity and use Windows to provide resilient RAID configuration.

Storage - Disks - RAID Level -LUN ID - LUN Size
MSA20 - 3-4 - RAID0 - 1 - 2TB
MSA20 - 5-6 - RAID0 - 2 - 2TB
MSA20 - 7-8 - RAID0 - 3 - 2TB
MSA20 - 9-10 - RAID0 - 4 - 2TB
MSA20 - 11-12 - RAID0 - 5 - 2TB

Rescan Disks in Disk Management and

· Initialise each disk as a dynamic disk
· Convert each volume to GPT
· Configure the following Dynamic Volume

Volume Type RAID5
Dynamic Disks Disks 2-6
Volume Size ~7.45TB
Drive Letter F:
File System NTFS
Allocation Unit Default
Volume Label Backup Volume

Can we have a thread about bunny rabbits instead?