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What Is RAID
What Is RAID
What Is RAID
RAID stands for "Redundant Array of Inexpensive Drives." The concept of RAID was
first described and published in a paper entitled "A Case for Redundant Arrays of
Inexpensive Disks (RAID)" by Patterson, Gibson and Katz at the University of
California Berkeley in 1987. Funded by Digital Equipment Corporation (the creators
of OpenVMS), the research developed and became a standard in the computing
industry for applications requiring fast, reliable storage of large volumes of data.
Benefits of RAID
The basic idea of RAID was to combine multiple small, inexpensive disk drives into
an array of disk drives to provide speed, reliability, and increased storage capacity.
This array of drives appears to the computer as a single logical storage unit or drive.
In general, using RAID provides the following benefits:
Types of RAID
There are six types of array architectures for RAID (level RAID-0 through RAID-5).
The efficiency of how the total drive storage is used and benefits of RAID depend on
the scheme or level of RAID being used. A brief description for each level is listed
below:
1. RAID-0 or "Striping"
(Non-redundant)
Striping offers high I/O rates since read/write operations may be performed
simultaneously on multiple drives. Data is split and written across drives one
segment at a time, resulting in higher data throughput.
RAID-0 is the fastest and most efficient array type since no redundant
information is stored. In addition, it offers no fault-tolerance (which prevents
the failure of any disk in the array results in data loss).
2. RAID-1 or "Mirroring"
(Redundant)
RAID-1 is a good entry-level redundant system since only two drives are
required. The architecture provides redundancy by writing all data to two or
more drives simultaneously. If one drive fails, data can still be retrieved from
the other member of the RAID set. This is an optima choice for performance-
critical, fault-tolerant environments and the only choice for fault-tolerance if
no more than two drives are desired.
RAID-1 is the most expensive RAID option since one drive is used to store a
duplicate of the data. By doubling storage requirements, cost per megabyte is
high. On the other hand, RAID-1 offers the ultimate in reliability. It provides
faster on reads and slower on writes compared to a single drive, but if either
drive fails, no data is lost.
3. RAID-2
(Redundant)
RAID-2 is seldom used today since ECC is embedded in almost all modern
disk drives. It uses Hamming error correction codes and is intended for use
with drives which do not have built-in error detection. All SCSI drives support
built-in error detection, so this level is of little use when using SCSI drives.
4. RAID-3
(Redundant)
5. RAID-4
(Redundant)
RAID-4 offers no advantages over RAID-5 and does not support multiple
simultaneous write operations. The architecture stripes data at a block level
across several drives, with parity stored on one drive. The parity information
allows recovery from the failure of any single drive.
Performance for RAID-4 is very good for reads (the same as level 0). Writes,
especially small random writes, however, require that parity data be updated
each time. Because only one drive in the array stores redundant data, the cost
per megabyte of a level 4 array can be fairly low.
6. RAID-5
(Redundant)
RAID-5 is the best choice in multi-user environments which are not write
performance sensitive. However, at least three, and more typically five drives
are required for RAID-5 arrays. The architecture is similar to level 4, but
distributes parity among the drives. It employs a combination of striping and
parity checking. The use of parity checking provides redundancy without the
overhead of having to double disk capacity. This can speed small writes in
multiprocessing systems, since the parity disk does not become a bottleneck.
Simply put, parity checking involves determining whether each given block
has an odd or even value. These values are summed across the stripe sets to
obtain a parity value. With this parity value, the contents of a failed disk can
easily be determined and rebuilt on a spare drive.
The performance for reads tends to be considerably lower than a level 4 array
and the cost per megabyte is the same as for level 4.
Addonics' Innovative RAID Solution
To provide RAID-0 and RAID-1 users with even more flexibility and better product
performance, Addonics has developed the Addonics Combo RAID System. The
system combines the latest RAID technology with Serial ATA and allows users to
build a high availability or a high performance storage system. The Addonics Combo
RAID System is unique in the following ways:
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1. If a mirror set's disk controller fails, both members of the mirror set will
be inaccessible.
2. However, a second controller can be installed in the computer so that
each disk in the mirror set has its own controller.
3. In this way, the mirror set is protected against both controller failure and
disk failure.
4. Duplexing also reduces bus traffic and potentially improves
performance.
5. Disk duplexing is a hardware enhancement to a Windows NT mirror
set. No additional software configuration is necessary.
Understanding RAID 5 : Disk Striping with Parity
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When a member of a mirror set fails, the computer continues to operate, and
to gain access all data from the functional member.
1. An administrator can "break" the mirror set so that the failed member
can be replaced and the mirror set reestablished. Disk Administrator
can be used to:
o Break the mirror set relationship to isolate the remaining working
partition as a separate volume.
o Then, if necessary, assign to the exposed working member of
the mirror set the drive letter that was previously assigned to the
complete mirror set.
o Delete the failed partition.
2. Use free space on another disk to create a new mirror set relationship.
3. When the computer is restarted, the data from the good partition is
copied to the new member of the mirror set.
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Creating a fault tolerance boot disk for recovery of a mirrored boot or system
partition requires editing the Advanced RISC Computing (ARC) names in the
Boot.ini file.
The first part of the name identifies the adapter/disk controller as multi or
SCSI.
• Multi indicates a disk other than a SCSI disk, or a SCSI disk accessed
by the SCSI BIOS. For Windows NT Server, this could be a disk
supported by the Atdisk driver, the Abiodisk, or Cpqarray drivers.
• SCSI indicates a SCSI disk on which SCSI BIOS is not enabled.
Convention Description
multi/scsi Identifies the hardware adapter (either multi or SCSI)
(x) Ordinal number of the hardware adapter
disk (y) SCSI bus number (always O if multi)
rdisk (z) Ordinal number of the disk ( Ignored for SCSI controllers )
partition (a) Ordinal number of the partition
In both multi and SCSI conventions, partition numbers are assigned starting
with partition (1).
All non-extended partitions are assigned numbers first, followed by all logical
drives in extended partitions.
SCSI and multi ARC naming conventions are similar except that the SCSI
notation varies the disk ( ) parameter for successive disks on one controller,
while the multi format varies the rdisk ( ) parameter. ¡@
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