RAID 5 array capacity upgrade... Procedure questions

[Magicthyse]

A few weeks ago, I asked whether the only way to upgrade an array (HP LC2000, Netraid controller, 4 x 9Gb -> 4 x 32Gb) was to backup, restore and rebuild.

The consensus seemed to be that this is indeed the only way.

Can anyone out there talk about the procedures they went through to rebuild an array this way? What problems did you have in backup/rebuild? Is MS Backup in Windows 2000 Server sufficient or will it not back up critical files?

 

[bozo1]

Are you sure you can't expand it? Compaq's RAID controllers allow you to do it so I'd be surprised if HP's didn't as well. It's a long procedure but it works - you yank a 9-gig drive, put in a 32-gig one. Once the array rebuilds itself, yank another one, and so forth. When it's all done, you can create another volume in the extra space or you can use the server version of partition magic to merge it into an existing volume if you want.

The other way is to do a backup, W2K backup is fine but make sure it is backing up the registry also, yank your drives, put in the new ones, built your array, reinstall a minimal version of W2K and do a complete restore of your backup. I highly recommend doing 2 backups on 2 sets of media in case you end up with a bad tape.

If you aren't comfortable with the restore procedure, just test doing it on another machine.

 

[JustinLerner]

Why can't you just create a second array of 4 disks (RAID 5), format them and then mirror everything from array 1 to array 2? Mirroring works fine in software via 2000/XP, but I would bet it works even via hardware on your controller.

I'm not familiar with the controller and have never attempted any sort of procedure, so this is my guess.

 

[JustinLerner]

You can't mirror either a Disk Manager (software) array (0 or 5) or a spanned volume created/maintained in 2000/XP. I don't know if this applies to hardware arrays.

I suppose you could always 'image' the 'volume' presented by the first array onto the new array. I wonder if you can create a second RAID 5 array by disabling 'virtual sizing' and setting your new array manually (reboot).