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181404
January 5th, 2013 08:00
Expanding a RAID 5 Virtual Partition on a Perc 6i
All,
I am running a Dell PowerEdge with the Perc 6/i card. When the server was setup, a RAID 5 was created of three 2TB hard drives. During the initial build, I discovered that I could not create a single 4TB RAID 5 array and be able to install windows. The solution I found was to create two separate partitions within the open manage software; the first partition is a 250GB boot "drive" that windows is installed on and the second is the Data "drive" where my data lives.
I now have run out of room on the Data "drive" and would like to expand the array. All of the instructions I find mention clicking on the dropdown and selecting reconfigure. I do not have that option.
Is there something I'm missing or is it because I created these virtual disk "partitions" that I'm now no longer to expand the array?
Thanks in advance,
PercNoob
DELL-Kenny K
685 Posts
1
January 8th, 2013 16:00
I did some further investigation and was able to find that the reason you are not able to get the reconfigure option is because the Raid array is "sliced" into two separate Virtual Disks. If the entire raid 5 was one single VD then you would be able to see the reconfigure option that you are looking for.
DELL-Kenny K
685 Posts
1
January 14th, 2013 14:00
The way you would have to do it would be to create two separate raid arrays. For example, something we see a lot is a 2 drive Raid 1 for the OS and then a use the remainder of the drives in a Raid 5 for the data. The way you have it now is, it sounds like you have single Raid array that is sliced into two separate VD's. I hope that helps you. Let me know if you need anything else.
DELL-Kenny K
685 Posts
0
January 7th, 2013 13:00
PercNoob2187,
The first thing I would recommend to do is to ensure that the Bios, Perc Driver and the Perc Firmware are all up to date. I have seen a number of times when the firmware that is installed is too old and will not give you the option on the VD to reconfigure it. Are you aware of what versions that you are currently running? Please let me know so we can find a resolution for you as soon as possible.
PercNoob2187
5 Posts
0
January 7th, 2013 20:00
Kenny,
BIOS Version is 2.7.0
PERC Firmware version is 6.3.1-0003
- PercNoob
DELL-Kenny K
685 Posts
0
January 8th, 2013 13:00
What model of server are you using with this Perc 6/I card?
PercNoob2187
5 Posts
0
January 8th, 2013 16:00
Poweredge 2900.
PercNoob2187
5 Posts
0
January 8th, 2013 18:00
So the solution is that I can't expand the array in the current configuration? If so, what configuration do I need to use to create an array on the PE2900 greater than 2TB that I can boot off of AND expand later?
-PercNoob
PercNoob2187
5 Posts
0
January 17th, 2013 07:00
Not the answer I was looking for, but indeed the answer.
Thanks!