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4.4.1 Partition - Create a Partition |
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This menu item leads to a submenu which lists the five types of partitions you can create: |
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Standard |
A partition within a single disk |
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Span |
A partition spanning multiple disks. |
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Stripe |
A striped (RAID 0) partition across multiple disks. |
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RAID 5 |
A RAID 5 partition across multiple disks. |
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Mirror |
A mirrored (RAID 1) partition across two disks. |
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Only the last two types (RAID 5 and RAID 1) are inherently fault tolerant partitions. Only when the first three partition types are applied to disks that are already part of Disk Level fault tolerant sets, will they inherit that fault tolerance.
To create a partition, first use the mouse to select an area of free space from each of the disks that will comprise the partition, then go to the menu and choose the partition type. Note that the partition must be formatted before it can be used. We'll look at each of the five partition types individually. |
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4.4.1.1 Create a Standard Partition |
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A Standard Partition is a normal Windows NT partition that is entirely contained within a single disk, and is not fault tolerant |
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To create a Standard Partition
Use the mouse to select an area of free space on the right hand side of a disk.
From the Partition menu, choose Create a Partition, then select Standard from the submenu. RAIDZONE displays the minimum and maximum sizes allowed for the new Standard Partition.
In the dialog box, type the size of the Standard Partition that you want to create.
Choose the OK button. The new Standard Partition will now be displayed in the location you selected. Note that the partition must be formatted before it can be used |
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4.4.1.2 Create a Span Partition |
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A Span Partition spans two or more disks, and contains no fault tolerance or performance enhancement at the partition level. It is commonly used to combine leftover pieces from multiple disks into a |
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single large partition. If all the disks used to create a Span Partition are members of Disk Level Fault Tolerant Sets,then the data on the Span Partition will inherit the fault tolerance and performance enhancement from the disk level. One common configuration is creating a Span Partition on top of multiple Disk Level Mirror sets.
To create a Span Partition
Use the mouse to select the areas of free space on the right hand side of each disk you want in the set. To include more than one disk, hold down the Ctrl or Shift key while selecting.
From the Partition menu, choose Create a Partition, then select Span from the submenu. RAIDZONE displays the minimum and maximum sizes allowed for the new Span Partition.
In the dialog box, type the size of the partition that you want to create.
Choose the OK button. The new Span Partition will now be displayed in the locations you selected. Note that the partition must be formatted before it can be used. |
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4.4.1.3 Create a Stripe Partition |
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A StripePartition is a RAID 0 partition that stripes data across two or more disk. This RAID scheme achieves the maximum in parallelism and the best performance, but provides no data redundancy. |
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A StripePartition is typically used to hold data that must be accessed as quickly as possible, but does not require fault tolerance. Some examples include disk caches, video capture data, data warehouse applications, and temporary file storage.
If all the disks used to create a StripePartition are members of Disk Level Fault Tolerant Sets, then the data on the StripePartition inherits the fault tolerance and performance enhancement from the disk level. It is common to create a StripePartition on top of multiple Disk Level Mirrors, which is known as Striped Mirrors or RAID 10.
To create a Stripe Partition
Use the mouse to select the areas of free space on the right hand side of each disk you want in the set. To include more than one disk, hold down the Ctrl or Shift key while selecting.
From the Partition menu, choose Create a Partition, then select Stripe from the submenu.RAIDZONE displays the minimum and maximum sizes allowed for the new Stripe Partition.
In the dialog box, type the size of the partition that you want to create.
Choose the OK button. The new Stripe Partition will now be displayed in the locations you selected. Note that the partition must be formatted before it can be used. |
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4.4.1.4 Create a RAID5 Partition |
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A RAID 5 Partition stripes data and redundant parity information across three or more disks. It provides both fault tolerance against a single disk failure, and improved read performance. Write operations, |
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however, incur a performance penalty because extra reads and writes must be performed to calculate and update the parity data.
A RAID 5 Partition is used to store data that is read more often than it is written, and that requires redundancy in the event of a disk failure. RAID 5 gives the lowest cost per megabyte of any redundant storage method.
Because a RAID 5 partition contains fault tolerance and performance enhancements, it is NOT normally combined with Disk Level Logical Sets.
To create a RAID 5 Partition:
Use the mouse to select the areas of free space on the right hand side of each disk you want in the set. To include more than one disk, hold down the Ctrl or Shift key while selecting.
From the Partition menu, choose Create a Partition, then select RAID 5 from the submenu. RAIDZONE displays the minimum and maximum sizes allowed for the new RAID 5 Partition.
In the dialog box, type the size of the partition that you want to create.
Choose the OK button. The new RAID 5 Partition will now be displayed in the locations you selected. Initialization of the parity data will begin immediately, and may take some time depending on the size of the partition. Note that the partition must be formatted before it can be used. |
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4.4.1.5 Create a Mirror Partition |
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MirrorPartitions behave very similarly to Disk Level Mirroring, except that the mirroring is performed at the partition level. This allows part of a disk to be mirrored, while another part is used for some other RAID type. |
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Just like Disk Level Mirroring, all data on a Mirror Partition is duplicated on a pair of disks. Mirroring is also known as RAID 1, and provides complete data redundancy as well as improved read performance.
A Mirror Partition is rarely used under RAIDZONE. It is hard to think of a practical situation that would not be better served by Disk Level Mirroring. Because a Mirror Partition contains fault tolerance and performance enhancements, it is not normally combined with Disk Level Logical sets.
To create a Mirror Partition:
Use the mouse to select the areas of free space on the right hand side of each disk you want in the set. To include more than one disk, hold down the Ctrl or Shift key while selecting.
From the Partition menu, choose Create a Partition, then select Mirror from the submenu. RAIDZONE displays the minimum and maximum sizes allowed for the new Mirror Partition. The maximum size permitted is the smaller free space partition size of the two disks.
In the dialog box, type the size of the partition that you want to create.
Choose the OK button. The new Mirror Partition will now be displayed in the locations you selected. Initialization will begin immediately, and may take some time depending on the size of the partition. Note that the partition must be formatted before it can be used. |
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