Repalce existing hard drives with raid1

[all4it]

I have a Dell Dimension 8400 Pentium 4 3.00GHz with 2 GB of memory that currently has raid1 enabled with 2 149 GB disk drives. I will have to replace the hard drives within the next month because the available storage is down to 27 gb. We use the PC for imaging and each week we add 2000 tiff documents. What is the best way to replace the hard drives with 500 gb drives? The system has a ATA Raid Controller with Intel Application Accelerator. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

 

[wolluf]

When you say replace - do you mean you want to clone the current drives to the new ones so system will look the same, but with more space? Does the system only support one RAID1 set?

If so, one suggestion:-

Connect external (USB) drive.

Boot from something like Acronis True Image bootable CD (I think it can see RAID arrays) or perhaps a BartPE disk with Ghost, would need array drivers on a floppy to supply after pressing F6.

Create image of the current system on the external drive.

Remove the current drives, install the new ones and create new array.

Boot again from Acronis (or equivalent) with external drive attached and restore the image to new array.

Should be back in business, with new 500GB RAID.

 

[wahnula]

If you have a spare IDE port try booting from it using one of the array drives (remove the other drive for safekeeping, label the drives). If you can boot to it as a single IDE drive (change BIOS boot settings) and the system operates normally then you can clone it to your new array over the PCI bus, much faster than USB. If it doesn't boot no worries as you can connect it back to your original RAID 1 array and it will rebuild if necessary. No need for another drive w/ this method and it's safe.

Tony

 

[kmcferrin]

If you have spare connectors for your RAID controller, you could install the new disks, set up the RAID1 on them, then clone the existing install to the new disks, then remove the old disks. That would be easy.

Alternatively, if your RAID controller supports RAID 0+1 or 1+0 (however you want to call it), you can add two more disks of the same size as your current disks and then possibly convert it to a RAID 0+1. You'll get more space and also higher performance that route. (Link describing how to do this:

http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/05/03/opting_for_raid_level_migration/page5.html)

The only question is how many connections your have on the mainboard.

 

[all4it]

Thanks, I have to increase my storage so I want to install the 500 GB hard drives and replicate the existing data to the new hard drives.

 

[wahnula]

All4it,

there is one crucial piece of datum missing. Are the current drives IDE (ribbon connector) or SATA (small red cable)? It might be really easy if we know this answer.

This MB has (2) IDE ports and (4) SATA ports. Are you using any of them for RAID or is the RAID from an add-on card? This could be really simple.

Tony

 

[all4it]

Tony, sorry it took so long, it has SATA drives and there are two additional ports on the MB.

Roy

 

[wahnula]

Chances are the port on the MB is enabled by default, or you may have to go into BIOS to enable it. First, do a full backup. I would disconnect both RAID1 drives, label "1" and "2". Connect drive #1 to the MB SATA port, place it 1st in boot sequence and see what happens. It might be 100% fine. Double-check all functions. Then, connect the two new drives to the RAID controller, create the array, initialize and format in Disk Management (do not assign a drive letter), clone from single drive to the new RAID 1 array. If anything fails you will still have drive #2 intact, so you can rebuild your old RAID 1 array and develop a different plan.

There are free cloning apps available but I have had the most success w/ Ghost 2003, it works w/ server OSes too. I have had problems with Acronis True Image. It's a Ford/Chevy thing. Both have their advocates.

Tony

 

[all4it]

Thanks everybody, I will attempt this change out after I take a few days off.

Have a good day.


Roy