On Wed, Aug 12 at 12:11, Erik Trimble wrote:
Anyways, if I have a bunch of different size disks (1.5 TB, 1.0 TB,
500 GB, etc), can I put them all into one big array and have data
redundancy, etc? (RAID-Z?)
Yes. RAID-Z requires a minimum of 3 drives, and it can use
different drives. Depending on the size differences, it will do the
underlying layout in different ways. Depending on the number and
size of the disks, ZFS is likely the best bet for using the most
total space.
I don't believe this is correct, as far as I understand it, RAID-Z
will use the lowest-common-denominator for sizing the overall array.
You'll get parity across all three drives, but it won't alter parity
schemes for different regions of the disks.
Best bet for a "throw a bunch of random disks in it and don't worry
about it" would probably be a Drobo. Not smoking fast by any stretch,
but they appear to create an underlying parity scheme that can
maximize space without sacrificing the ability to survive any
single-disk failure.
Can I also expand that array at any time?
Not in the traditional "I'm adding 1 drive to a 3-disk RAIDZ to make
it a 4-disk RAIDZ". See the archives for how zpool expansion is
done.
This is correct. The smallest unit of easy pool expansion in ZFS is
adding vdev. To have redundancy, mirrored vdevs use the fewest
physical devices, and you can add mirrored pairs to your pool quite
easily. This is what we use on our server in this branch office.
--eric
--
Eric D. Mudama
[email protected]
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