Apple NMB-003 manual RAID Overview, Setting Up the Xserve RAID System

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RAID Overview

Xserve RAID provides a powerful, versatile, and cost-effective answer to the growing storage requirements of graphics and video production companies, email and web services, educational file sharing, and other businesses.

You can configure the Xserve RAID system in a variety of ways, using up to 14 drives in two groups of 7 drives. Each group has a separate RAID controller. The Xserve RAID hardware can support RAID levels 0, 1, 0+1, 3, or 5, and you can use the RAID software in Mac OS X to create the hybrid levels 10, 30, or 50. See “About RAID Storage” on page 58 for descriptions of RAID levels and storage methods.

Setting Up the Xserve RAID System

This manual includes an explanation of the RAID technology and instructions for configuring your Xserve RAID system. The setup procedure involves these steps:

minstalling the hardware and setting up network and host connections

mdetermining the RAID levels, the number of RAID sets, and the configurations for your storage needs

minstalling or rearranging Apple Drive Modules in the Xserve RAID system for the configuration you’ve selected, if necessary

mconfiguring RAID sets using the RAID Admin software supplied with the system (and possibly also using Disk Utility in Mac OS X to augment sets)

mformatting the Xserve RAID sets with a file system on the host system using Disk Utility

Installing Xserve RAID Hardware and Software

Follow the instructions in Chapter 3, “Mounting Xserve RAID in a Rack,” on page 23 and Chapter 4, “Connecting Xserve RAID to a Host System and a Network,” on page 37 for hardware installation and connections. These include

minstalling the system in a rack or cabinet

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