NETGEAR Pioneer Edition manual Volume Management for X-RAID2, Adding a Second Disk for Redundancy

ReadyNAS Pro Pioneer Edition User Guide

Notice that the disk on Channel 4 that we did not configure is listed in the Available Disks section. We can add this disk as a hot spare by clicking Make hot spare.

Figure 2-18

We can also remove a disk from the volume by clicking Remove. The volume will still be available but in a non-redundant state. An additional disk failure would render this volume unusable.

Note: The Remove operation is a maintenance feature. NETGEAR recommends that you do not use it in a live environment. Its function is equivalent to hot-removing the

disk or simulating a disk failure.

The Locate option is a way to verify that a disk is correctly situated in the expected disk slot. Clicking Locate causes disk LED to blink for 15 seconds.

Volume Management for X-RAID2

Most people want to either add redundancy or expand their data volume. X-RAID2 enables this without the headaches usually associated with doing so.

Adding a Second Disk for Redundancy

A one-disk X-RAID2 device has no redundancy and provides no protection from a disk failure. However, if and when you feel the need for redundancy, simply add a new disk with at least the capacity of the first disk. Depending on the size of the disk, within a few hours, your data volume will be fully redundant. The process occurs in the background, so access to the ReadyNAS Pro Pioneer Edition is not interrupted.

Adding More Disks

At a certain point, you will want more capacity. With typical RAID volumes, you have to back up your data to another system (with enough space), add a new disk, reformat your RAID volume, and restore your data back to the new RAID volume.

2-16 Setting Up and Managing Your ReadyNAS Pro

v1.0, December 2008