upgrading disks in RN 204

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Superray wrote:

 

so I can change Raid group 1 to X-raid? (which I think is preferable?) 

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Did you change to FlexRAID? 

Is there a green stripe on the X-RAID control on the volume page of the web ui? If not, can you click on the X-RAID control now (and enable it)?

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Superray wrote:

At this moment I'm having 4 disks in my RN204:

6Tb

3Tb

6Tb

8Tb

 

Raid group 1 consists of all 4 disks

Raid group 2 consists of the last 2 disks: 6Tb and 8Tb

 

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Normally you'd have disk 1, 2, and 4 in RAID group 2.  If you are using FlexRAID you should be able to add disk 1 to the group (expanding it to RAID-5).  That will increase your volume size by 3 TB.  Note with this mix of disks, you are losing 2 TB of space from the 8 TB disk (since it cannot be made redundant).

The way this is intended to work:

1. RAID group 1 should be RAID-5 4x3TB (using the first 3 TB of all 4 disks).
2. RAID group 2 should be RAID-5 3x3TB (using the next 3 TB of disks 1,2,4).

These two groups are then concatentated into a single 15 TB volume (13.6 TiB).

FWIW, X-RAID would also have these RAID groups, but the web ui wouldn't show them to you.

The above setup is optimal for redundant RAID (there is no way to get a larger redundant volume with this combination of disks).

But as I mentioned above, for some reason your system isn't optimal now - you are only getting 12 TB volume. Likely this due to something you did in the past (when you upgraded disk 1).

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Superray wrote:

 

I'd like to upgrade these disks to at least 3 14Tb disks and want to use the maximum amount of disk space available.

3x14TB would give you a 28 TB volume (~25.4 TiB), and leave one slot for future expansion.

If you continue to use your 8 TB drive, you could go with 

1. 2x14TB+8TB -> 22 TB volume (~20 TB)
2. 3x14TB+8TB -> 36 TB volume  (~32.7 TB)

All three of these options give you the maximum amount of disk space possible with RAID redundancy.

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Superray wrote:

 

- Is the easiest thing to do back-up the data and add the new 3 disks?

 

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If you want to go with three disks, then you will need to destroy your current volume, and rebuild the NAS. 

If you stick with 4 disks, it should be possible to expand the current volume. FWIW, if you were to expand your current volume, you'd end up with 4 RAID groups.  But it would be faster to destroy it, and start fresh.  So either way, I suggest starting over.  

In addition to restoring your data, you will need to reinstall any apps you have installed.  You can

1. back up the data
2. save the configuration files
3. do a factory reset with all the new disks in place
4. do the minimual NAS setup
5. re-install your apps
6. restore the configuration files
7. restore the data

It is important to do step 5 before step 6.