Topic: Large raided file server

[Bluephoton]

I have been using SME with 2 X 500mb IDE drives in Raid 1 as a file server for a couple of years now and I really like it.  Its bullet proof and just runs, never needing attention.  The only problem is it's small capacity - I always have to delete stuff to make room or back it up to DVDs that I lose or can't reference because I am no good a cataloging or any type of organization.

What I would really like is a large capacity server that could store everything I want for the next 2-3 years.

I would like to have 4 (or 6 if possible) X 2TB hard drives in 2 (or 3) banks of Raid 1 mirrored pairs.

Is there a way of doing this with SME or other linux distro?

[byte]

SME Server can handle the following:

1 hard drive is automatically set up half of a RAID1 mirror, ready to accept a second drive. Systems with 2 drives are set up as RAID 1

3-5 drives as RAID5

and 6+ Drives as RAID6

You have the option to specify no spare otherwise a spare will be set up respectively.

[Bluephoton]

Yes I did read that and I guess what you are saying is that's all you can do. 

It seems like quite a limitation when you can stuff a desktop with at least 6 - 2TB drives but as soon as you introduce some form of Raid data protection your whole storage system is limited to the size of one drive.

I guess if I want 4 TB I have to set up 2 server boxes and put 2 drives in each or am I not understanding Raid 5 and 6?  How much storage would I get out of 3 - 2TB drives in Raid 5?

[byte]

It seems like quite a limitation when you can stuff a desktop with at least 6 - 2TB drives but as soon as you introduce some form of Raid data protection your whole storage system is limited to the size of one drive.

No, its standard raid design.

I guess if I want 4 TB I have to set up 2 server boxes and put 2 drives in each.

Why would you want to do that ? Your probably more interested in HA then.

[Bluephoton]

No, its standard raid design.

Why would you want to do that ? Your probably more interested in HA then.

What is HA?

[idp_qbn]

Read That Fine Manual - RAID 5 is not the same as RAID 1.
With RAID 5, the capacity is roughly (the number of disks) - 1
So, if you had 5 x 2Tb disks, you would have approx 8 TB of storage.
([5-1=4] - at 2Tb each = 8Tb)
Now, how would you back that up?

Cheers
Ian

[Bluephoton]

Thanks for the clarification - I misunderstood the capacity of raid 5.

[byte]

What is HA?

High Availability