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20097
August 21st, 2006 15:00
Adding Additional Drives to PowerEdge 2600 RAID
Hi,
I have a couple of quick questions I'm hoping someone here might be able to assist me with. We are currently running a PowerEdge 2600 server with Win2K3 Server on it, and according to Computer Management: Disk Management, here is the layout:
Disk 0 - 39 MB (EISA Configuration) / C: NTFS 12 GB (System) / E: NTFS 4.38 GB
Disk 1 - D: 67.73 GB NTFS (Page File)
I believe Disk 1 is a RAID drive, although I know very little about RAID in general...I've been told it's RAID 5 but that might not be the case.
My questions are:
1) How can I make the System partition bigger, either by resizing the partition to take advantage of the 4.38 GB that is being taken up by the E: drive, or by putting a new drive in entirely (and imaging the old drive to the new one so that everything basically stays the same except now I have more space)?
2) How can I add more space to the D: drive (assuming it is RAID which I've been told - and how do I find out if it is RAID)? Can I purchase more HD's and add them to the RAID configuration? How do I do this? How do I know how many more drives I can add and what size they can be?
Any help is greatly appreciated! Thanks.
Marc
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warwizard55
720 Posts
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August 22nd, 2006 23:00
Hi Marc_idea
Ok first off you need to truly understand what hardware you have. A RAID 5 requires 3 or more physical disks, wheras a RAID 1 only needs 2 physical disks. A PE2600 is able to mount 6 or more drives, and there are several different options for RAID controllers as well as a non-RAID SCSI controller that could be controlling your drives. (in which case you could still have a RAID, only in software). look on support.dell.com, and review your as sold configuration, just put the service tag of the system in the tool.
Or you could post the tag and we community members could look it up as well.
Generally Dell will advise that you reinstall the O/S if you need to make the C: partition larger. your C:, D:, and E: could be on the same logical drive or on seperate logical drives, lots of unknowns here. some more details would be nice to have.
warwizard
marc_idea
6 Posts
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August 23rd, 2006 18:00
Warwizard,
First, thanks for the help! It is much appreciated!
The service tag # for the machine is (SEE BELOW FOR FURTHER INFORMATION)
With respect to my Question #1 - What other information do you need to know and where can I get that information? Did the original information I gave you that I pulled from the Computer Management: Disk Management screen not provide all the necessary information? Just let me know where to look and I'd be happy to get you the right information.
With respect to my Question #2 - Does knowing the service tag # (see above) give you all the information you need to answer this? What else do you need to know?
Also, it's very odd. Computer Management: Disk Management in the PowerEdge is reporting one logical drive with 67.73 GB of space, one logical drive with 12 GB of space, and one logical drive with 4.83 GB of space. However, according to the original system configuration, we should have about 144 GB of space (3 36 GB HD's and 2 18 GB HD's). What happened to the rest of our space? Any ideas?
Thanks again!
- Marc
FURTHER INFORMATION ON DELL POWEREDGE 2600 SERVER:
ORIGINAL SYSTEM CONFIGURATION:
Quantity Parts # Part Description
1 D3433 KIT, DOCUMENTATION ON COMPACT DISK, DOCUMENT OBJECT MODEL, V3.7, WORLD WIDE
1 6878T CORD, POWER, 125V, 10FT, SJT, UNSHIELDED
1 F0364 PRINTED WIRING ASSY, PLANAR (MOTHERBOARD), P2600, 533MHZ, V2
1 2M214 CARD (CIRCUIT), VOLTAGE REGULATOR MODULE, 12V, 9.1
1 U0621 PROCESSOR, 80532K, 2.4GHZ, 512K, 533, DECISION ONE
1 7N242 KEYBOARD, 104, UNITED STATES, SILITEK, LOW COST, MIDNIGHT GRAY
1 4D175 CORD, POWER, 125V, 10FT, 2TO1, SJT
1 6878T CORD, POWER, 125V, 10FT, SJT, UNSHIELDED
2 C1297 POWER SUPPLY, 730W, REDUNDANT
1 H2993 MOUSE, PERSONAL SYSTEM 2, 6P, SAW34, 2BTN, LOGITECH
1 6M140 ASSEMBLY, CABLE, POWER, PLN/BKPLN, 1X2
1 R0208 PRINTED WIRING ASSY, DAUGHTERBOARD, BACKPLANE, P2600, MICRO STAR INTERNATIONAL CO LTD
1 R0225 PRINTED WIRING ASSY, BACKPLANE, 1X6, S, P2600, MICRO STAR INTERNATIONAL CO LTD
1 2M214 CARD (CIRCUIT), VOLTAGE REGULATOR MODULE, 12V, 9.1
1 U0621 PROCESSOR, 80532K, 2.4GHZ, 512K, 533, DECISION ONE
4 9U174 DUAL IN-LINE MEMORY MODULE, 512, 266M, 64X72, 8K, 184, 1U
1 0R397 COMPACT DISK DRIVE, 650M, I, INTERNAL, THIRD HEIGHT, 24X, BLACK, TEAC
1 0K898 FLOPPY DRIVE, 1.44M, 3.5" FORM FACTOR, THIRD HEIGHT, NO BEZEL, TEAC
1 1W032 ASSEMBLY, CABLE, FLAT, INTRPSR-PLN
1 R0257 ASSEMBLY, PRINTED WIRING ASSY, INTERFACE, COMPACT DISK/FLOPPY DRIVE COMBO, MULTI-MEDIA, MICRO STAR INTERNATIONAL CO LTD
1 G5555 DUAL IN-LINE MEMORY MODULE, 128, 100, 16X72, 4K, 168, RAID ON MOTHER BOARD
1 J1055 PRINTED WIRING ASSY, INPUT/OUTPUT, P2600, RAID-KEY, MICRO STAR INTERNATIONAL CO LTD
1 5X524 ASSEMBLY, CABLE, FLEXIBLE, PLN/BKPLN, 2
2 6M139 ASSEMBLY, CABLE, INPUT/OUTPUT, SCSI (SMALL COMPUTER SYSTEMS INTERFACE), PLN/BKPLN
2 H4890 HARD DRIVE, 18GB, SCSI (SMALL COMPUTER SYSTEMS INTERFACE), U320, 15K, 80P, FJT
3 J4449 HARD DRIVE, 36GB, SCSI (SMALL COMPUTER SYSTEMS INTERFACE), U320, 15K, 80P, FJT
1 C0132 OVERPACK KIT, MICROSOFT WINDOWS SERVER 2003 STANDARD EDITION, ENGLAND/ENGLISH, WORLD WIDE
warwizard55
720 Posts
0
August 25th, 2006 00:00
Hi Mark_idea,
You have two logical drives, as configured from the factory.
The two 18 GB drives are in a RAID 1 with a usable capacity of 18 GB (defined as 1000*1000*1000 Bytes, note the O/S will report GB as 1024*1024*1024 bytes) this is LD0.
The three 36 GB drives are in a RAID 5 with 72 GB usable space, this is LD1.
Total usable space 90GB C: 12 GB and E: with 4 and a bit GB are on LD0, and D: is on LD1.
warwizard
marc_idea
6 Posts
0
August 25th, 2006 16:00
2) How can I add more space to the D: drive (assuming it is RAID which I've been told - and how do I find out if it is RAID)? Can I purchase more HD's and add them to the RAID configuration? How do I do this? How do I know how many more drives I can add and what size they can be?
warwizard55
720 Posts
0
August 31st, 2006 00:00
Hi Marc,
The reduction of available space is how a RAID array provides the ability to survive a failed drive, Data IS stored in the unavailable space in a RAID 1 it's a mirror of the other drive, in a RAID 5 the extra space is spread between all the drives in the RAID 5 and is parity data so that if any one drive is missing, the parity can be used to recreate the missing data set. All this is handled automatically by the H/W based RAID controller, the O/S only sees the logical drives that the controller reports, not the underlying physical disks.
Ok generally with Microsoft operating systems, making the C: drive larger is problematical. The method Microsoft advises is to back up the data and then do a reinstall and restore from backup.
The D: drive can be expanded quite easily, you purchase a drive carrier (and 4 screws) and another drive of the same or larger size, remove the blank carrier install the new drive, then open up the RAID utility and reconfigure the RAID 5 to be a larger raid 5.
You should contact Dell support to make sure you get the correct P/N carrier and screws, they'll transfer you to sales with the info you need. They can also help you determine which RAID utility you have and can give you step by step instructions.
warwizard