New to Servers

  • Thread starter Thread starter Ashley Hathaway
  • Start date Start date
Yes Ash...you're on the right track. A hardware based RAID controller takes a bunch of disks...organized them into whatever RAID type you create...and it presents that RAID volume as a single physical disk to the operating system getting installed on it.

Here is a real brief of the common RAIDs....while I'm waiting for a reboot doing some remote work...you can Google the rest but I'll just give a real brief overview.

RAID 0 is a minimum of 2 disks...striped, max performance...but no redundancy. If 1 disk fails..the whole thing is dead. You do not use this in servers. Capacity is 200% of 1 drive.
RAID 1 is a pair of disks, mirroring each other. Often used in servers for the host OS..and sometimes used in servers for smaller needs as the second volume..the data volume. So often on smaller servers you'll see a pair of small disks RAID 1 for the C drive, and a pair of larger disks RAID 1 for the data storage. Capacity is 100% of 1 drive.
RAID 5...a minimum of 3 disks...has striping with parity...there is redundancy...if a single drive fails, the other 2 keep it going...until you replace the failed drive. If 2 drives fail...you're dead. Pretty good read performance (especially if using more and more disks)...sorta slow write performance, so not good for database servers. Capacity roughly 66% of the total volume
RAID 10...minimum of 4 drives...starts with a pair of striped mirrors ....so you have a minimum of a pair of RAID 1s...that are striped. Very fast read and write. Capacity about 50% of the total volume
 
You pretty much have the gist of it all. Yes, RAID allows you to "combine" multiple drives into a logical, singular drive. This gives you "fault tolerance", and depending on the RAID type, will allow you to rebuild the bad drive in case one fails. In the case of RAID 1, both drives will be mirrors of each other. You may have the option to assign "Spare Drives" to the array. If a drive fails, the array will automatically rebuild the bad drive on the spare. Spare drives are optional and not needed for RAID, but a good idea all the same.

While RAID 1 is "less exciting" because it only mirrors the drive.. RAID 5 and 10, for instance, write chunks of data across all of the drives (3-5 drives) with a parity bit. If a drive or two goes down.. the computer should be able to rebuild the missing data based on the other drives and the parity bits.
 
woop, finally getting somewhere. I have set it up with raid 0 simply because that is the only viable option i have untill i add more drives. Its all starting to make sense now :) really feel like i have achieved something. Big thank you to you all for helping me. I am here to learn and i am certianly doing so.

EDIT:
I cant install the OS it keeps coming up with an error could this be down to the raid configuration?
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Ashley Hathaway said:
woop, finally getting somewhere. I have set it up with raid 0 simply because that is the only viable option i have untill i add more drives..
Click to expand...

Nope..stop right there. Just erase "RAID 0" from your mind. Don't use it. You said you have a pair of drives...so you can also do RAID 1. Which is the proper thing to do for the OS drive of a server.
 
I haven't got the option of raid 1, I only have 0, 0+1, or 5. from the research i have done 0+1 needs at least 4 disks and 5 needs at least 3. I guess the only option is to run them as two independent drives then?
EDIT:
Slight alteration its 1+0 which i believe is different than 0+1. so I guess I can run 1+0?
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Ashley Hathaway said:
I haven't got the option of raid 1, I only have 0, 0+1, or 5. from the research i have done 0+1 needs at least 4 disks and 5 needs at least 3. I guess the only option is to run them as two independent drives then?
EDIT:
Slight alteration its 1+0 which i believe is different than 0+1. so I guess I can run 1+0?
Click to expand...

Quick tip: Raid 1+0 = RAID 10, which is a 4 drive minimum, even amount of drives required.

I see here on Page 6, it does say your controller supports RAID 0, 1+0, and 5.. so yeah, RAID 1 likely not there for you. Either run them as independent drives or as RAID 0 in your case. If it were an important install I would recommend just a single non-RAIDed drive.. but if it's just your test bed, RAID 0 will suffice in teaching you how to setup RAID and work with it (The other RAID types are no more hard/easy and the steps are virtually the same). Obviously, with RAID 0 there is no fault tolerance and you won't be able to practice rebuilding drives/hotswapping.. but the initial setup and learning will be useful.

The nice thing about RAID 0 is that Read/Write performance is very good because it's working with two physical spindles.. bad thing is that you DOUBLE your failure chances... for a test bed that may be acceptable.
 
Well thats all it is, a test bed. My aim is to tinker and play about with it and learn in the process. The problem i am having at the moment though is the OS wont install regardless of the RAID level, it appears to be something to do with the kernel. Its unable to install the selected kernel. It seems the default sets it to 1+0. The link you posted is for the E200 which is an exteral raid controller. I have the E200i which is intergratedinto the main board already. I then have the bbcw which enables me to have raid 5
 
Good find Stonecat..
I wonder why the one I linked doesn't list RAID 1? I thought it was weird not to have RAID 1 listed. Perhaps the controller will default to RAID 1 if you pick 1+0 OR perhaps there could be a Controller BIOS ROM upgrade.

Also, in Stonecat's manual: "Up to 4.5TB of total storage with 6 x 750GB SATA hard drives (3.5") " - Looks like you should be able to swap those two SAS drives for a few SATA drives and RAID as you see fit.
 
well i am on hp bios d21 02/02/2011 and the E200i firmware is 1.86 and i cant seem to find any info as to whether there is an upgrade. I am going to have one more go trying to install linux with no raid setup and i will see if i can put windows seven on it
 
Ashley, I am seeing a lot of "Linux"/Debian problems with the E200i controller... specifically the Kernel not mapping the controller correctly in GRUB. If you can boot a Live CD of your distro.. looks like there might be a few Linux things to do in order to make it work.
Maybe this could help?
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2187378

Check fdisk -l on the Live CD and see if the OS even sees it all.
 
I think i might have to invest in a licence key. I have a copy of windows server 2012 but just need a key. I believe it will be so much easier
 
phaZed said:
Good find Stonecat..
I wonder why the one I linked doesn't list RAID 1? I thought it was weird not to have RAID 1 listed. t.
Click to expand...

Dunno...I started at the link you put up and had disbelief in my eyes....HP sure made that confusing. Never knew of a RAID controller that couldn't do 0 and 1 at a minimum. Those are the minimums.
 
I have a copy I just need to get a licence key. I assume the sort of server i will use in my new job will be windows based anyway.
curiously though before i started playing with the server today i already had got linux server on there. so i know it will go on.
 
Well thanks to YoOldeStoneCat and PhaZed :D I have a nice list of stuff to look at. So here it is:
  • Configure RAID
    • Learn RAID levels and nested levels
  • Install Windows Server
  • Learn About the Hardware
    • What hardware I have
    • Difference between server grade and ordinary components
  • Install HP Management Tools inc. RAID Utility
  • Swap drives whilst its Running
    • See how the management tools respond
  • Look at group policy
    • What is it
    • how it works
  • Look into DNS
  • Look at Active Directory
    • how it works
    • Adding, deleting and managing users
  • Promote to domain Controller
    • Learn what a domain controller
    • Learn how to promote
    • Learn how to manage
  • Look at Network Drives/ User folders
  • Look at iLO2
    • Learn how it works
    • how to configure
    • use it to remotely access server
  • Install VMware ESXi
    • Learn how to install virtual guests
    • Learn how to manage virtual guests
  • Install Microsoft Hyper-V
    • Learn how to install virtual guests
    • Learn how to manage virtual guests
  • Install a computer onto the domain
  • Install Untangle (Linux based)
    • learn how it works
    • Learn how to configure it
Well that is certainly quite a list to get started with, is there anything else worth looking at?

I will edit this post with new points. My aim here would be to write an article for anyone new to servers, sound like a good idea?
 
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I'm new too Ash :)

Group Policy is a big game changer. Also DNS and active directory. Check out folder redirection (making user folders on domain computers save on the server rather than the local machine - but you can set an offline cache I believe in case of network/server issues)
 
Thank you mrapoc, that is a very good point, I will add it to the list. Your not far from me lol I live in gloucestershire
 
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