Harddrive 2TB Limit

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spikesforu

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I have Dell 2900 with the following specifications:
2x Intel Xeon CPU 5130@ 2.00Ghz
RAM 12.0 GB
OS Windows 7 Ultimate Service Pack 1
2x WD 320gb running a RAID 1 - OS
3x WD Green 3TB no RAID - Media
1x WD 500GB no RAID - Mis

I use this server for media.

Since my WD Green keep crashing I decided to switch them out for WD Red NAS 3tb. I got four of these WD Red and plan to use a RAID 5 so I won't keep losing all my media. So the obvious problem that I keep reading online is that windows wont let me use 2.78 of my drive it will limit me to 2.0. Unless i change the format to GPT. I have read numerous post of software you can use to get use of all the full drive. I have tried all of them. I have read the fact that Dell 2900 BIOS does not support or that the RAID controller wont support it. However, with all the cant's against me I had the same problems with my WD Green when I first got them and was able to this day run them with the capacity of 2.78TB. I just can't remember how I did it. So does anybody know how to get a full capacity of my RED's. Thanks....

Let me add these WD Red's were purchased used, but the partition they came in showed 2.73 but I was not able to use that partition so I had to delete the partition in order to use them. After deleting the partition windows said there's only 2.0 that can be used.
 
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RealBeast
If you can run NAS4Free you can use ZFS raidz, which is similar to RAID 5 but more robust. ZFS likes drives attached with a simple SATA interface and not a RAID controller, although you may be able to configure yours that way. If not look for a cheap IBM M1015 SATA controller.
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RealBeast

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If your bios or add on card do not support >2.2TB you cannot use the full drive as a single partition. If you want the full capacity of your drives, buy a SATA or RAID 5 controller that supports them. Any posts to the contrary are either wrong or are discussing other equipment that supports larger drives or both. Just double check to be sure that a bios update is not available to fix the issue for you.

Your Green drives were crashing for a reason even though they were not in RAID (and do not do well in RAID arrays), but not sure how you got them formatted to 2.72TB if your bios doesn't support larger drives.
 
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RealBeast

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I would check to see if the RAID controller has later firmware that allows use of larger drives, otherwise I would find an inexpensive RAID 5 controller that can do the larger drives.

Using a distinct RAID controller is a far safer way to create an array than a bios based RAID -- bios RAID can be destroyed by very simple issues with the bios.
 
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spikesforu

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Got my answer on the whole hard drive issue after sitting down and thinking about it. What i did was attached the drives to a none raid controller board and threw windows disk management I was able to see the rest of the drive. I deleted the partition on the main drive and added the whole drive together (2.72). Then I put the drive back in the server made it a raid o and now i can see the whole drive in windows. Back-draw if I make the 4 WD Red drives a Raid 5 I will still lose the extra storage due to the limitation of the Raid Controller.

Everything on the server is update to date.
I have found out that some people have experimented with a dell raid controller for newer servers that has worked on the dell 2900, it the H310.

So I was going to ask if it would be better to get a Raid Software like NAS4Free. I have heard some good reviews but never used this software. And if I were to use it what happen to the Raid Controller that comes with the server?

Any help would be appreciated....
 
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RealBeast

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If you can run NAS4Free you can use ZFS raidz, which is similar to RAID 5 but more robust. ZFS likes drives attached with a simple SATA interface and not a RAID controller, although you may be able to configure yours that way. If not look for a cheap IBM M1015 SATA controller.
 
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spikesforu

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Got another question on this subject. Is a RAID Controller better than Software Raid? I keep fighting with the server and it obvious that its going to win. If i touch the drives in any way than adding my media it changes the amount of storage i have.

With that said I can use the Raid controller it brings or use Storage pools or NSA4Free. What would be your advice?
 
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RealBeast

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A controller based RAID will always be more reliable than bios based/software based and will generally be easier to completely recover if the controller breaks. The tops in terms of reliability would be to use a ZFS raidz because it gives you drive failure protection and also scrubs the data for errors, but it does not like to have drives on a RAID controller of any kind so it has direct access to the drives to perform its operations.

The easiest reliable thing to do is use RAID 5 on a hardware controller if it supports large drives, as ZFS implementations take a fair amount of extra work to set up the first time.
 
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spikesforu

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Okay, so I decided to purchase the Dell H700 which seems to work for a lot of people having the same issues. My question on this would be, I already have a raid 5 with the current raid controller. If I change the raid controller will I lose my current partition or media on my harddrives. I already had reconstruct the drives and I'm up to 4TB of media stored. Thanks...
 
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RealBeast

RealBeast

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You cannot change RAID controllers and use the same disks without building a new array with the rare exception of upgrading some Adaptec (and some other specific brand and model) PCIe controllers. I am not aware of any motherboard controllers that allow such a change, including just replacing the motherboard to an identical model.
 
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RealBeast

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Yes, that is correct.

And it is always best to maintain a backup of the important files since any RAID array can fail beyond repair, which is why storage guys have the mantra that RAID is a redundant storage solution not a backup.

 
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RealBeast

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No special way but if the data is important you have no choice but to back it up in order to re-create the array. Backup is a tough issue since it requires a lot of space for a big array. Basically backup means buying more storage than you would otherwise need, but if you really want the data safe it is worth the cost and effort. Sometimes you can borrow external drives from friend or family for a while to do a rebuild, but then you lack long term backup in the event of total array failure. It really depends on the importance of the data in the event of loss, weighing inconvenience or loss of data against cost.

If it is mission critical for a business install it's too important to skimp and expense is less of an issue. For home use expense is an issue.

As an example, on my home servers I've used a lot of different solutions over time. Currently I back up onto a pile of old 2 and 3TB Green drives from my media array, which is 8 4TB drives in RAID 6 on an Adaptec controller so it takes a bunch of 2-3TB drives. Fortunately, I have a big pile of old drives and I stuck an IcyDock MB971SP-B in the server so I can hot dock the Green drives for faster copying.

Three hours ago I had a drive in my media array die, so I swapped it out and it is rebuilding, it may take close to a week but still works although is much slower than normal when rebuilding for a lost drive. This makes me wish that I hadn't sold my old FreeNAS box with 10 3TB drives in raidz2, I could have used it for backup and quick restoration, but the cash was too tempting.

 
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