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RAID 5 mostly unusable, need help

Tags:
  • NAS / RAID
  • Controller
  • Storage
Last response: in Storage
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September 11, 2014 11:08:56 AM

I have installed 5x 2.0TB disks in RAID5. Configured with the RAID-controller on my Z77-motherboard.

OS is installed on my SSD wich is on the same controller, but is a seperate volume.
the RAID5 volume will be used for other data.

While the controller was set to RAID, it wasn't easy to install Windows, because it kept telling me it couldn't create a partition on my empty SSD.
I had this problem before, and I did something with the EUFI settings in the BIOS.
So I did this again. Not sure what I exactly switched, it the install worked.

However

My RAID5 volume isn't working properly now.


Somehow, it split up my volume, where I can only access the 2047.66GB. The 5404.06GB are unaccessible for some reason.

I read something about some UEFI and GPT settings which should do something. But I'm not sure what exactly I'd have to do to fix this.

More about : raid unusable

a b G Storage
September 11, 2014 11:29:14 AM

Ok you need to start over from scratch sorry man. Go unplug all the hard drives and plug in only the SSD. Then install OS on SSD. Ok then plug in hard drives and format as GPT and you will have everything setup right. With OS on SSD and one huge chunk of space. In this setup you will not need to boot UEFI unless you want to. That is just to be able to boot to a partition larger than 2 TB. That 350 meg partition should be on the SSD and is needed to boot that is why you need to reload Windows.

Thent
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September 11, 2014 12:24:39 PM

Can't I somehow get the "system reserved" partition away from the RAID volume, and then gain control over the RAID volume and make it GPT?

I really don't want to wait another 2 days for initializing -.-
I don't care about re-installing Windows, but the 2 days are agonizing :p 
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a b G Storage
September 11, 2014 1:23:30 PM

1) when creating your RAID you included the SSD, that was the first mistake. NEVER INCLUDE SSD IN RAID, no benefit and can actually slow the performance down of the SSD.
A) As Thently said, start from scratch.
B) First reset BIOS back to default (if you need to unplug the power and remove the 'watch battery' on the mobo for 15 minutes before putting back in to clear the BIOS).
C) Download and make a DBAN CD, ONLY HAVE THE SSD IN, wipe the SSD with DBAN then install Windows to the SSD normally.
2) With the RAID and you have a UEFI, then to achieve larger then 2TB (5x2TB RAID 5 = 8TB (2TB is used for consistency check) you need to use GPT. These would normally 'default' with the UEFI/BIOS defaults UNLESS YOUR MOBO MANUAL TELLS YOU OTHERWISE - aka RTFM.
3) carefully create the RAID of the 5 other drives and should show up with the full 8TB available.
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September 12, 2014 5:45:06 AM

Update:

At first,
Quote:
1) when creating your RAID you included the SSD, that was the first mistake. NEVER INCLUDE SSD IN RAID, no benefit and can actually slow the performance down of the SSD.
I didn't include the SSD in the RAID-array.

When installing Windows, the RAID-volume was available. Although I selected my SSD as the Windows disk, the setup managed to pick my RAID-volume for the System Reserved partition. This way, the entire RAID-volume was set to "MBR" instead of "GPT" which is needed for >2000GB disks as you said.
Because of This tutorial I managed to remove the System Reserved parititon and put everything on my SSD, what even feels faster with booting. When the System Reserved partition was gone, I was able to transfer the RAID-volume to "GPT". Which instantly gave me acces over the full 7.27TB

But even with full acces to the RAID-volume, I got a new problem. The write speeds go up 20MB/s max.
If this isn't fixable, the volume is useless to me.
So far I've tried most of these steps, but even with Write-Back mode, speeds aren't higher than 20MB/s.

Any solutions?
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September 12, 2014 6:16:16 AM



Here you have some numbers... I mean.. Come on..... not even 20MB/s
I want at least up to 100MB/s
Under 20MB/s my downloadspeeds would suffer, because the volume can't keep up..
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September 13, 2014 1:58:45 AM

So far I've found out that Intel Z77 Raid "supports" RAID5, but is terribly slow with the parity job. So it basicly has a terrible write-performance. There seems to be NO solution to improve write-performance on the Z77 controller.

Only option is to get a new controller. But there are some problems
- I have no place on PCIe slots left. My GPU's and Audio card cover all slots
- RAID-controllers with >5 SATA ports are expensive

I've found a certain controller that is simply connected to SATA, but is able to set the drives in RAID
http://www.addonics.com/products/ad5sapm.php
Problem is, I don't really trust the write speeds of this device either. Although it is dedicated, I can't really know the performance. There is no review on the internet as far as I looked.

Does anyone know more about this device or know a better solution?

Budget < €100
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a b G Storage
September 18, 2014 9:33:58 AM

So how much space do you need ? get 1 more drive and make a raid 10 but you will only get 6 TB of space the plus side is a full backup... If you do not need fault tolerance AKA you ar backing it up somehow run a raid 0 that needs no parity this is blazing fast you should se Writes up over 200 if you can give it that much.

Thent
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