Clone OS raid to a larger raid

jpt7505

Honorable
Mar 25, 2015
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10,510
I ordered a workstation with the main C drive as a raid 1. When I view the hard drives under disk management one is online and the other is offline both with the same partitions and space etc. It appears they are indeed a raid array and are duplicates of each other.

First thing is I've never seen this type before and they state they are both basic drives, not dynamic.

Second concern is I need more space and need to basically clone this raid array to a larger one. But when I create a mirrored array in windows, it makes the discs dynamic which will not allow me to clone to them. I've tried several software solutions and manual cloning and nothing has worked. When I make the raid in Windows, I see both drives (although I only see one in 'my computer') and they are both online.

Why is one set basic and half online/offline, when the one I make is dynamic and both online?

I need any assistance please.

W7 Pro 64bit
 
Solution
Ok, first you have a problem. one of your raid1 disks is offline and you need to resolve this but without knowing your setup we can only offer general advice.
Being a non-dynamic set tells us that the raid is more hardware based and you need to use your raid utility or the boot-up utility to enter the raid manager and get the second drive back online. If this is motherbd raid you would press CTRL+I for intel an usually CTRL+H for AMD. For a dedicated raid card you can watch the screen during POST for the message of what to press or consult your raid cards manual.

As for expanding the raid, it again depends on what you have controlling it so we need more info.

popatim

Titan
Moderator
Ok, first you have a problem. one of your raid1 disks is offline and you need to resolve this but without knowing your setup we can only offer general advice.
Being a non-dynamic set tells us that the raid is more hardware based and you need to use your raid utility or the boot-up utility to enter the raid manager and get the second drive back online. If this is motherbd raid you would press CTRL+I for intel an usually CTRL+H for AMD. For a dedicated raid card you can watch the screen during POST for the message of what to press or consult your raid cards manual.

As for expanding the raid, it again depends on what you have controlling it so we need more info.
 
Solution

jpt7505

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Mar 25, 2015
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10,510
Thank you for the reply. From your information provided I will suppose the builder created the OS Raid via the motherboard (if this is indeed possible). I'm making the additional Raid via Windows 7. So would that be a Hardware vs software raid?

I'm actually truly concerned about attempting to activate the offline raid, since it has been like this from the beginning and I had the builder also make an additional raid 1 for my project files. One of those dual 2 TB discs is also always offline and listed as basic. I would further suppose they created it via the same process.

I will attempt to look at the boot up utility and attempt to gather additional details. I truly appreciate the assistance.


 

jpt7505

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Mar 25, 2015
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10,510
Some added info. I am running Intel however pressing CTRL + I does nothing during boot-up :( I've also attempted to access the Marvell raid (CTRL + M) capabilities but the drives don't show up there. I guess that's because they are plugged into different ports on the board. Not sure what the next step is, I do not have a separate hardware raid controller so I'm still lost.
 

jpt7505

Honorable
Mar 25, 2015
8
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10,510


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