It is possible to create a RAID set with 2x500GB drives and a 1TB drive?

[cowm007]

I currently have a 4x500GB RAID 10 set in my Mac Pro. (Two sets of 2x500GB mirrors which are then striped which gives me 1TB of protected data). One of the 500GB drives just failed so instead of just replacing directly, I'd like to do some upgrades. I just came across a cheap 1TB drive which I purchased and I'd like to use in my Mac Pro.

Is it possible to replace one of those striped sets with the 1TB drive? Essentially, I'd end up with a mirror of the 1TB drive and a 2x500GB striped set.

I know I'll lose the of the performance from the striping, but my concern is if this is simply possible using disk utility. My goal is to eventually replace all the drives so that I end up with 2TB of RAID 10 storage so doing incremental changes isn't a big deal for now. Thanks.

 

[Metatron]

I would say no...at least not in the way you want it. You can put all of them together in a JBOD configuration, but I do not recommend it. I would recommend you take your 3 500 GB drives and put them on a raid 5 as a data store and take the 1 TB drive and make it your boot volume...

Our you can buy a few more 1 TB drives and replace the old array completely.

 

[cowm007]

I would say no...at least not in the way you want it. You can put all of them together in a JBOD configuration, but I do not recommend it. I would recommend you take your 3 500 GB drives and put them on a raid 5 as a data store and take the 1 TB drive and make it your boot volume...

Our you can buy a few more 1 TB drives and replace the old array completely.

I thought about the RAID 5 setup, but it's cheaper to have a RAID 10 setup than RAID 5 because of the card needed. Also, I actually have 6 drives in my Mac Pro so I already have a separate boot drive and a boot camp drive, but that is a good recommendation for anyone that hasn't done it yet.

I think in the end I'm just gonna bite the bullet and get another 1TB in the meanwhile and setup the two TB drives in a mirror RAID. When I can get two more I'll go to a RAID 10 again. Thanks for the input.

 

[ChrisA]

(Two sets of 2x500GB mirrors which are then striped which gives me 1TB of protected data). One of the 500GB drives just failed

So take the failed drive and chuck it out. Put the remaining three 500Gb drives in a RAID 5 system which will give you the same 1TB usable storage and maybe better performance then you had before. Use your new 1TB drive as an off-site backup.

 

[cowm007]

So take the failed drive and chuck it out. Put the remaining three 500Gb drives in a RAID 5 system which will give you the same 1TB usable storage and maybe better performance then you had before. Use your new 1TB drive as an off-site backup.

I wish I could have a RAID-5 system but don't have enough for the RAID card. In the end I got 2x 1TB drives and had those mirrored. It was possible to make the 2x500 + 1x1TB RAID 10, but there was no point to it now that I have both TB drives. Thanks for the help.