1.  Are these controllers compatible?

 

2.  Has anybody used them?

 

3.  If a raid 5 or 6 volume is created can the controller spin the drives down like the Areca 1200 can with a raid 1 volume?

 

4.  If I have a raid 5 or 6 volume what is the max size that can be used?  I wasn't sure if it was limited by Unraid or the ReiserFS file system.

 

5.  I would like to use a raid 5 or raid 6 volume so that my non-media files that I modify frequently can be saved faster and for a protected cache drive.  This would be similar to what others have done with a raid1 setup with the acrea 1200.  I'm curious if using one of these other controller would be a way to get a hardware raid protected volume large than 2TB.  Is anybody doing this with raid 5 or raid 6 hardware?

 

The areca 1200 with raid 1 setups have been discussed in these threads:

http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=7150.0

http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=2113.0

http://lime-technology.com/forum/index.php?topic=12491.0

 

 

Thanks to all,

Kerry

I've tested various raid volumes with the areca. the unRAID kernel sees them.

I suppose you could have a larger then 2 TB volume, but it would not be automounted via unRAID/emhttp. you would need to create a script to do it which is pretty easy.

 

I'm sure the volume would spin down associated drives if nothing has occurred on any of the associated drives.

 

The only time I see the use of RAID5 for this would be the need for a larger then 2TB volume or the need for high speed I/O.

I don't know what the max size would be for a stand alone volume with reiserfs on unRAID.

I do know that if you intend to incorporate a multi disk volume (RAID1 or RAID0) from the areca into unRAID with Parity protection, the limit would be 2TB at the current time.

 

Is RAID1 on the cache in capable of the size or speed you need?

I was needing it to be bigger then 2TB.  I was also thinking if it was on a raid 5 or raid 6 array that I could easily expand it.  I'm guessing the raid 5 or raid 6 hardware could easily expand the volume size, but does unraid contain any tools to expand the partition size without deleting it and re-creating it?

 

One of my biggest concerns was that the controller wouldn't be able to spin a raid 5 or 6 array down, like it could a raid 1.  That's good to hear that it should spin them down. 

 

Thanks,

Kerry

 

> does unraid contain any tools to expand the partition size without deleting it and re-creating it?

 

When you replace a disk in place. it will be rebuilt and automatically expanded by emhttp.

It couldn't be easier.

In fact it's probably easier then expanding the RAID5/6 volume.

I was looking for the operating systems tools behind unraid that can expand a partition that isn't controlled and protected by unraid.  If I have a 4TB raid 5 array and then expand the volume with another disk through the hardware raid controller, are there operating system tools available to expand the partition without data loss or are there only tools available to create it from scratch?

 

Thanks,

Kerry

Reiserfs was one of the first filesystems that had the ability to expand as you suggest.

Nowadays I believe ext3 and ext4 can do that too.