So an older 2TB drive is failing on me and instead of replacing it with another 2TB, I thought I could kill two birds with one stone by finally picking up a 3TB drive and migrating to 5.0rc from 4.7. What would be a good strategy? I’d really do not want to first get another 2TB unless I have to.

 

Thanks in advance

So an older 2TB drive is failing on me and instead of replacing it with another 2TB, I thought I could kill two birds with one stone by finally picking up a 3TB drive and migrating to 5.0rc from 4.7. What would be a good strategy? I’d really do not want to first get another 2TB unless I have to.

Unless you buy 2 3TB drives, one for the failing drive and one for parity, you wouldn't be accomplishing anything, because parity must be the same or larger than every drive in the array.

 

If it were me, I'd get the 3TB drive, short stroke it with hdparm to exactly match your current parity drive, test it with preclear and then use it to replace your failing drive while staying with 4.7. Then, after the array is stable and working well, you could update to the 5. series, and replace your parity drive with a 3TB drive. After that hurdle has been crossed, and everything is stable with several clean parity checks under your belt, you could rerun the hdparm command and reset the 3TB to full capacity.

So an older 2TB drive is failing on me and instead of replacing it with another 2TB, I thought I could kill two birds with one stone by finally picking up a 3TB drive and migrating to 5.0rc from 4.7. What would be a good strategy? I’d really do not want to first get another 2TB unless I have to.

Unless you buy 2 3TB drives, one for the failing drive and one for parity, you wouldn't be accomplishing anything, because parity must be the same or larger than every drive in the array.

 

If it were me, I'd get the 3TB drive, short stroke it with hdparm to exactly match your current parity drive, test it with preclear and then use it to replace your failing drive while staying with 4.7. Then, after the array is stable and working well, you could update to the 5. series, and replace your parity drive with a 3TB drive. After that hurdle has been crossed, and everything is stable with several clean parity checks under your belt, you could rerun the hdparm command and reset the 3TB to full capacity.

 

Upgrading software should be done on a healthy array to minimize complications. However, the latest RC versions have a "parity is correct" checkbox. In theory, you can upgrade the software, check the '"parity is correct" box and start the array, then install and assign the new 3T drive as parity and the old parity drive as the failing data drive. I've never tried this so back-up the current contents of the flash in case you need to revert.