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mbpark · 08-20-2011, 09:19 PM

Ut,

We run RAID 5 on hundreds of servers and an EMC Clariion SAN (think about $2M) with over 20 VSphere boxes and 500TB of storage. We run it because it allows us to keep drive arrays running while replacing bad drives. Your statement there is not true for servers and other hardware. In many cases, we run RAID 6 so we can have two drives fail and still keep the array (my smtp bridgeheads run this).

The only time in the past five years I have had an issue is because the quality of the drive array controllers in HP servers has gone to the toilet in a few cases. We had bad array controller corrupt NTFS during a rebuild on a Proliant DL 380 G5. We had to restore from backup and regenerate the rest of the data. The other 99.5 percent of the time we just replace the drive and there is no issue. This includes servers from Dell, IBM, HP, and even some whiteboxes.

And yes, I would recommend RAID 5 and a spare drive in a heartbeat if you have a decent controller. RAID 1 is more cost effective however.

08-20-2011, 09:19 PM	#2
mbpark Lecturer Join Date: Jan 2001 Location: Carmel, Indiana Posts: 761	Raid 5 Ut, We run RAID 5 on hundreds of servers and an EMC Clariion SAN (think about $2M) with over 20 VSphere boxes and 500TB of storage. We run it because it allows us to keep drive arrays running while replacing bad drives. Your statement there is not true for servers and other hardware. In many cases, we run RAID 6 so we can have two drives fail and still keep the array (my smtp bridgeheads run this). The only time in the past five years I have had an issue is because the quality of the drive array controllers in HP servers has gone to the toilet in a few cases. We had bad array controller corrupt NTFS during a rebuild on a Proliant DL 380 G5. We had to restore from backup and regenerate the rest of the data. The other 99.5 percent of the time we just replace the drive and there is no issue. This includes servers from Dell, IBM, HP, and even some whiteboxes. And yes, I would recommend RAID 5 and a spare drive in a heartbeat if you have a decent controller. RAID 1 is more cost effective however.