Question Upgrading Drives in a Storage Spaces Mirror

[fastoy]

I have a Windows 11 Pro system with a Storage Spaces two-way mirror. Unknown to me, it was "thin provisioned". It consists of 2 4TB drives giving "8TB" of capacity. I realize that this is really only 4TB of capacity.

I would like to upgrade this Storage Space to 2 8TB drives giving a true 8TB of capacity.

What steps would I need to do to accomplish this? When completed, can I remove the specification of thin provisioning so the true capacity is presented?

 

[USAFRet]

Unknown to me...

Sorry, but you really really need to undo this Storage Space thing, and institute a real backup situation.
What you have is not that.

 

[fastoy]

Thanks but right now I'm too far down the road with Storage Spaces. Let me get over this and I'll revisit.

My thinking is to use Storage Spaces and REMOVE one of the 4TB drives. Then ADD an 8TB drive and let Storage Spaces reestablish the mirror. When that is done, REMOVE the other 4TB drive and ADD a second 8TB drive. When Storage Spaces reestablishes the mirror, I should be done.

Even if Storage Spaces doesn't readjust the thin provisioning size from the current 8TB, that's what I actually prefer.

 

[USAFRet]

Thanks but right now I'm too far down the road with Storage Spaces. Let me get over this and I'll revisit.

My thinking is to use Storage Spaces and REMOVE one of the 4TB drives. Then ADD an 8TB drive and let Storage Spaces reestablish the mirror. When that is done, REMOVE the other 4TB drive and ADD a second 8TB drive. When Storage Spaces reestablishes the mirror, I should be done.

Even if Storage Spaces doesn't readjust the thin provisioning size from the current 8TB, that's what I actually prefer.

The only experience I have with StorageSpaces is....don't use StorageSpaces.
There are much better methods for data security.

Will your plan work? Unknown.

Is there a known good backup of ALL data on those drives, before you start swapping things around?
If not, you are playing with matches, while standing in a pool of gasoline.

 

[thestryker]

Is there a reason behind using storage spaces?

At the end of the day I doubt there would be anything stopping you from putting two 8TB drives in, creating a new pool and copying the data over. I'm just curious what your goal storage wise is here.

 

[fastoy]

Is there a reason behind using storage spaces?

At the end of the day I doubt there would be anything stopping you from putting two 8TB drives in, creating a new pool and copying the data over. I'm just curious what your goal storage wise is here.

My goal is to increase my current storage pool from 4TB actual to 8TB actual, preferably without creating a second pool as I don't have bays for 2 additional drives.

 

[fastoy]

Sorry, but you really really need to undo this Storage Space thing, and institute a real backup situation.
What you have is not that.

Thanks for the guidance.

Let's take another tack.

Today I have a mid-tower system with 2 3.5" drive bays. These are occupied by 2 4TB drives. These drives are in a mirrored Storage Spaces pool. I am using an HP EliteDesk 800 G4 Tower.

I provide BACKUP for this data using a periodic Drive Snapshot copy to a removable 5TB USB drive. Further, his data is BACKED UP dynamically on Crashplan.

The objective of the mirror is to protect against single drive failure.

Currently the 2 4TB mirrored drives provide 4TBs (I understand a disk drive TB is not really a terabyte).

I want to increase the space for protection against single drive failure to 8TB. Consuming this larger space will eventually require me to upgrade my 5TB USB backup drive.

What is the most expeditious, simplest, safest way to accomplish this given my 2 bay constraint?

I have read concerns about using motherboard RAID techniques due to specific RAID algorithms (https://skrypuch.com/raid/).

I have also read that Microsoft has deprecated dynamic disks, e.g. mirrors (https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/w...nt/change-a-dynamic-disk-back-to-a-basic-disk).

I have read experiences (http://betanews.com/2014/01/15/windows-storage-spaces-and-refs-is-it-time-to-ditch-raid-for-good/) where a user removed a single mirrored disk from a Storage Spaces pool and was able to successfully access it on a different system.

My personal experience goes back to mainframe and open system disk management using a wide variety of vendors and technologies at several Fortune 100 corporations.

But my hands-on expertise on Windows systems is limited.

Thanks for your time and insights.

 

[thestryker]

My goal is to increase my current storage pool from 4TB actual to 8TB actual, preferably without creating a second pool as I don't have bays for 2 additional drives.

I'm not familiar enough with the way Storage Spaces handles size expansion but if you can't put in additional drives the only way to do it I can think of would be to replace a drive, rebuild then replace the other drive and rebuild.

 

[fastoy]

I'm not familiar enough with the way Storage Spaces handles size expansion but if you can't put in additional drives the only way to do it I can think of would be to replace a drive, rebuild then replace the other drive and rebuild.

That's what I started out wanting to do but got lots of cautious feedback. I'm trying to listen and consider the feedback from more experienced users.

I realize that when I remove/replace one of the drives, I'm subject to a single drive failure at that point and would need to have a current separate backup.

I'm just worried about the Storage Spaces pool going "kablamo" in the middle of this process.

The worst case would be at that point to blow away the Storage Spaces pool and create a new mirror configuration (Storage Spaces, dynamic disks, ?) and reload from backup.

 

[lantis3]

Posting from reddit user

https://www.reddit.com/r/DataHoarder/comments/10a26dk/storage_spaces_adding_drives_to_existing_mirrored/

 

[USAFRet]

I provide BACKUP for this data using a periodic Drive Snapshot copy to a removable 5TB USB drive. Further, his data is BACKED UP dynamically on Crashplan.

The objective of the mirror is to protect against single drive failure.

Given a good backup plan, single drive fail is of no consequence.

You simply slot in a new drive, and recover from the backup.

How often does this backup happen?


In my realm, I have a nightly Image with Macrium Reflect.
Each drive individually, keep the Incremental for a rolling 30 days.
And yes, I have had to recover from a drive fail.

 

[USAFRet]

Still, if you're intent on keeping this mirror config:

Make a 100% backup of the data in this array.
Know how to recover it.
Swap one of the 4TB for an 8TB.
Let it finish what it is doing.
Then, swap the other 4TB for the 8TB.
Let it finish.

Hopefully, you now have an 8TB array.

But if something fails and it borks the data in the array, you have that 100% backup.
Let it build itself with 2 blank 8TB drives, then recover the data.

I did exactly that when changing my NAS from a 4x 3TB RAID 5 to 4x 4TB.
(that RAID 5 no longer exists)

 

[fastoy]

Given a good backup plan, single drive fail is of no consequence.

You simply slot in a new drive, and recover from the backup.

How often does this backup happen?


In my realm, I have a nightly Image with Macrium Reflect.
Each drive individually, keep the Incremental for a rolling 30 days.
And yes, I have had to recover from a drive fail.

I have been using Macrium Reflect quarterly as a backup against my Drobo in case of a Drobo catastrophe. That seems to be getting more likely. That's why I am moving to mirrored drives. The Drobo is fine today.

With using Drive Snapshot against the mirrored drives, I plan to run a differential monthly to protect against double drive failure or sweeping damage/changes. Incidental damage/changes to the files on the mirrored drives ae protected by the near real-time Crashplan backups.

I've been happy with Macrium Reflect but have found that Drive Snapshot doesn't require installation and does it's own encryption.

And I too have had to recover from a drive fail, both at home and in the enterprise.

Thanks for all your help.