Increase partition size on RAID mirrored disk volume

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woods.81@googlemail.com - 16 Jan 2007 21:07 GMT

Hello!

Was wondering if anyone could help me with a problem I've come across
recently.

I had a working RAID system running 1 set of mirrored disks however
both the disks have recently died. Thankfully the drives died a few
months apart, and I was able to connect replacement disks and the
mirroring continued.

However, I am now at the stage where I have a 250GB RAID, but the
partitions are only at 150GB as this was the size of my original array.

What is the best way I can re-size my mirrored disk volume to it uses
the full 250GB that's available? I'm surprised it's not an automated
process. I've looked around the Intel Matrix RAID utility but can't
seem any option that would allow me to do this. I have also tried the
CTRL-I option at boot time, but there is also no option there to expand
the RAID into the available space. I've also tried the XP disk manager
as well as some third part disk partition utilities although they don't
see my hard drive as a RAID volume, only 1 disk that is using the full
space available.

Anyone got any ideas? I suppose I could break the RAID and return to a
single booting SATA drive, then expand the partition, then perform
another RAID migration, however I'm sure there's an easier way, and
this Intel Matrix based motherboard is very fussy about performing RAID
migrations and officially only does it if it's a fresh XP installation.

Cheers,

Joe

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kony - 16 Jan 2007 23:39 GMT

>Hello!
>
[quoted text clipped - 11 lines]
>What is the best way I can re-size my mirrored disk volume to it uses
>the full 250GB that's available?

Copy off the data, then reboot system to the RAID controller
bios and delete the array, then recreate it. Partition and
format however you like, like with your preferred OS.

>I'm surprised it's not an automated
>process.

Then you haven't used RAID arrays much, that's not how they
generally work.

>I've looked around the Intel Matrix RAID utility but can't
>seem any option that would allow me to do this. I have also tried the
>CTRL-I option at boot time, but there is also no option there to expand
>the RAID into the available space.

Suppose you had only a single drive, partitioned for 160GB
out of 250. Is there an option in the bios to expand that
160GB partition to 250GB? No, so why would there be for a
raid array?

>I've also tried the XP disk manager
>as well as some third part disk partition utilities although they don't
>see my hard drive as a RAID volume, only 1 disk that is using the full
>space available.

Yes, that's the whole point of an array, that it is
presented as only 1 logical volume to everything except a
raid manger software, so if the option existed at all, it
would have to be in the raid manager software or the raid
bios menu itself.

>Anyone got any ideas? I suppose I could break the RAID and return to a
>single booting SATA drive, then expand the partition, then perform
>another RAID migration,

Since it would be wise to back up the data anyway, this
seems more complex (and BTW, not supported by many
controllers/software either) without a need, when you can
just do it the normal way.

Reply to this Message

Yousuf Khan - 17 Jan 2007 01:09 GMT

> However, I am now at the stage where I have a 250GB RAID, but the
> partitions are only at 150GB as this was the size of my original array.
[quoted text clipped - 8 lines]
> see my hard drive as a RAID volume, only 1 disk that is using the full
> space available.

Use a program like Partition Magic or BootItNG.

> Anyone got any ideas? I suppose I could break the RAID and return to a
> single booting SATA drive, then expand the partition, then perform
> another RAID migration, however I'm sure there's an easier way, and
> this Intel Matrix based motherboard is very fussy about performing RAID
> migrations and officially only does it if it's a fresh XP installation.

The disks that have been formatted with Intel RAID have an additional
layer of formatting beyond regular disks. The volume that you see in
Windows is really a virtual disk that is just a subset of the full Intel
RAID'ed disks.

Yousuf Khan

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woods.81@googlemail.com - 17 Jan 2007 15:13 GMT

I had hoped Partition Magic would be more intelligent and be able to
recognise and manipulate the Intel RAID layer, but unfortunately it
sees it the same way as Windows Disk Manager, just as a single
"virtual" disk.

> > However, I am now at the stage where I have a 250GB RAID, but the
> > partitions are only at 150GB as this was the size of my original array.
[quoted text clipped - 23 lines]
>
> Yousuf Khan

Reply to this Message

Ed Medlin - 19 Jan 2007 12:01 GMT

>I had hoped Partition Magic would be more intelligent and be able to
> recognise and manipulate the Intel RAID layer, but unfortunately it
> sees it the same way as Windows Disk Manager, just as a single
> "virtual" disk.

In some cases you may get an option in the raid setup that asks if you wish
to delete the data. Not all raid chipsets have this option. Like Kony said,
copy the data to other storage and delete (rebuild if you have that option
might work too) the array and set it up again. If you get the option of
whether or not to delete the data, you might get lucky. If not, you will
have the data backed up to put it back.

Ed

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