14.6 Creating Software RAID Devices with NSSMU

  1. In NSSMU, select RAID Devices from the NSSMU main menu.

  2. Press Insert (Ins) to create a new device.

  3. Select the RAID type (0, 1, or 5), then press Enter.

  4. (Conditional) If this is a RAID 0 or 5 device, specify the stripe size, then press Enter.

    The default stripe size is 64 KB, which typically provides the best performance for devices with NSS volumes.

  5. Use the arrow keys to select the partitions that you want to contribute space to the RAID.

    If no partitions appear, it is an indication that either there are no partitions large enough or there are no free partitions. Each segment must be more than 12 MB. If any segment uses space from a device that is partitioned with the DOS partition table scheme, then the maximum segment size must be less than 2 TB. If all devices are using GPT, a RAID segment size can be more than 2 TB. Since pools are currently limited to 8TB, RAID1 sizes for pool objects are also limited to 8TB.

    IMPORTANT:Unallocated partitions (that is, partitions that are not mirrored and do not contain pools or other file systems), are deleted in order to present the unused space as free space for use by the RAID. No data loss occurs by this action.

    After space is selected from a device, other free space associated with that device might not appear. This prevents you from adding more than one segment from a single physical device, and consequently, helps ensure the optimum performance of your file system.

    The following table lists the number of segments that you can include in a RAID device:

    RAID Type

    Number of Segments

    RAID 0

    Minimum of 2 and a maximum of 14

    RAID 1

    Maximum of 4

    RAID 5

    Minimum of 3 and a maximum of 14; one segment is used for parity

  6. Specify the amount of space to use, then press Enter.

    The segment is created and added to the Segments Included in the RAID window.