Create RAID5 Array

RAID5 Array uses block-level striping with parity data distributed across all member disks. It requires a minimum of 3 disks to implement. It has highest read data transaction rate and medium write data transaction rate. When one of the disks in RAID5 failed, the data in RAID5 can also be accessed, and the broken RAID5 disk array can be repaired with a new disk.

To create a RAID5 disk array, click toolbar button or menu item Operation => Create RAID5 ,then the following dialog will appear:

Click 'Auto' or 'Custom' button to select an Array Creating Method. Then the Create RAID5 Array dialog will appear:

If you select Auto creation method, all available free disks attached on the RAID controller will be initially added into the RAID5 disk array. You can deselect some disks from the Array Disks list if you don't want to use all Available Disks to create the RAID5 array.

To add a disk into array, please select an available disk from the left side list, then click button (or press Right-Arrow key). The array disk's order in the RAID5 disk array is the same order as it was added into the array.

To remove a disk from array, please select the array disk, then click button (or press Left-Arrow key).

Whenever a disk (array disk or available disk) is selected, its capacity and physical location will be shown in the bottom-left corner.

Principles to select RAID5 Array disk:

1. Try to select disks in different channels. Certainly you can adjust disks' physical position manually after shutting down the system.

2. It should be taken into account not to select a disk whose capacity is too much different with other array disks, or else the extra space on larger array disks will be wasted. The reason is that for each RAID5 Array disk, its effective capacity (real capacity) will always be the smallest data capacity among all array disks.
3. To create a RAID5 disk array, you must select at least 3 disks.

Select Block Size for the RAID5 Array

Refer to above dialog box, there is a drop-down list with the title 'Block Size' in the bottom-right corner. Block Size is the basic data block size used when writing data onto each stripe array disk. The principle of selecting Block Size is trying to balance most data Read/Write work onto all stripe disks, so that all stripe disks can work in parallel when Read/Write a data record is requested by the system. Therefore, the smaller the average system data record is, the smaller Block Size should be selected when create a RAID5 Array. The default Block Size is 2048K bytes.

Final Step

Click Create button to create the RAID5 array. Message boxes will then pop up to ask for confirmation and prompt system reboot. System must be rebooted to enable the newly created RAID5 array.