From owner-freebsd-geom@FreeBSD.ORG Mon Nov 15 16:12:27 2010 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-geom@FreeBSD.ORG Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 822121065675 for ; Mon, 15 Nov 2010 16:12:27 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from olli@lurza.secnetix.de) Received: from lurza.secnetix.de (lurza.secnetix.de [IPv6:2a01:170:102f::2]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id F3A908FC13 for ; Mon, 15 Nov 2010 16:12:26 +0000 (UTC) Received: from lurza.secnetix.de (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by lurza.secnetix.de (8.14.3/8.14.3) with ESMTP id oAFGBqC0011223; Mon, 15 Nov 2010 17:12:08 +0100 (CET) (envelope-from oliver.fromme@secnetix.de) Received: (from olli@localhost) by lurza.secnetix.de (8.14.3/8.14.3/Submit) id oAFGBqUo011222; Mon, 15 Nov 2010 17:11:52 +0100 (CET) (envelope-from olli) Date: Mon, 15 Nov 2010 17:11:52 +0100 (CET) Message-Id: <201011151611.oAFGBqUo011222@lurza.secnetix.de> From: Oliver Fromme To: freebsd-geom@FreeBSD.ORG, bsemene@cyanide-studio.com In-Reply-To: <4CE0FD0B.2010700@cyanide-studio.com> X-Newsgroups: list.freebsd-geom User-Agent: tin/1.8.3-20070201 ("Scotasay") (UNIX) (FreeBSD/6.4-PRERELEASE-20080904 (i386)) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Greylist: Sender IP whitelisted, not delayed by milter-greylist-4.3.5 (lurza.secnetix.de [127.0.0.1]); Mon, 15 Nov 2010 17:12:08 +0100 (CET) Cc: Subject: Re: Newbie RAID 0 question X-BeenThere: freebsd-geom@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list Reply-To: freebsd-geom@FreeBSD.ORG, bsemene@cyanide-studio.com List-Id: GEOM-specific discussions and implementations List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Mon, 15 Nov 2010 16:12:27 -0000 Bastien Semene wrote: > If I'm understanding well, I can add space with gconcat (8) but there > will be two separate stripings, in your example datas will be stripped > between ad0/ad1 and when space is full between ad2/ad3 ? Yes. > I'm using RAID-1+0 structure, so I think I can do the work with 2 arrays > (old one with datas, new one with datas and more space). You didn't mention RAID-1+0 in your first posting, only RAID-0. That's quite a difference. If you expect to receive good advice, you should describe your existing setup as precisely as possible. > Do you see some advantage/disadvantage using the gconcat model instead > of a true striping ? Both is "true" striping, there's only a difference in how the data is organized, which can have an impact on performance. When four disks are organized in a single RAID-0, this means that stripes are distributed equally across all four disks. In theory this can improve performance, especially for sequential access. When two pairs of disks are organized in two RAID-0 volumes which are then concatenated, the stripes for each of the sub-volumes are distributed only across two disks. Therefore there's a lower limit on the maximum performance that can be achieved (in theory). In other words: Adding two new disks using a concat container will not make the whole thing faster (but not slower either). It will be just bigger. It should also be noted that the new volume will be less reliable. Every time you add another disk to an array without redundancy (no matter whether RAID-0 or concat), you reduce reliability, because the whole array will go down when any one of the disks fails. The more disks, the higher the probability that one of the disks fails. Of course, if you have RAID-1+0, then things are a lot different. > Is it planned that geom will add an insert command, or is gconcat the > definitive solution ? I'm not a geom developer, so I'm not authoritative, but I don't think that such a feature is planned. As I wrote previously, adding another disk to an existing RAID-0 is technically expensive and time- consuming. I don't think it's worth the effort. Best regards Oliver -- Oliver Fromme, secnetix GmbH & Co. KG, Marktplatz 29, 85567 Grafing b. M. Handelsregister: Registergericht Muenchen, HRA 74606, Geschäftsfuehrung: secnetix Verwaltungsgesellsch. mbH, Handelsregister: Registergericht Mün- chen, HRB 125758, Geschäftsführer: Maik Bachmann, Olaf Erb, Ralf Gebhart FreeBSD-Dienstleistungen, -Produkte und mehr: http://www.secnetix.de/bsd "The ITU has offered the IETF formal alignment with its corresponding technology, Penguins, but that won't fly." -- RFC 2549