Mac OS X 10.4 - Software RAID 10???

Hello All...
As a motion graphics artist by trade and a musician at night, I am constantly faced with the on-going dilemma of my storage needs. As you may probably already know, these two activities eat up drive space and require a speedy storage solution as well.
Here's my current setup:
- PowerMac G5 Dual 2GHz (PCI-X) w/ 3GB of RAM.
- Sonnet Tempo-X eSATA 4x4 PCI-X card.
- MacGurus Burly 4 bay SATA enclosure.
- 2 250GB WD drives in the Burly enclosure.
I have the two 250GB WD drives in the external SATA enclosure software-RAIDed together to form one RAID 0 (striped) volume, using the OS X disk utility RAID feature. While that has resulted in an excellent, fast, big disk... I am starting to run into errors, and starting to lose sleep over the fact that the current setup is not redundant / reliable.
My initial solution was to buy two more disks, RAID them together as another striped volume and run backups from the first two-disk WD striped volume to the new striped RAID. So, four disks, two striped raids with two disks each.... But when I called Sonnet Tech Support, the support guy said that OS X 10.4 has support for RAID 10. That changes everything! If I could fill the Burly enclosure with 4 of the same disks and software RAID 10 them together, I'd be in business... I think...
Does OS X 10.4 really allow you to create a software RAID 10???
If so, do you think this is the most ideal solution for what I'm working with?
Keep in mind, I'm working with a low budget. No, XServes/XServe-RAID is NOT an option!
Any input is greatly appreciated!
TIA

Hi, noka.
Yes, it supports RAID 10. See "Disk Utility 10.5 Help: Protecting your data against hardware failure with a mirrored RAID set."
However, you may not get the performance you expect.
FWIW and IMO, unless one is running a high-volume transaction server with a 99.999% ("Five Nines") availability requirement, RAID is overkill. For example, unless you're running a bank, a brokerage, or a major e-commerce site, you're probably spending sums of time and money with RAID that could be applied elsewhere.
RAID is high on the "geek chic" scale, low on the practicality scale, and very high on the "complex to troubleshoot" scale when problems arise. The average user, even one in your lines of business, is better served by implementing a comprehensive Backup and Recovery solution and using it regularly.
Good luck!
Dr. Smoke
Author: Troubleshooting Mac® OS X
Note: The information provided in the link(s) above is freely available. However, because I own The X Lab™, a commercial Web site to which some of these links point, the Apple Discussions Terms of Use require I include the following disclosure statement with this post:
I may receive some form of compensation, financial or otherwise, from my recommendation or link.

Similar Messages

  • I have some questions regarding setting up a software RAID 0 on a Mac Pro

    I have some questions regarding setting up a software RAID 0 on a Mac pro (early 2009).
    These questions might seem stupid to many of you, but, as my last, in fact my one and only, computer before the Mac Pro was a IICX/4/80 running System 7.5, I am a complete novice regarding this particular matter.
    A few days ago I installed a WD3000HLFS VelociRaptor 300GB in bay 1, and moved the original 640GB HD to bay 2. I now have 2 bootable internal drives, and currently I am using the VR300 as my startup disk. Instead of cloning from the original drive, I have reinstalled the Mac OS, and all my applications & software onto the VR300. Everything is backed up onto a WD SE II 2TB external drive, using Time Machine. The original 640GB has an eDrive partition, which was created some time ago using TechTool Pro 5.
    The system will be used primarily for photo editing, digital imaging, and to produce colour prints up to A2 size. Some of the image files, from scanned imports of film negatives & transparencies, will be 40MB or larger. Next year I hope to buy a high resolution full frame digital SLR, which will also generate large files.
    Currently I am using Apple's bundled iPhoto, Aperture 2, Photoshop Elements 8, Silverfast Ai, ColorMunki Photo, EZcolor and other applications/software. I will also be using Photoshop CS5, when it becomes available, and I will probably change over to Lightroom 3, which is currently in Beta, because I have had problems with Aperture, which, until recent upgrades (HD, RAM & graphics card) to my system, would not even load images for print. All I had was a blank preview page, and a constant, frozen "loading" message - the symbol underneath remained static, instead of revolving!
    It is now possible to print images from within Aperture 2, but I am not happy with the colour fidelity, whereas it is possible to produce excellent, natural colour prints using its "minnow" sibling, iPhoto!
    My intention is to buy another 3 VR300s to form a 4 drive Raid 0 array for optimum performance, and to store the original 640GB drive as an emergency bootable back-up. I would have ordered the additional VR300s already, but for the fact that there appears to have been a run on them, and currently they are out of stock at all, but the more expensive, UK resellers.
    I should be most grateful to receive advice regarding the following questions:
    QUESTION 1:
    I have had a look at the RAID setting up facility in Disk Utility and it states: "To create a RAID set, drag disks or partitions into the list below".
    If I install another 3 VR300s, can I drag all 4 of them into the "list below" box, without any risk of losing everything I have already installed on the existing VR300?
    Or would I have to reinstall the OS, applications and software again?
    I mention this, because one of the applications, Personal accountz, has a label on its CD wallet stating that the Licence Key can only be used once, and I have already used it when I installed it on the existing VR300.
    QUESTION 2:
    I understand that the failure of just one drive will result in all the data in a Raid 0 array being lost.
    Does this mean that I would not be able to boot up from the 4 drive array in that scenario?
    Even so, it would be worth the risk to gain the optimum performance provide by Raid 0 over the other RAID setup options, and, in addition to the SE II, I will probably back up all my image files onto a portable drive as an additional precaution.
    QUESTION 3:
    Is it possible to create an eDrive partition, using TechTool Pro 5, on the VR300 in bay !?
    Or would this not be of any use anyway, in the event of a single drive failure?
    QUESTION 4:
    Would there be a significant increase in performance using a 4 x VR300 drive RAID 0 array, compared to only 2 or 3 drives?
    QUESTION 5:
    If I used a 3 x VR300 RAID 0 array, and installed either a cloned VR300 or the original 640GB HD in bay 4, and I left the Startup Disk in System Preferences unlocked, would the system boot up automatically from the 4th. drive in the event of a single drive failure in the 3 drive RAID 0 array which had been selected for startup?
    Apologies if these seem stupid questions, but I am trying to determine the best option without foregoing optimum performance.

    Well said.
    Steps to set up RAID
    Setting up a RAID array in Mac OS X is part of the installation process. This procedure assumes that you have already installed Mac OS 10.1 and the hard drive subsystem (two hard drives and a PCI controller card, for example) that RAID will be implemented on. Follow these steps:
    1. Open Disk Utility (/Applications/Utilities).
    2. When the disks appear in the pane on the left, select the disks you wish to be in the array and drag them to the disk panel.
    3. Choose Stripe or Mirror from the RAID Scheme pop-up menu.
    4. Name the RAID set.
    5. Choose a volume format. The size of the array will be automatically determined based on what you selected.
    6. Click Create.
    Recovering from a hard drive failure on a mirrored array
    1. Open Disk Utility in (/Applications/Utilities).
    2. Click the RAID tab. If an issue has occurred, a dialog box will appear that describes it.
    3. If an issue with the disk is indicated, click Rebuild.
    4. If Rebuild does not work, shut down the computer and replace the damaged hard disk.
    5. Repeat steps 1 and 2.
    6. Drag the icon of the new disk on top of that of the removed disk.
    7. Click Rebuild.
    http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2559
    Drive A + B = VOLUME ONE
    Drive C + D = VOLUME TWO
    What you put on those volumes is of course up to you and easy to do.
    A system really only needs to be backed up "as needed" like before you add or update or install anything.
    /Users can be backed up hourly, daily, weekly schedule
    Media files as needed.
    Things that hurt performance:
    Page outs
    Spotlight - disable this for boot drive and 'scratch'
    SCRATCH: Temporary space; erased between projects and steps.
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/StandardRAIDlevels
    (normally I'd link to Wikipedia but I can't load right now)
    Disk drives are the slowest component, so tackling that has always made sense. Easy way to make a difference. More RAM only if it will be of value and used. Same with more/faster processors, or graphic card.
    To help understand and configure your 2009 Nehalem Mac Pro:
    http://arstechnica.com/apple/reviews/2009/04/266ghz-8-core-mac-pro-review.ars/1
    http://macperformanceguide.com/
    http://www.macgurus.com/guides/storageaccelguide.php
    http://www.macintouch.com/readerreports/harddrives/index.html
    http://macperformanceguide.com/OptimizingPhotoshop-Configuration.html
    http://kb2.adobe.com/cps/404/kb404440.html

  • Can you move a software raid 1 from one mac to another

    I have a 2 disc software raid 1 on my powermac and I want to move it to my mac pro. Does anyone know if I can do this?

    It appears that in Mac OS X 10.4, and again in the transition to 10.7, RAID format may have undergone dramatic changes. If you are trying to move a RAID array across those boundaries, you may not have the best results moving the drives directly.

  • Moving Thunderbold DAS with software RAID 1 to different Mac

    Background:  I am preparing to wipe my iMac (currently Mavericks) to then do a clean install of Yosemite.  Attached to my iMac is a "WD MyBook Thunderbolt Duo".  This external "DAS" drive model is a single enclosure that contains two, 2TB physical drives, and attaches to the iMac with a single Thunderbolt cable.  I am not using any WesternDigital software on my iMac!  Instead, I have used Disk Utility to manage the drive and have created a single 2TB software RAID 1 array (HFS+Journaled) incorporating both of the 2 physical drives as slices.  The RAID 1 volume mounts as "DAS" on my Desktop and currently contains the majority of my media files.
    Before beginning the repartitioning, formatting, and doing a clean install of Yosemite on the iMac's internal HDD, I plan on disconnecting the DAS's thunderbolt cable so it's safe from the install process. 
    Question:  What I need to know is what to expect when I eventually reconnect the DAS to the new Yosemite installation.  Will my RAID 1 volume "DAS" simply mount on the desktop as expected?
    What I don't understand is where software RAID slice and volume configurations are stored.  Is the software RAID 1 configuration stored as part of the partition table on the drives themselves or is it stored on the Mac?  I am hoping to hear that the software RAID configuration is all on the drives themselves and therefore the drive can be reattached to a new Mac and it will just recognize the configuration and mount the volume normally with no additional effort.  Can someone please confirm this to ease my mind (or save me before I go ahead with this).
    Sorry to put this in the OS X Server forum but I thought that a software RAID question using Disk Utility would be best answered from the expertise here.
    I appreciate any info you can provide.

    Yes the software RAID configuration is stored on the drives themselves so it will be safe to disconnect from one Mac and reconnect to a second Mac.
    Note to others. Any Mac that supports Thunderbolt is going to be running a new enough version of OS X so as to not cause a problem.

  • Software Raid Inconsistent on a mac pro

    My software raid 0 array is sometimes slow, sometimes fast.  Using the Blackmagic disk speed test utility, it sometimes gets 97MB/s read speed, and sometimes 150MB/s read speed.  I ensure nothing else is running in the background between tests.  Another test I do is to duplicate a folder containing 1 gig of files.  Sometimes it takes twice as long to duplicate it.  Early 2008 Mac Pro, 8 cores, 8 gig mem, raid 0 is two 750gig Caviars (using the 4th internal bay for time machine) Disk utility reports all is clean.  Lion 10.7.1.  Rebuild array?  ideas?

    Mac OS X runs with main memory massively over-committed. Because of this, it often has to return to the Boot Drive to get a few pages of this or that. This activity moves the read/write heads ways from the data area on the data drive and kills RAID performance.
    If you have not done so already, you should consider creating a separate Boot Drive containing System, Library, Applications, and the hidden unix files including Paging/Swap. Move all User files off that drive, except one Admin User used only for Administration, not daily work.

  • Is it true any Mac Pro can do software RAID 0?

    I dont know why I never came across this, but is it true that any Mac Pro (or just macs in general??) can do software RAID 0 if you have two of the identical hard drives? Basically the OS handles everything and no special hardware or card is needed?
    If true, what would be the reason so little people do it for faster disk access??

    RAID Basics
    For basic definitions and discussion of what a RAID is and the different types of RAIDs see RAIDs. Additional discussions plus advantages and disadvantages of RAIDs and different RAID arrays see:
    RAID Tutorial;
    RAID Array and Server: Hardware and Service Comparison>.
    Hardware or Software RAID?
    RAID Hardware Vs RAID Software - What is your best option?
    RAID is a method of combining multiple disk drives into a single entity in order to improve the overall performance and reliability of your system. The different options for combining the disks are referred to as RAID levels. There are several different levels of RAID available depending on the needs of your system. One of the options available to you is whether you should use a Hardware RAID solution or a Software RAID solution.
    RAID Hardware is always a disk controller to which you can cable up the disk drives. RAID Software is a set of kernel modules coupled together with management utilities that implement RAID in Software and require no additional hardware.
    Pros and cons
    Software RAID is more flexible than Hardware RAID. Software RAID is also considerably less expensive. On the other hand, a Software RAID system requires more CPU cycles and power to run well than a comparable Hardware RAID System. Also, because Software RAID operates on a partition by partition basis where a number of individual disk partitions are grouped together as opposed to Hardware RAID systems which generally group together entire disk drives, Software RAID tends be slightly more complicated to run. This is because it has more available configurations and options. An added benefit to the slightly more expensive Hardware RAID solution is that many Hardware RAID systems incorporate features that are specialized for optimizing the performance of your system.
    For more detailed information on the differences between Software RAID and Hardware RAID you may want to read: Hardware RAID vs. Software RAID: Which Implementation is Best for my Application?

  • Mac Pro with software raid and upgrading to Snow Leopard

    Not sure if anyone else has experienced this but here goes. I have a mac pro with 4 500G drives using the onboard software raid. When I insert the Snow Leopard disk and try to install, it fails to find the raid. Is there a trick to get this to work?

    Thank you SSSOOO much Greg818. I was pulling my hair out over this problem. I even went so far as to do a full Leopard install with Snow Leopard update on a USB drive and them cloned it over to my RAID 0 array using SuperDuper hoping that this would solve the problem. It seemed to in the sense that the clone went fine but then when I would try and boot from the array I would get the Apple Logo and spinning wheel but it just kept spinning and spinning until finally the Apple logo was replaced by the Do Not Enter symbol(you know the circle with the slash through it).
    So came here and found this thread. Your solution worked like charm!!! Once again thank you so much... you saved me from being bald.

  • Using a Mac Pro w / Apple Internal Hardware RAID Card?

    Anyone using a Mac Pro with a Apple Hardware RAID Card 2010?
    ( I have a 12 Core )
    Is it worth the $600-700 ?
    How much faster than the software RAID 0?
    I see Hamm's RAID tips chart .. but it doesn't include such options .. plus it is based on a PC system.
    Any tips would be great ..
    I find many areas where the application is slow / unresponsive .. and I'm not sure where the bottleneck is ... Maybe the hardware RAID will solve it?
    I'm really am impressed with CS5 .. it would be even better with some adjustments .. but I am absolutely disappointed with sluggish performance on my top-of-the-line Mac Pro 12 Core.
    This is not what I expected for a $8,000 machine.
    Some users says that the port of CS5 for the Mac has taken a back seat to the Windows version at Adobe.
    I can't imagine that Adobe would not put 100% effort into Mac products.
    Go Team!!!

    I have a 2009 Mac Pro 3.33GHz Quad core w/ Apple RAID card, 16GB RAM from OWC, and Apple's Radeon HD 5870 GPU.
    I have RAID 0 set across 3x1TB drives internally, and the standard 640GB drive for OSX and all program files. I set all video assets, renders, previews and such on the 3TB RAID.
    This seems to work wonderfully. I built this system specifically to edit a feature film shot on P2 DVCProHD, and I've been impressed with how it handles it. This was all built prior to CS5, which took me by surprise. Had I known nVidia would become such a problem for Apple, I would have built a PC, but that's another story.
    I just started a new project in CS5 on the same system, this time using H.264 video from my Nikon D7000, and so far, it seems to play just as nicely, despite not having hardware acceleration via CUDA technology. Yellow bars on top, even. I haven't had any problems with clips taking a long time to populate on the timeline or any of that, so perhaps the RAID card helps there.
    All this aside, I've already decided to upgrade my RAID for another reason. Right now, my backup is performed via an eSATA-connected external drive through a PCI eSATA card. After every edit session, I dump everything on the RAID onto the external drive, and it goes much faster than the old FW800 transfer used to. I'm about to replace my Apple RAID card with an Areca card and set up a 4-bay RAID 3 via an SAS connection. This will allow for excellent data throughput while offering more security than my current RAID 0 / manual backup system, and free up the internal drives for backups, exports and render files.
    I believe in hardware RAID, but I'm not as knowledgeable as Harm and others are about it. I had my Mac built to order with the Apple RAID card, so I have no experience using Premiere with a software RAID. Due to my smooth experience using it, I think it was worth it, but plenty of people say the Apple RAID card is rubbish, and to go with Areca or Atto cards. I didn't know about them until after I built my system, and even though it will cost a couple thousand to upgrade my RAID from this point, I expect to have an even better system than I already have.
    I hope this helps, and feel free to ask any questions I didn't address.

  • Software RAID Failure - my experience and solution

    I just wanted to share this information with the iCloud community.
    I searched a bit and did not find much information that was useful with regard to my software RAID issue.
    I have 27 inch Mid 2011 iMac with SSD and Hard drive which has been great.
    I added an external hard drive (I think if I mention any brand name the moderator will delete this post) which includes an nice aluminum case with two 3 TB hard drives within it, and it has a big blue light on the front and is connected via Thunderbolt. This unit is about 2 years old and I have it configured in a 3 TB mirrored RAID (RAID 1) via a software RAID configured via Mac OS Disk Utility. 
    I had at one point a minor glitch which was fixed using another piece of software (again if I mention a brand the moderator will delete this post) which is like a 'Harddrive Fighter' or similar type name LOL.   So otherwise that RAID has served me well as a site for my Time Machine back up and Aperture Vault, etc.  (I created a 1.5 TB Sparse bundle for Time Machine so that the backup would not use the entire 3 TBs)
    I recently purchased a second aluminum block of drives, and set that up as a 4 TB RAID 1.
    Each of the two RAIDs are set with the option of “Automatically rebuild RAID mirror sets” checked.
    I put only about 400 gb on the new RAID to let it sit for a ‘burning in period.’
    A few days ago the monitoring software from the vendor who sells the aluminum block of drives told me I had a problem.  One of the drives had “Failed.”   The monitoring software strangely enough does not distinguish the drives so you can figure out which pair had the issue, so I assumed it was the New 8 TB model.  Long story short, it was the older 6 TB model, but that does not matter for this discussion.
    I contacted the vender and this is part of their response.
    “This is an indication that the Disk Utility application in Mac had a momentary problem communicating with the drive mechanism. As a result, it marked that drive as "failed" in the header information. Unfortunately, once this designation is applied to a drive by the OS, the Disk Utility will thereafter refuse to attempt any further operations with that disk until the incorrect "failed" marker is manually cleared off the drive.”
    That did not sound very good to me…..back up killed by a SOFTWARE GLITCH?
    “The solution is to remove the corrupted volume header, and allow the generation of a new one….This command will need to be done for each disk in the array… (using Terminal)…
    diskutil zerodisk (identifier)
    …3. After everything is finished, you should be able to exit Terminal, and go back into the Disk Utility Application to re-configure the RAID array on the device.”
    Furthermore they said.
    “If the Disk Utility has placed a flag into the RAID array header (which exists on both drives) then performing this procedure on a single drive will not correct anything.”
    And…
    “When a drive actually does fail, it typically stops appearing in the Disk Utility application altogether. In that circumstance, it will never be marked "failed" by the Disk Utility, so the header erase operation is not needed.”
    This all sounded like a bad idea to me. And what does the Vendors RAID monitor software say then?  “Disk Really Really FAILED, check for a fire.”
    As I tried to figure out which drive was actually the bad RAID pair I stumbled on a solution.
    First I noted that the OS Disk Utility did NOT show a fault in the RAID. It listed both RAIDS as “Online.’ Thus no rebuilding was needed and it did not begin the rebuild process.
    The Vendors disk monitor software saw some fault, but Mac was still able to read and write to the RAID, both disks in the mirror.  I wrote a folder to the RAID and with various rebooting steps I pulled the “Bad” drive and looked at the “Good” Drive….the folder was there…I put the Bad drive back in and pulled the Good Drive and the folder was there on the “bad” drive.  So it wrote to both drives.  AND THE VENDORS MONITORING SOFTWARE SHOWED THE PREVIOUSLY LABELED ‘BAD’ DRIVE AS ‘GOOD’ AND THE MISSING DRIVE SLOT AS ‘BAD’.
    My stumbled FIX.   I moved a bunch of files off the failed RAID to the new RAID  but before I moved the sparse bundle, a folder of 500 gigs movies and some other really big folders the DISK UTILITY WINDOW (which I still had open) now showed that the RAID had a Defect and began rebuilding the mirror set itself, out of the blue!   I don't know why this happened.  But moving about 1/2 of the data off of it perhaps did something?  Any Ideas?
    This process took a few hours as best I can tell (let it run overnight) and the next day the RAID was fine and the Vendors RAID monitor did not show a fault any longer.
    So, the Vendors RAID monitoring software reporting a “FAILED” drive without any specific error codes to look up.  Perhaps they could have more info for the user on the specific fault?  The support line of the the Vendor said with certainty “the Volume Header is corrupted” and THE ONLY FIX is to completely ZERO THE DRIVE! This was not necessary as it turns out.
    And the stick in the eye to me…..
    “I've also sometimes seen the drives get marked as "failed" by the disk utility due to a shaky connection. In some cases, swapping the ends of the Thunderbolt cable will help with this. Something to try, perhaps, if your problems come back. “
    Ya Right…..
    Mike

    Follow up.
    After going through the Zeroing process and rebuilding the RAID set three times, with various configurations, LaCie finally agreed to repair the unit under warrantee.
    I tried swapping the power supplies and thunderbolt wires, tried taking the drive out of series with the newer big brother of it.  And it still failed after a few days.
    I just wanted to share more of what I learned with regard to rebuilding the RAID sets via the Terminal.  The commands can be typed partially and a help paragraph will come up to give VERY cryptic descriptions of the proper use of the commands.
    First Under terminal you can used the command "diskutil appleRAID list" to list those drives which are in the RAID.  This gives you the ID number for each physical drive. For example:
    AppleRAID sets (1 found)
    ===============================================================================
    Name:                 LaCie RAID 3TB
    Unique ID:            84A93ADF-A7CA-4E5A-B8AE-8B4A8A6960CA
    Type:                 Mirror
    Status:               Online
    Size:                 3.0 TB (3000248991744 Bytes)
    Rebuild:              manual
    Device Node:          disk4
    #  DevNode   UUID                                  Status     Size
    0  disk3s2   D53F6A81-89F1-4FB3-86A9-8808006683C2  Online     3000248991744
    -  disk2s2   E58CA8F5-1D2C-423A-B4BE-FBAA80F85879  Spare      3000248991744
    ===============================================================================
    In my situation with the failed RAID, I had an extra disk in this with the status of Missing/Failed. 
    The command is "diskutil appleRAID remove" and the cryptic help paragraph says:
    Usage:  diskutil appleRAID remove MemberDeviceName|MemberUUID
            RAIDSetVolumePath|RAIDSetDeviceName|RAIDSetUUID
    MemberDeviceName|MemberUUID  is the number listed in the "diskutil appleRAID List" command,  and
    RAIDSetVolumePath|RAIDSetDeviceName|RAIDSetUUID is the Device Node for the RAID which here is /dev/disk4.
    I used this command to remove the third entry (missing/failed), I did not copy the terminal window text on that one, so I cannot show the list of three disks.
    I could not get to remove the disk2s2 disk listed as SPARE, as it gave an error message:
    Michaels-iMac:~ mike_aronis$ diskutil appleraid remove E58CA8F5-1D2C-423A-B4BE-FBAA80F85879 /dev/disk4
    Started RAID operation on disk4 LaCie RAID 3TB
    Removing disk from RAID
    Changing the disk type
    Can't resize the file system on the disk "disk2s2"
    Error: -69827: The partition cannot be resized
    But I was able to remove it using the graphical interface Disk Utility program using the delete key.
    I then rebuilt the RAID set by dragging the second drive back into the RAID set.
    I could not get the command: "diskutil appleRAID update AutoRebuild 1 /dev/disk4" to work, because even though it was trying to execute it HUNG.  I put the two drives into my newer LaCie 2big as my attempt at further trouble shooting the RAID (this was not suggested by LaCie tech), rebuild the RAID and now I am going to leave it setup that way for a few days before I ship it back to just see if the old drives work fine in the new RAID box (thus proving the RAID box is the problem). I tried the AutoRebuild 1 command just now and it gave an error.
    Michaels-iMac:~ mike_aronis$ diskutil appleraid update autorebuild 1 /dev/disk4
    Error updating RAID: Couldn't modify RAID (-69848)
    Michaels-iMac:~ mike_aronis$
    In my haste to rebuild the RAID set for the third or forth time as LaCie led me through the testing this and test that phase, I forgot to click the "Auto Rebuild" option in the Disk Utility program.
    Question for the more experienced:
    As I was working on this issue, I notice that each time I rebooted and did work in the Terminal (with and without the RAID plugged in to the thunderbolt connection) I notice that the list of drives would change and my main boot drive would not stay listed as drive 0!  Some times it would be drive 0, sometimes the RAID would be listed as Drive 0.  It's strange to me...I would have thought the designation for Drive0 and Drive1 would always be my two build in drives (SSD and spinning drive).
    Mike

  • Software RAID issue

    I have just installed 2-200 GB seagate hd's into my machine and set them up as a software raid 0. Also installed is the original 80 GB drive and a Hitachi 160 GB drive. The two new drives functioned long enough for me to copy all of my raw digital home video.
    Now, when I try to boot the grey Apple screen comes up and the machine hangs. When I disconnect the drives, it boots right up.
    I thought maybe my power supply was giving up the ghost until I reconnected them and successfully rebooted with Drive Genius 1.2. I rebuilt the raid set (maintaining all data) and rebooted into OSX successfully. Woohoo!
    But not so fast. Next reboot started the same thing. And now Drive Genius has no effect.
    I really dont wan't to lose the data on these drives. Is there a problem with the software raid in 10.4.7? Any ideas of other things to try? Help?!?!
    Thanks,
    Andy
    G4 1.25DP FW800   Mac OS X (10.4.7)  
    G4 1.25DP FW800   Mac OS X (10.4.7)  

    Possibly a couple things that "aren't quite right" with your setup.
    SoftRAID 3.5 supports mirror for boot drive, but not with stripped.
    The two IDE buses are not identical, making for some slight problems with RAID on the two.
    You really can't RAID if both drives are together in one drive cage on the same IDE bus.
    You need a PCI controller to RAID in MDD. Most people at this point in time opt for Serial ATA drives and controller. If you want a bootable SATA drive...
    http://www.firmtek.com/seritek
    If you must boot from stripped RAID (not always a good idea and may not offer much actually in real world performance, check www.barefeats.com for some tests for one).
    A dedicated boot drive for OS/Apps and use other drives for media, data, scratch, even for /users.
    Two ATA drives on the same bus, have to share the bus, contend for I/O.
    You can create a stripe raid with Disk Utility and boot.
    I assume that you read the SoftRAID QuickStart and Manual which really are helpful. There are a number of sites etc that can go into more about RAID.

  • Can I install Snow Leopard and boot from software RAID 1 (mirror)?

    I have a Mac Pro (quad core 2.66 GHz) on order for my office workstation. Yeah, I know new ones are probably coming out early next year but due to budget and upcoming projects I need one now. What I'd like to do is replace the pre-installed 640GB drive with two 1 TB drives and mirror them. The 640GB drive will be redeployed to another machine in the office. Can I boot from the Snow Leopard install DVD, go to Disk Utility, setup a RAID 1 with the two drives, install Snow Leopard to the mirror and then boot off the mirror set?
    I've searched and found offhand comments to the effect that installing to and booting from a software mirror is OK, but I'd like to know for sure that it's OK. Any experience that you have with such a configuration would be nice to hear.

    Yes. But before you do read the following:
    RAID Basics
    For basic definitions and discussion of what a RAID is and the different types of RAIDs see RAIDs. Additional discussions plus advantages and disadvantages of RAIDs and different RAID arrays see:
    RAID Tutorial;
    RAID Array and Server: Hardware and Service Comparison>.
    Hardware or Software RAID?
    RAID Hardware Vs RAID Software - What is your best option?
    RAID is a method of combining multiple disk drives into a single entity in order to improve the overall performance and reliability of your system. The different options for combining the disks are referred to as RAID levels. There are several different levels of RAID available depending on the needs of your system. One of the options available to you is whether you should use a Hardware RAID solution or a Software RAID solution.
    RAID Hardware is always a disk controller to which you can cable up the disk drives. RAID Software is a set of kernel modules coupled together with management utilities that implement RAID in Software and require no additional hardware.
    Pros and cons
    Software RAID is more flexible than Hardware RAID. Software RAID is also considerably less expensive. On the other hand, a Software RAID system requires more CPU cycles and power to run well than a comparable Hardware RAID System. Also, because Software RAID operates on a partition by partition basis where a number of individual disk partitions are grouped together as opposed to Hardware RAID systems which generally group together entire disk drives, Software RAID tends be slightly more complicated to run. This is because it has more available configurations and options. An added benefit to the slightly more expensive Hardware RAID solution is that many Hardware RAID systems incorporate features that are specialized for optimizing the performance of your system.
    For more detailed information on the differences between Software RAID and Hardware RAID you may want to read: Hardware RAID vs. Software RAID: Which Implementation is Best for my Application?

  • How to restore a software raid mirror after a drive failure

    i set up a software raid mirror with two hard drives in a mac pro. then one failed as reported by disk utility. i replaced the drive. it does not seem possible to restore this raid short of copying the files to a third location and then erasing and establishing a new raid. is there a way to simply "restore"?

    Question: Do I need special software to administer the Mac Pro RAID Card or the Xserve RAID Card?
    Answer: Normal administration can be carried out using the RAID Utility (found in /Application/Utilities) or by using the raidutil command. For more information refer to the User’s Guide or man raidutil.
    The command-line utility should be available in Single-User mode.
    To run RAID Utility, you may need to boot to an alternate source of Mac OS to be able to manipulate the Boot drive.
    This article suggests using the Make Spare command:
    RAID Utility 1.0 Help > If a Disk Fails
    Message was edited by: Grant Bennet-Alder

  • Can I install boot camp on a machine with a Software Raid-0?

    I have a machine with a software Raid-0 running Snow Leopard. I'd like to install Boot Camp but I only have 2 SATA hard drives. Windows does not need to run in a RAID on this machine and I'm fine partitioning both drives so that I have a 30GB Windows 7 partition. Both drives are 500GB each.
    Can I partition each drive with -30GB run a software raid and still use bootcamp?
    Please let me know.

    No, and 30GB is too small for Windows 7 64-bit Pro for your Mac.
    Get a 3rd drive. Assuming this is a Mac Pro you have 4 internal drive bays.

  • Apple software RAID 0 not spinning down while not in use

    I have a G-Tech G-RAID w/ Thunderbolt, 8TB external enclosure.  It has two 4TB fujitsu drives in it, set up as RAID 0 with Apple's Disk Utility v13 (426) that ships with 10.8 Mountain Lion.  This is attached to a very cleanly installed Mid 2011 Mac Mini, which is acting as a media server.  There is basically no 3rd party software on it, because it's acting as a NFS filer server for streaming digital players around the house.
    However, I have the G-RAID set to spin down when possible in energy saver, and it's not.  It never spins down.  I have 4 external drives on this media server, ranging from USB to FW800 to the Thunderbolt drive, all from different manufacturers, and different sizes and models.  All the other drives spin down after 10 minutes.
    Not only is the checkbox "Put hard disks to sleep when possible" checked in Energy Saver, but a
    pmset -g
    reveals that the "disksleep" is set to 10 (min).
    In frustration, I have tried a lot of things including (but not limited to) removing all other hard drives and hardware, starting up with shift held (safe boot) and removing any software at all that I thought would be keeping the drive "alive."
    Finally I decided to start monitoring the drive with fs_usage, to see if I could suss out what is keeping this one drive alive.
    "fs_usage | grep DISKNAME" reveals that SystemUIServer is accessing the drive every minute, about seven times in a clump.  Considering that SystemUIServer is the peice of software that controls the little menu add-ons to the right of the menubar, I have spend a great deal of time trying to figure out what would use SystemUIServer that is accessing this drive.
    Now it's true that this drive is set up as a time machine drive, but I have disabled time machine, and spotlight, and still I get the same SystemUIServer accesses every minute.  Here is a fs_usage dump:
    orion:~ seanb$ sudo fs_usage | grep Betelgeuse
    Password:
    15:53:16  getattrlist       /Volumes/Betelgeuse     0.000029   SystemUIServ
    15:53:16  getattrlist       /Volumes/Betelgeuse     0.000011   SystemUIServ
    15:53:16  getattrlist       /Volumes/Betelgeuse     0.000017   SystemUIServ
    15:53:16  getattrlist       /Volumes/Betelgeuse     0.000010   SystemUIServ
    15:53:16  getattrlist       /Volumes/Betelgeuse     0.000008   SystemUIServ
    15:53:16  getattrlist       /Volumes/Betelgeuse     0.000010   SystemUIServ
    15:53:16  statfs64          /Volumes/Betelgeuse     0.000017   SystemUIServ
    15:54:16  getattrlist       /Volumes/Betelgeuse     0.000025   SystemUIServ
    15:54:16  getattrlist       /Volumes/Betelgeuse     0.000007   SystemUIServ
    15:54:16  getattrlist       /Volumes/Betelgeuse     0.000011   SystemUIServ
    15:54:16  getattrlist       /Volumes/Betelgeuse     0.000011   SystemUIServ
    15:54:16  getattrlist       /Volumes/Betelgeuse     0.000009   SystemUIServ
    15:54:16  getattrlist       /Volumes/Betelgeuse     0.000010   SystemUIServ
    15:54:17  statfs64          /Volumes/Betelgeuse     0.000014   SystemUIServ
    15:55:17  getattrlist       /Volumes/Betelgeuse     0.000062   SystemUIServ
    15:55:17  getattrlist       /Volumes/Betelgeuse     0.000013   SystemUIServ
    15:55:17  getattrlist       /Volumes/Betelgeuse     0.000024   SystemUIServ
    15:55:17  getattrlist       /Volumes/Betelgeuse     0.000010   SystemUIServ
    15:55:17  getattrlist       /Volumes/Betelgeuse     0.000009   SystemUIServ
    15:55:17  getattrlist       /Volumes/Betelgeuse     0.000010   SystemUIServ
    15:55:17  statfs64          /Volumes/Betelgeuse     0.000014   SystemUIServ
    As you can see, it's the same seven drive accesses every minute.  This is NOT occuring with any of my other drives.  Now, here comes my wild conjecture.  Is this something the system does because they are RAID slices?  Do OS X software RAID slices check themselves every minute? This seems to be preventing them from sleeping.
    Any help would be appreciated, I'm going nuts here.
    Sean

    The second column in your fs_usage report says that iStat Menus is what is accessing your disk (Istat64).  Disable iStat Menus and I bet your issue will go away.  I know there is a module in iStat Menus to monitor drive space, but if I recall correctly, even if that module is disabled, iStat has a habit of checking drives anyhow.  I remember hearing people getting rid of istat menus in order to allow their HDs to sleep propely.
    In fact, and easy way to test this would be to reboot your Mac with the shift key held down until you see your desktop load up.  This will prevent 3rd party add-ons from loading like iStat Menus. Let me know if that works.
    Unfortunatrly this is not the problem I am having, as I've booted with shift, and I still see the  "getattrlist" accesses in my fs_usage report.
    EDIT: stupid font made your report look like iStat when it was Lstat.  So what I said about iStat Menus is probably incorrect.  But using the shift key to boot could still lead you to the correct anwer.  I'm doing testing on my end as well. Let you know if I see anything that pertains to your issue.  (I got an Lstat entry in my fs_usage when I open the drive during testing, but I have not beeing getting them an regular intervals like you do.  I would still guess that you have 3rd party software that is checking on drives periodically, and that holding shift might suss that out.)
    Message was edited by: Cheule

  • Migrating Software RAID 1 ?!

    Hello all, i just installed my new SSD on which i'm doing a fresh install of my OS, although have now run into an issue with regaining the software raid 1 i had setup on 2 external drives with the old OS. Can i possibly migrate this raid 1 to the fresh OS??the drives are not coming up at all at the moment but if i boot the old OS disk they appear as normal.
    any help would be great
    thanks

    Did a bit more research, SCSI and storage use to be my hobby, and Mac Pro my passion. So I tried to dig into this further. SSD is very popular and people want to have 2 x SSDs along with 3-4 traditional mechanical hard drives. I just don't see going with an external type solution.
    Short answer: ain't gonna boot.
    You want a mirror - that should be fine.
    I was not familiar at all with one item, but I advise people to not put USB/FW cases on SATA controllers, too many problems and issues.
    *Raidon 4bay 19in 1ru esata enclusure*
    Like this?
    http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Raidon/SR4WBS2/
    Is the controller one of the very few that are bootable? most are not.
    To be bootable, the card would have to have Mac EFI firmware. Also, the EFI ROM version can "interfere" with support for cards and being bootable.
    There are always drivers and firmware when it comes to booting. It is suppose to be "driver-less." translation: built into OS X 10.5.x and later.
    NewerTech use Marvell chipset. I can say their 6G chipset which you can google and see who else uses them. I just picked up Marvell based 6G 2-port. So interested in why MINE is having trouble (conflicts with Sonnet Silicon Image most likely). I have a couple Sonnet cards, E4P and E2P, and there are drivers.
    the Caldigit Fasta-2E is not bootable with the Mac Pro. In addition, while most FirmTek controllers are bootable with the PowerMac G4 and G5, they are not bootable with the Apple Mac Pro. Bootable External drives Mac Pro?
    *NewerTech MAXPower eSATA 6G*
    +Does NOT support booting on any Macintosh platform.+
    http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Newer%20Technology/MXPCIE6GS2/
    Or this one,
    *eSATA 6G PCIe 2.0 RAID Capable Controller Card*
    http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Newer%20Technology/MXPCIE6GRS/
    http://www.newertech.com/products/pcieraidesata.php
    Reviewed here (and this should be req'd site to check also for Mac Pro owners)
    http://macperformanceguide.com/Reviews-MAXPowereSATA6G.html
    http://www.xlr8yourmac.com/IDE/NewerTech6GeSATA/Newertech6GeSataCard.html
    There is also FirmTek.
    http://firmtek.com/seritek/seritek-2me4-e/perform/
    http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Firmtek/SATAE6G/
    Highpoint has always depended on driver.
    Popular kit to install two SSDs in optical drive bay:
    http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Other%20World%20Computing/MM352A52MP9/
    External dual drive (SATA only, which is what I use and want for native SATA speeds)
    http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Other%20World%20Computing/MESATATBEK/?APC=XLR8You rMac09
    The ideal would be to boot off the two SSDs, and yes it would help to have a PCIe with internal ports, then use them in stripe RAID, not mirror (you can backup the OS and have a clone on external FW800; on sparse disk image of 100GB; on a small internal drive even), and when it changes.
    http://www.xlr8yourmac.com/IDE/SSDin_Mac_Pro/SSD_install_inMacPro.htm#storytop
    For an internal controller, HPT RR640 IF it was supported at all on Mac
    http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816115077
    http://www.tweaktown.com/reviews/3309/highpointrocketraid_640_sata_6gb_s_4_port_pci_e_2_0controller/index.html
    http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2011/01/04/high-point-rocketraid-640-review/5
    To boot in 64-bit mode, all drivers and even some application plug-ins I believe have to be 64-bit, but not everything is 64-bit mode compatible.
    one SSD in optical drive bay for system
    no need to mirror
    no controller
    use the 2nd for scratch or an expensive off line backup
    If the SSD fails, swap out, use clone, rebuild and restore.
    No meed for mirror, AND disks writes are where SSDs can suffer and slow down.
    But DO consider SoftRAID 4.x, great support for SSDs and driver even for non-RAID, but their mirror RAID is a notch above.
    http://www.softraid.com
    I found Highpoint RR Quad on Apple Store:
    Is this compatible with the new 2010 Mac Pros? bootable?
    http://store.apple.com/us/product/H1113LL/A#compatibility
    I think you would get more mac pro owners to read and help in Mac Pro forum. And don't forget to stop by and check XLR8YOURMAC web site for news and tips about hardware upgrades and reports.

Maybe you are looking for