Proper procedure for replacing drive in Xserve RAID RAID5 set

I've got a five-drive RAID-5 set (with a sixth hot spare) in an Xserve RAID running the 1.5/1.50f firmware. One of the drives in the RAID-5 set has an amber/orange status light on and has been getting occasional errors like to following:
Timestamp: 11/10/10 10:34:53 AM
Priority: Warning
Controller: Upper Controller
Type: 112
Event ID: 1000
Event: Disk 5 Reported An Error. COMMAND:0x35 ERROR:0x10 STATUS:0x51 LBA:0x19B80
Description: The drive reported an ATA error. This is a failure in the communication from the RAID Controller to the drive.
I have double checked the drives in RAID Admin and, as the drive is only in a warning state, the hot spare has not been pulled into the RAID set yet. As this is an old drive, I'd like to replace that particular drive first. I have a current, full backup of the data, but want to make sure I understand the process correctly.
I understand the "Installing or Replacing an Apple Drive Module" section of http://manuals.info.apple.com/en/XserveRAID_UserGuide.PDF, but it and RAID Admin's built-in help don't describe what will happen when replacing a drive in a RAID set that has a hot spare. When I pull out the drive and replace it, will it correctly use the newly inserted drive or will it use the hot spare? If it uses the hot spare, will the hot spare revert back to a hot spare once the new drive is inserted or will it permanently become a member of the RAID set and need to be moved to the original drive's slot? Or, should I just pull out the hot spare, pull out the failing drive, and pop the hot spare into the failing drive's slot?

Hello, makkintosshu, and welcome to the AppleBoards,
If you pull out the drive the RAID should/will immediately start rebuilding using the hot spare. The hot spare will become a new permanent member of the RAID and the new replacement drive will become the new hot spare. The physical slot locations of the drives don't matter you can build a RAID from any combination of drives as long as they are on the same side.
If you pull the hot spare and then the failing drive the RAID will wait for a new drive before taking action. I find it hard to recommend this course of action unless there is a really good reason for you not wanting the hot spare to become part of the RAID. Rebuilding is going to take a good long while and you want it to start as soon as possible - as long as the RAID is not rebuilt your data is at risk. Letting the RAID rebuild hang as you physically swap out the failed the drive strikes me as bad idea that needs a really good justification.
HTH,
=Tod

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