Configuring The Hard Disk Drive; Disk Configurations - Acer Altos easyStore M2 User Manual

232

Configuring the hard disk drive

The storage system supports up to four 3.5-inch hot-swappable SATA
hard disk drives (HDDs).

Disk configurations

The storage system supports various types of disk configurations,
including RAID (redundant array of independent disks), a disk
subsystem that can increase performance, provide data protection, or
both.
• Linear — A linear configuration is similar to using multiple HDDs in
a regular computer. Each HDD is an independent entity, and the
data on it is self-contained. You can add or remove the HDDs
without affecting the other HDDs. All the available disk space is
used for data.
If your storage system has only one HDD, you must use a linear
configuration. However, you can use a linear configuration for
two, three, or four HDDs as well.
• RAID 0 — Instead of writing all the data to one HDD in a linear
fashion, some bytes are written to one HDD, and other bytes are
written to another. Performance is faster because reading and
writing activities can occur on multiple HDDs simultaneously. All
the available disk space is used for data.
For RAID 0, your storage system must have at least two HDDs.
However, you can use RAID 0 with three or four HDDs as well, and
the HDDs can be any size.
• RAID 1 — In this configuration, all the data written to one HDD is
duplicated on the other HDD. This offers greater data protection
since if one HDD fails, all your data is still intact on the other HDD.
However, using RAID 1 means only half your available disk space is
used for data; the other half is used for a duplicate (mirror) of that
data.
You can use RAID 1 only if your storage system has only two HDDs.
If the HDDs are not the same size, the smaller of the two HDDs is
used for data, and the larger of the two HDDs is used as the
mirror.
If one HDD fails, the other HDD continues to make its data
available.
8 Configuring the storage system