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HOWTO: Expand a RAID 5 by adding another disk

06/12/09

HOWTO: Expand a RAID 5 by adding another disk

So you already have a RAID 5 array and you want to make it bigger. You can either swap out each disk one at a time for a larger disk or simply add an new disk to the existing array. When I say simply there is a scary bit at the end.

TIP:Install VMware and play around with RAID drives using a virtual guest first. You can create a miniature copy of your own real system and then make a copy of that before testing out these RAID configurations.

Ok, so you have a VMware test system or you have complete backups of your system. Now read all this HOWTO before doing anything.


Assuming your existing RAID 5 array has 3 disks (sdb1, sdc1, sdd1) and is called md0. You will need to install the new drive and then partition it and set the ID to 0xDA - Non-fs data or 0xFD - Linux raid autodetect, ready for use and then add the new disk to the array.

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