Raid 5 questions

[P4Clock]

So.. i have 4 1tb WD blacks sitting in raid 5 in my plex server.
with raid 5 do all drives have to match? i just picked up 2 samsung's with the same spec's but obvious not the same drives..

also can you add more drives into raid 5 or would i have to scrap the old set up and start again.? (not really an option)

 

[bledd]

Being that small, I would sell them and start with 4tb minimum drives.

If you're decided on keeping them, I'd look at Stablebit Drivepool. It's a software based pooling solution that effectively works like raid5 for your purposes. There's a trial for it.

Very easy to use and very powerful.

 

[skyripper]

also can you add more drives into raid 5 or would i have to scrap the old set up and start again.? (not really an option)

Entirely depends on the Raid controller. Expensive enterprise Raid controllers allow you to expand an array with more drives, or if you are really patient, swap each drive for a bigger one and when they are all bigger - expand the capacity of the array that way.

I'd just look at a mirror of 2 bigger drives instead. Raid5's when they crap out are a pain to recover from. (I am currently guilty of having a 3 drive ZFS array which is essentially the same as a RAID5) for my movies and backups.

 

[P4Clock]

thanks for info lads, i dont think my smart array p800 will let me add drivers so i think for now i will drop the two new drivers into raid0 just to dump stuff onto.
i think it may be time to invest into some new tech