IBM-AUSTRIA - PC-HW-Support    30 Aug 1999

Defining Logical Drives

1.  Select Define Logical drive from the  Create/Delete Array menu. The following screen  appears, the cursor is active in the Array list.

    
   

2.  Use the Up Arrow (  ) key or the Down Arrow (  )  key to highlight the array you want to define,  then press Enter.  The Select RAID Level pop-up window appears, and  the cursor is active in the window.

   NOTE:   The system automatically assigns RAID level 0 to any  logical drives defined  in an array containing only one hard disk drive. When this is the case,  the Select RAID Level pop-up window will not appear.

    If you have only two hard disk drives in the array, the Select RAID  Level pop-up window  appears, but RAID level 5 is not  selectable because you need at least three  hard disk drives in an array to assign RAID level 5 to  one of the logical drives.  You can define more than one logical drive for the array. The only restriction is that the maximum  number of logical drives you can define is eight.

3.  Use the Up Arrow (  ) key or  the Down Arrow (  )  key to highlight the RAID level you want to assign to these logical  drives,  then press Enter.

    
   NOTE:   Because the level you assign can influence the space  needed for the drive,  you must assign a RAID level before you enter the size of  the logical drive.

    The Logical Drive list  contains  the logical drive ID,  the size of  each logical drive, the RAID level you assigned to that logical  drive, and the date that the logical drive was created.

    The status of the logical drive also is shown. Good means that  all is well with the drive. Critical means that you must  replace the hard disk drive or do a rebuild operation.  (You will have received a message  telling you what has happened to the drive.) Offline means  that the logical drive is unrecoverable, the data on that drive  is lost.

    The Logical Drive Size pop-up window shows the  space in the array that is available for logical drives.

    
   

4.  Type the size, in megabytes, that you want for the logical drive, then  press Enter. A pop-up window appears  asking you to confirm  your action.

    Information about the new logical drive  appears in the Logical Drive  list.

   NOTE:   The size appearing in the Logical Drive list might be different  from the size you typed. (binary equivalent)  The size of a logical drive is determined by a number of factors,  but basically the size must be divisible by the number of drives in  the array.

    Consider the  following scenarios:

   Example 1: 
    The array consists of three 1GB drives.  You assign RAID level 0 (which  uses all the drives in the array with no parity storage), and type 1000MB . The number in the Size (MB) field  will be 999, which is the number closest to and  lower than 1000 that is divisible by 3.

   Example 2: 
    The array consists of three 1GB drives, and you assign RAID level 5.  Data is striped across all three drives in the array, but the space  equivalent to that of one drive is used for  parity storage.  Therefore, if you  type 1000MB , the number in the Size (MB) field  remains 1000 because it is  divisible by 2 (drives), which  is the space available for data.

    If you do not use the entire array for this logical drive, you can  create another by assigning either the same or a different  RAID level for an additional logical drive.  You can have as many as eight  logical drives among four disk arrays.

5.  To return to the Create/Delete Array menu, press Esc.  To define  more logical drives, repeat steps 1 through 5 of this procedure.
6.  To leave this screen, select Exit  or press Esc.  A pop-up window appears asking you to confirm your action.
7.  To save the changes, select Yes.  To maintain the disk-array configuration that was in  place before you made changes,  select No.
8.  If you are using  RAID level 1 or RAID level 5, you  must select Initialize logical  drive for proper operation . This sets the drive to a  predetermined state. Any data existing on the drive is overwritten  with zeros, and corresponding parity is  initialized to the correct value.
   1.  Select Initialize/synchronize array from the Main  Menu, then select Initialize logical drive.
   2.  Select the logical drives you want to initialize  from the Logical Drive list by pressing  the Spacebar (the selected drives will appear highlighted).  To start the initialization, press Enter.  A pop-up window appears asking you to confirm your action.

          If you select Yes in the Confirm pop-up  window, information in the  logical drive will be overwritten with zeros.

   3.  Select Yes to confirm that you want to initialize this  logical drive.

       The initialization process begins, and you can see its progress in the Pct. Int. (Percent Initialized)  column of the Logical Drive list.

   4.  To stop the initialization at any time, press Esc.  Then press Esc again to return to the menu,  or press Enter to continue initializing the drive.

9.  To back up the disk-array configuration to diskette,  you will need a 3.5-inch formatted  diskette.  To back up the disk-array configuration:
   1.  Select Advanced functions from the Main Menu.
   2.  Select Backup config. to diskette.

       Follow the instructions on the screen.  A pop-up window shows  the default file name of CONFIG. You can change the file  name by typing over the default.  The Backup program will assign a  file-name extension of .dmc .

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