RAID LEVELS
Basic functions
At the very simplest level, RAID combines multiple hard drives into a single logical unit. Thus, instead of seeing several differenthard drives, theoperating systemsees only one. RAID is typically used on servercomputers, and is usually (but not necessarily)
implemented with identically sized disk drives. With decreases in hard drive prices and wider availability of RAID options built intomotherboardchipsets, RAID is also being found and offered as an option in more advanced personal computers. This is especiallytrue in computers dedicated to storage-intensive tasks, such as video and audio editing.
History
titled "System for recovering data stored in failed memoryunit" and theclaims for thispatent describe what would later be termed RAID 5 with fullstripe writes. This 1978 patent also
mentions that disk mirroring or duplexing (what would later be termed RAID 1) and protection with dedicated parity (that wouldlater be termed RAID 4) wereprior artat that time.The original RAID specification suggested a number of prototype "RAID levels", or combinations of disks. Each had theoreticaladvantages and disadvantages. Over the years, different implementations of the RAID concept have appeared. Most differsubstantially from the original idealized RAID levels, but the numbered names have remained. This can be confusing, since oneimplementation of RAID 5, for example, can differ substantially from another. RAID 3 and RAID 4 are often confused and even usedinterchangeably.RAID technology was first defined byDavid A. Patterson,Garth A. Gibsonand Randy Katzat theUniversity of California, Berkeley
in 1987. They studied the possibility of using two or more disks to appear as a single device to the host system and published a
paper:
"A case for Redundant Arrays of Inexpensive Disks (RAID)"
in June 1988 at theSIGMOD conference.
Their paper formallydefined RAID levels 1 through 5:
•
section 7: "First Level RAID: Mirrored Disks"
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section 8: "Second Level RAID: Hamming Code forError Correction"
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section 9: "Third Level RAID: Single Check Disk Per Group"
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section 10: "Fourth Level RAID: Independent Reads and Writes"
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section 11: "Fifth Level RAID: Spread data/parity over all disks (no single check disk)"Their paper is also the origination of the term "RAID", to which the second meaning "Independent" for the "I" has been since used.
The very definition of RAID has been argued over the years. The use of the term
redundant
leads many to object to RAID 0 beingcalled a RAID at all.
Similarly, the change from
inexpensive
to
independent
confuses many as to the intended purpose of RAID.
]
There are even some single-disk implementations of the RAID concept.
For the purpose of this article, it is best to assume that any system which employs the basic RAID concepts to combine physicaldisk space for purposes of reliability, capacity, or performance is a RAID system.
RAID implementationsHardware vs. software
The distribution of data across multiple disks can be managed by either dedicated hardware or bysoftware.Additionally, there are
hybrid RAIDs that are partially software AND hardware-based solutions.With a software implementation, theoperating system manages the disks of the array through the normal drive controller
(IDE/ATA, SATA, SCSI,Fibre Channel, etc.). With present CPU speeds, software RAID can be faster than hardware RAID
,thoughat the cost of using CPU power which might be best used for other tasks. One major exception is where the hardwareimplementation of RAID incorporates a battery backed-up write backcachewhich can speed up an application, such as an OLTP
database server. In this case, the hardware RAID implementation flushes the write cache to secure storage to preserve data at aknown point if there is a crash. The hardware approach is faster than accessing the disk drive and limited by RAM speeds, the rateat which the cache can be mirrored to another controller, the amount of cache and how fast it can flush the cache to disk. For thisreason, battery-backed caching disk controllers are often recommended for high transaction rate database servers. In the samesituation, the software solution is limited to no more flushes than the number of rotations or seeks per second of the drives.Another disadvantage of a pure software RAID is that, depending on the disk that fails and the boot arrangements in use, thecomputer may not be able to be rebooted until the array has been rebuilt.
A hardware implementation of RAID requires at a minimum a special-purposeRAID controller.On a desktop system, this may be a
PCI expansion card, or might be a capability built in to themotherboard. In larger RAIDs, the controller and disks are usually
housed in an external multi-bay enclosure. The disks may be IDE/ATA,SATA, SCSI, Fibre Channel,or any combination thereof. The
controller links to the host computer(s) with one or more high-speed SCSI, PCIe, Fibre Channel oriSCSI connections, either
directly, or through a fabric, or is accessed asnetwork-attached storage. This controller handles the management of the disks, andperforms parity calculations (needed for many RAID levels). This option tends to provide better performance, and makes operatingsystem support easier. Hardware implementations also typically support hot swapping, allowing failed drives to be replaced while
the system is running. In rare cases hardware controllers have become faulty, which can result in data loss. Hybrid RAIDs havebecome very popular with the introduction of inexpensive
hardware RAID controllers
. The hardware is a normal disk controller thathas no RAID features, but there is a boot-time application that allows users to set up RAIDs that are controlled via the BIOS. Whenany modern operating system is used, it will need specialized RAID drivers that will make the array look like a single block device.Since these controllers actually do all calculations in software, not hardware, they are often called "fakeraids". Unlike softwareRAID, these "fakeraids" typically cannot span multiple controllers.Both hardware and software versions may support the use of a
, a preinstalled drive which is used to immediately (andalmost always automatically) replace a drive that has failed. This reduces the mean time to repair period during which a seconddrive failure in the same RAID redundancy group can result in loss of data.Some software RAID systems allow one to build arrays from partitions instead of whole disks. UnlikeMatrix RAIDthey are notlimited to just RAID 0 and RAID 1 and not all partitions need to be RAID.
Standard RAID levels
Main article:Standard RAID levels
A quick summary of the most commonly used RAID levels:
•
RAID 0:Striped Set
•
RAID 1:Mirrored Set
•
•
RAID 01: A mirror of stripes
•
RAID 10: A stripe of mirrors
•
RAID 50: A stripe across dedicated parity RAID systems
•
RAID 100: A stripe of a stripe of mirrors
Nested RAID levels
Main article:Nested RAID levels
Many storage controllers allow RAID levels to be nested. That is, one RAID can use another as its basic element, instead of usingphysical disks. It is instructive to think of these arrays as layered on top of each other, with physical disks at the bottom.Nested RAIDs are usually signified by joining the numbers indicating the RAID levels into a single number, sometimes with a '+' inbetween. For example, RAID 10 (or RAID 1+0) conceptually consists of multiple level 1 arrays stored on physical disks with a level0 array on top, striped over the level 1 arrays. In the case of RAID 0+1, it is most often called RAID 0+1 as opposed to RAID 01 toavoid confusion with RAID 1. However, when the top array is a RAID 0 (such as in RAID 10 and RAID 50), most vendors choose toomit the '+', though RAID 5+0 is more informative.
Non-standard RAID levels
Main article:Non-standard RAID levels
Given the large amount of custom configurations available with a RAID array, many companies, organizations, and groups havecreated their own non-standard configurations, typically designed to meet at least one but usually very small niche groups of arrays. Most of these non-standard RAID levels are proprietary.Some of the more prominent modifications are:
•
ATTO Technology's
DVRAID adds RAID protection to systems delivering high-definition audio and video
•
•
EMC Corporationoffer's
RAID S
as an alternative to RAID 5 on their Symmetrix systems.
•
RAID-Zin thezfsfilesystem of OpenSolarissolves the "write hole" problem of RAID-5.
What RAID Can and Cannot Do
This guide was taken from a thread in a RAID-related forum to help clarify the advantages and disadvantages to choosing RAID foreither increases in performance or redundancy. It contains links to other threads in its forum containing user-generated anecdotalreviews of their RAID experiences.
What RAID Can Do
•
RAID can protect uptime. RAID levels 1, 0+1/10, 5, and 6 (and their variants such as 50 and 51) allow a mechanical harddisk to fail while keeping the data on the array accessible to users. Rather than being required to perform a timeconsuming restore from tape, DVD, or other slow backup media, RAID allows data to be restored to a replacement diskfrom the other members of the array, while being simultaneously available to users in a degraded state. This is of highvalue to enterprises, as downtime quickly leads to lost earning power. For home users, it can protect uptime of largemedia storage arrays, which would require time consuming restoration from dozens of DVD or quite a few tapes in theevent of a disk failing that is not protected by redundancy.
•
RAID can increase performance in certain applications. RAID levels 0, and 5-6 all use variations on striping, which allowsmultiple spindles to increase sustained transfer rates when conducting linear transfers. Workstation type applications thatwork with large files, such as image and video editing applications, benefit greatly from disk striping. The extra throughputoffered by disk striping is also useful in disk-to-disk backups applications. Also if RAID 1 or a striping based RAID with asufficiently large block size is used RAID can provide performance improvements for access patterns involving multiplesimultaneous random accesses (e.g., multi-user databases).
What RAID Cannot Do
•
RAID cannot protect the data on the array. A RAID array has one file system. This creates a single point of failure. A RAIDarray's file system is vulnerable to a wide variety of hazards other than physical disk failure, so RAID cannot defendagainst these sources of data loss. RAID will not stop a virus from destroying data. RAID will not prevent corruption. RAIDwill not save data from accidental modification or deletion by the user. RAID does not protect data from hardware failureof any component besides physical disks. RAID does not protect data from natural or man made disaster such as fires andfloods. To protect data, data must be backed up to removable media, such as DVD, tape, or an external hard drive, andstored in an off site location. RAID alone will not prevent a disaster from turning into data loss. Disaster is notpreventable, but backups allow data loss to be prevented.
•
RAID cannot simplify disaster recovery
*
. When running a single disk, the disk is usually accessible with a generic ATA orSCSI driver built into most operating systems. However, most RAID controllers require specific drivers. Recovery tools thatwork with single disks on generic controllers will require special drivers to access data on RAID arrays. If these recoverytools are poorly coded and do not allow providing for additional drivers, then a RAID array will probably be inaccessible tothat recovery tool.
•
RAID cannot provide a performance boost in all applications. This statement is especially true with typical desktopapplication users and gamers. Most desktop applications and games place performance emphasis on the buffer strategyand seek performance of the disk(s). Increasing raw sustained transfer rate shows little gains for desktop users andgamers, as most files that they access are typically very small anyway. Disk striping using RAID 0 increases linear transferperformance, not buffer and seek performance. As a result, disk striping using RAID 0 shows little to no performance gainin most desktop applications and games, although there are exceptions. For desktop users and gamers with highperformance as a goal, it is better to buy a faster, bigger, and more expensive single disk than it is to run twoslower/smaller drives in RAID 0. Even running the large high quality drive in RAID-0 is unlikely to boost performance morethan 10% and performance may drop in some access patterns, particularly games.
•
RAID is not readily moved to a new system
*
. When using a single disk, it is relatively straightforward to move the disk to anew system. Simply connect it to the new system, provided it has the same interface available. However, this is not soeasy with a RAID array. A RAID BIOS must be able to read metadata from the array members in order to successfullyconstruct the array and make it accessible to an operating system. Since RAID controller makers use different formats fortheir metadata (even controllers of different families from the same manufacturer may use incompatible metadataformats) it is virtually impossible to move a RAID array to a different controller. When moving a RAID array to a newsystem, plans should be made to move the controller as well. With the popularity of motherboard integrated RAIDcontrollers, this is extremely difficult to accomplish. Generally, it is possible to move the RAID array members andcontrollers as a unit, and software RAID in Linux and Windows Server Products can also work around this limitation, butsoftware RAID has other limitations (mostly performance related).
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