A customer with several modern Dell servers wanted to expand the RAID 1 arrays on each, and I was able to do this without backup-and-restore to external media: this saved a ton of time (though I did do a backup up front just-in-case).
This was useful enough that I wrote it up in a Tech Tip, in the hopes it may be helpful to others:
Extending a Dell PERC6/i RAID1 Array in place
But two important notes:
- RAID1 only — will not work with any other level
- PERC6/i only — has not been tested (or even looked at) on any other controller
Good luck!
hey, Nice guide!
I was just in the same situation, but found a safer way:
You can expand the volume in the Dell OpenManage Server Administrator. Its a bit more safe than to recreate the virtual disk :)
1. Select the PERC controller in the OMSA
2. Select Virtual disks
3. Select Reconfigure next to the volume and click execute.
4. This will expand the virtual disk nice and safely.
4. Afterwards expand the partition with diskpart as you say in your guide
/Christian
Posted by: Christian Thomasberg | September 10, 2010 at 12:00 AM
Great article!
Just to let you know that I successfully carried out the same
exercise on a Dell PERC 5/i RAID Controller with no data loss.
I replaced 2x 2.5" 73GB SAS Drives for 2x 2.5" 146GB SAS Drives in a PowerEdge 1950.
Ian
Posted by: Ian Pittam | August 17, 2011 at 04:57 AM