The wizard offers two methods for creating (or configuring) logical devices—express configuration and custom configuration. This topic describes how to use the custom configuration method.
The custom configuration option guides you through the process of creating logical devices, helping you group disk drives, set RAID levels, determine logical device size, and configure advanced settings. Use this option when you want to create customized logical devices with any or all available disk drives.
Note! For instructions on creating logical devices using express configuration, click here.
To build logical devices with the custom configuration method:
In the Enterprise View, select the controller you want to configure; then, click the Create button on the tool bar.
The wizard opens.
Select Custom configuration..., then click Next.
Select a RAID level.
The most common RAID levels are listed first; other RAID levels are available by clicking Advanced settings.
Note! The RAID levels available for your logical devices depend on the number of disk drives on your controller.
Click Next.
Note! If you do not have enough disk drives to create a logical device with the RAID level you chose, click Back to select a new RAID level.
In the Name field, enter a name for the logical device. Use a meaningful name that will help you easily identify it later. Logical device names can be up to 15 characters long.
Select the disk drives you want to use in the logical device. (Adaptec Storage Manager prompts you to select the correct number of disk drives.) By default, Adaptec Storage Manager automatically sets the size of the logical device and maximizes the capacity of the disk drives you select.
Note! Adaptec recommends that you not combine SAS and SATA disk drives within the same logical device. Adaptec Storage Manager generates a warning if you try to create a logical device using a combination of SAS and SATA disk drives.
(optional) Create a global hot spare by control-clicking on an available disk drive; alternatively, click the Create Hot Spare button , then select an available disk drive.
A plus sign (+) appears to indicate that the selected drive will be designated as a hot spare. To remove a hot-spare designation from a disk drive, control-click it again.
If you do not want the logical device to use all available space on your disk drives, click Advanced settings, enter the size of the logical device in the Size field, then select the capacity units from the drop-down list.
(optional) Adjust other Advanced Settings, as needed.
Note! Not all advanced settings are available for all RAID levels.
Second-level devices—For RAID level-x0, the number of sub-logical devices in the logical device. This number determines the number of physical drives you need to create the logical device. For example, for a RAID-50 with three second-level devices, you need at least nine drives.
Stripe size—Determines the amount of data, in kilobytes (KB), written to one segment of a logical device before the next segment is used to store data. Depending on the controller, you can choose a stripe size from 16 KB to 1024 KB.
Note! The default stripe size usually provides the best performance for typical applications. To change a logical device's stripe size, you must expand or migrate the logical device.
Write cache—Determines how data is stored in the controller's cache memory. You can choose from two available settings: write-through and write-back.
Read cache—Enables and disables read caching. When read-caching is enabled, the controller monitors read access to the logical device. If it detects a pattern, it pre-loads the cache with the data that seems most likely to be read next. The default is Enabled.
MaxIQ cache—Enables and disables read caching on the Solid State Disks (SSD) in your system. To enable the MaxIQ cache, regular read caching must also be enabled.
Initialize method—Determines how a logical device is prepared for reading and writing, and how long initialization will take. Adaptec Storage Manager provides three initialization methods:
Build (slowest)
Build is the default setting for most logical devices. For RAID 1 logical devices, data is copied from the primary drive to the mirror drive; for RAID 5 logical devices, parity is computed and written.
Adaptec Storage Manager performs build initializations in the background; you can use the logical device immediately.
Every block in the logical device is overwritten, removing all existing data. You can not use the logical device until the initialization is complete.
Quick (fastest)
The logical device is made available immediately. Quick is the default setting for RAID 1, RAID 1E, and RAID 10 logical devices.
Initialize priority—Determines the priority for the initialization of the logical device. The default setting is High, which means that the logical device is initialized as quickly as possible.
Power management—Enables power management on the disk drives in a logical device.
If you have available disk drives and want to create more logical devices, click Add logical device to open a new tab in the wizard; then, repeat Steps 3 to 9 for each logical device that you want to create on the controller.
Click Next, review the logical device settings, click Apply, then click Yes.
Adaptec Storage Manager creates the logical device(s).
Caution! Do not remove and reinsert any drive included in the logical device while the logical device is building.
If you enabled power management for the logical device (the default setting), the power timers window opens. Set the power timers for the logical device’s disk drives.
Slow down drives after—Period of inactivity, from 3 minutes to 3 hours, after which the drives’ spin rate is lowered. The default is Never.
Note! For disk drives that do not support slow operation, set this timer to Never.
Power off drives after—Period of inactivity, from 3 minutes to 3 hours, after which the disk drives are turned off. The default is Never.
Verify drives after—Period of inactivity, from 1 hour to 24 hours. after which an inactive drive (a drive that’s already powered down) is restarted and checked to verify its health. Once the check is completed, the drive is powered down and returns to its inactive state. The default is Never.
Note! Adaptec Storage Manager prompts you to set the power timers for each logical device you created in the wizard.