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kquinn
Asked: 2011-02-03 16:50:01 +0800 CST

Technical details of Windows software RAID

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I am looking for technical details of how software RAID (specifically RAID 1 and RAID 5) is implemented in Windows operating systems, particularly Server 2008 R2 and Windows 7. I'm sure this information is out there, but I haven't been able to find it on Google. I am looking for:

  • At what level does RAID 1/mirroring operate? File, cluster, sector, or something else? That is, how identical are two disks in a mirrored pair, at the sector level?
  • What triggers a resynchronization of a mirror?
  • Once Windows determines a resynchronization is needed, how does it decide what order to resynchronize volumes in?
  • What checks are done on read data to ensure the data is correct, and should not be reconstructed from the redundancy information?
windows-server-2008 windows-7 software-raid

1 Answers

  1. Best Answer
    • RAID operates at the block level, typically a 64k block.
    • A resync is triggered when a disk is replaced.
    • It probably does them in disk ID order. (I'm just guessing.)
    • No checks are done on the data to ensure that the data is correct. You are protecting against a disk failure not against corrupt data.
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