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Accepted
Max Chernyak
Asked: 2012-01-20 17:11:42 +0800 CST

RAID1 with non-empty HDDs on a NAS

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On one hand I have 2 HDDs with data, which are clones of one another I made using Cavalry Retriever duplicator. On another hand I have a brand new Patriot Javelin S4 NAS unit. I'm new to both RAID and NAS, but I figured that for my purposes I need RAID1 (2 mirrored drives, or if I get another pair of drives — 2 pairs of 2 mirrored drives).

Question

Is there any way to have the drives setup in RAID1 without moving data out and back in again?

Disclosure: I don't actually have Javelin S4 yet, but it's shipped, and I can't find any info on this subject. Maybe all will be clear when I see its interface?

network-attached-storage raid1

2 Answers

  1. my reccomendation would be read the manual (each NAS is different). if the disk is NTFS and your NAS supports that, there may not be a need for the nas to format the first disk. Then you could potentially stick the second disk in and say something like "convert this volume into a RAID 1". Like i said though, check with your vendor, some of the cheaper ones, format both disk when making RAID changes. I would strongly suggest having a third disk with a copy of the data, if you're going to try this though.

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  2. Best Answer

    Taken from the Manual page 130

    7. In the confirmation box, click the OK button.
The RAID Volume is created and formatting begins. Formatting requires
several minutes, depending on the size of your disk drives.

    This means you have to copy the data after creating the RAID volume.

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