LVM-esque Solution on Windows???

[Jim Morbid]

Hi All.

I setting up a storage server specifically geared for storing DVD ISO files on my XBMC, but I have a few problems...

1) I want to put in a total of eleven hard drives (eventually), but I dont want to see 11 7200rmp, sataII drives when I'm trying to find a DVD to watch through XBMC. ie, I want to merge the hard drives into one logical drive.

2) I assume most people would suggest RAID 0, but I'm building the server over time, starting with only about 3 drives in, adding the others as I need them. I'm no guru at RAID but I dont think you can add another disk into a RAID 0 array without loosing everything on the array (but if I'm wrong _please_ let me know), also, and once again this is as far as I know, if a drive fails in a RAID 0 array the entire array becomes unusable, which isn't very fun :(

3) Does anyone know how much power HDD's use? I mean, what kind of power supply will I need to power 11 drives?

Thanks!

JM

[greenmaji]

You can use a imaging software package to backup your array to DVD or a spair hardive, then rebuild your array with more disks and reimage the array with the what was on it before.

The power a HD uses depends on the make and model, you pretty much have to look that up.
most dont peek past 14W on the 12Vrail and IIRC 8W on the 5Vrail.

So if recalled correctly that would be 13Amps 12V and 18Amps 5V total for 11 drives. YMMV depending on the HD's chosen.

[Jim Morbid]

But that would be mean I would eventually need 10 backup disks to backup the 10 other disks before I add the 11th into the array. If I'm understanding you correctly...

And I spoke to Seagate yesterday (since I'll be using 320gig Sata2 'cudas) andthey recommend using a 700wat PSU. Ust incase anyone has the same problem.

[emboss]

Solaris with ZFS!

:)

I'm pretty sure Server 2003 supports online expansion of volumes, but not sure if the MS software RAID supports restriping/expansion of RAID arrays. I doubt XP can do it though.

[Jim Morbid]

Thank emboss.

I'll look into the 2003 server thing quickly. Damn, I really thought this build would have been easy, but this problem is _killing_ me :p

JM