![]() ![]() With a mirror volume, if a disk fails, you can keep working as the remaining disks will take over. If your business depends on the files stored on your Mac, you should be using a mirror volume. We recommend mirror volumes for all important files. Rebuilds which might take days with other RAID systems take less than an hour with SoftRAID. When the disk is reattached, SoftRAID only rebuilds those blocks, rather than rebuilding the entire volume. Whenever a disk is missing from a mirror, SoftRAID remembers which blocks of data are written to the volume while the disk is missing. With SoftRAID’s Fast Mirror Rebuilds, rebuilds can take less than an hour. Rebuilding a multi-terabyte mirror volume can often take a day or longer. With most RAID systems, rebuilding a volume takes a long time. The SoftRAID Monitor will also warn you when the flash memory on an SSD is worn out. Unlike many RAID systems, SoftRAID supports TRIM commands on all SoftRAID volumes. SoftRAID automatically configures the mirror volume for the fastest possible performance by having the reads come only from the SSD The SSD gives you incredibly fast read speeds and the normal hard disk gives you the redundant storage which protects your files from disk failure. You can create fast mirror volumes, for starting up your Mac or for storing files you frequently use, by combining an SSD with a normal hard disk. SoftRAID automatically keeps track of which disks are attached to your Mac at any time and will correctly rebuild missing disks when they are re-attached to your Mac.Ĭreating the fastest possible mirror volume As long as at least one of the mirror volume’s disks is still working and attached to your Mac, the volume is safe and will function normally. Unlike stripe volumes, each disk contains a copy of the entire volume. SoftRAID mirror volumes give you the greatest level of reliability.Įach disk in a mirror volume contains an entire copy of the volume.Ī mirrored volume uses two or more disks to create a volume that is protected from disk failure. With SoftRAID, these are mirror (RAID 1), RAID 4, RAID 5, and RAID 1+0 volumes. For this, and all other uses, particularly where the safety of your data is an issue, we recommend you use a RAID level which protects your volume from disk failure. RAID 0 is not a good solution for permanent storage. A great use for a stripe volume is as a scratch disk when using Photoshop, Lightroom, or editing uncompressed video it will give you the fastest possible scratch disk for these purposes. We recommend stripe volumes ONLY for temporary storage – ie for any application where speed is most important and you have a recent backup. SoftRAID will help you choose the correct value depending on the type of files you plan to store on your stripe volume. When you create a SoftRAID stripe volume, you will be asked to select the stripe unit size for your new volume. The size of each block is called the “stripe unit size.” The first block of the volume is on the first disk, the second is on the second disk, etc. In a stripe volume, data is spread across the volume’s disks in blocks. A stripe volume cannot work unless all of its disks are present and working correctly. Because of this, read and write speeds are a fraction of what they would be if a single disk had to be accessed for the entire file. The disks work simultaneously, in parallel, each disk reading just a small part of the file. Each disk is asked to send back just the part of the file which it holds. When reading or writing a large file, the request gets sent to all of the disks at the same time. Each disk contains only part of the volume. Stripe volumes, also known as RAID 0 volumes, spread the data for a volume over 2 or more disks. For that reason, and because a stripe volume isn’t protected against disk failure, RAID 0 is NOT a viable alternative for permanent storage Over time, that risk increases-our calculations show on average a 25% risk of a disk failure within 10 years with a four disk RAID2. When considering using RAID 0, it’s important to remember that all disks can fail, even one that is considered ‘reliable’. Stripe volumes are great for scratch files or when you have readily available backups of the files on your volume. When a disk fails on a stripe volume, you will lose all the files on the volume. However, they provide no protection from disk failure. SoftRAID stripe volumes give you the highest possible performance. ![]()
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