Assigning and Deassigning a Hot Spare
Assigning a Hot Spare
Use this option to assign a selected unassigned drive as a hot spare drive. A hot spare drive contains no data and acts as a standby in case any drive fails in a RAID level 1, 3, or 5 array on the Storage Subsystem. The hot spare drive adds another level of redundancy to the Storage Subsystem.
Important:
- You can only assign Optimal unassigned drives
as hot spare drives.
- The hot spare drive is available to any RAID level 1, 3, or 5 array in the Storage Subsystem. It is not specifically associated with any single array.
- When you assign a drive to be a hot spare, make sure that there is at least one other drive on the Storage Subsystem that is not assigned as a hot spare and that has a capacity equal to or smaller than the drive you assign as a hot spare.
- Select a drive with a capacity equal to or larger than the configured capacity of the drive you want to cover with the hot spare. For example, if you have an 18 GB drive with configured capacity of 8 GB, you could use a 9 GB or larger drive as a hot spare. In general, however, you should not assign a drive to be a hot spare unless its capacity is equal to or greater than the capacity of the largest drive on the Storage Subsystem.
- The maximum number of SCSI hot spare drives you can create is equal to the number of SCSI drive channels supported by the controller. The maximum number of fibre channel hot spare drives you can create is 15, depending on the controller model.
How to Assign a Hot Spare Drive
To assign a hot spare drive, select one or more drives in the Physical View from the available unassigned drives; then, select either the Drive >> Assign Hot Spare pull-down menu option, or Assign Hot Spare from the right-mouse pop-up menu.
Result: The drive changes from unassigned to standby hot spare.
The drive's capacity is subtracted from the Unconfigured Capacity node in the Logical View.
Deassigning a Hot Spare
Use this option to return a selected hot spare drive or drives to an unassigned state.
Caution:
- You can only use this option on standby, optimal
hot spares. A hot spare drive cannot be deassigned if it is in use (taking over for a failed drive).
- If a hot spare drive is not in an Optimal state, follow the Recovery Guru procedures for correcting the problem before trying to deassign the drive.
How to Deassign a Hot Spare Drive
To deassign a hot spare drive, select one or more standby hot spare drives in the Physical View; then, select either the Drive >> Deassign Hot Spare pull-down menu option, or Deassign Hot Spare from the right-mouse pop-up menu.
Result: The drive changes from standby hot spare to unassigned.
The drive's capacity is added to the Unconfigured Capacity node in the Logical View.