Users Guide

Creating Virtual Disks
Does my controller support this feature? See Supported Features.
In order to implement RAID functions, you must create a virtual disk. A virtual disk refers to storage created by a RAID controller from
one or more physical disks. Although a virtual disk may be created from several physical disks, it is seen by the operating system as a
single disk.
Before creating a virtual disk, you should be familiar with the information in Considerations Before Creating Virtual Disks.
Storage Management provides wizards to help you create a virtual disk:
• The Create Virtual Disk Express Wizard calculates an appropriate virtual disk layout based on the available space and controller
considerations. Using this wizard, you can quickly create a virtual disk using recommended selections.
• The Create Virtual Disk Advanced Wizard allows you to specify the read, write, and cache policy for the virtual disk. You can
also select the physical disks and the controller connector to be used. You need a good knowledge of RAID levels and hardware
to use the advanced wizard.
Related links
What is RAID?
Deleting A Virtual Disk
Channel Redundancy
Reconguring Or Migrating Virtual Disks
Physical Disk Or Physical Device Properties
Physical Disk Or Physical Device Tasks
Create Virtual Disk Advanced Wizard
Create Virtual Disk Express Wizard
Reconguring Or Migrating Virtual Disks
Does my controller support this feature? See Supported Features.
Reconguring or migrating a virtual disk enables you to increase the capacity or change the RAID level of the virtual disk.
To recongure a virtual disk:
1. Review the information in Starting and Target RAID Levels for Virtual Disk Reconguration and Capacity Expansion.
2. Locate the controller on which the virtual disk resides in the tree view. Expand the controller object until the Virtual Disks object
is displayed.
3. Select the Recongure task from the virtual disk’s Tasks drop-down list box and click Execute.
4. Complete the Recongure task using the Recongure wizard.
Starting And Target RAID Levels For Virtual Disk Reconguration And
Capacity Expansion
After you have created a virtual disk, the possibilities for reconguring the virtual disk depend on the controller, RAID level, and
available physical disks.
Table 32. Possible scenarios for
reconguring a virtual disk
Controller Starting RAID Level Target RAID Level Comments
PERC H330 Adapter, PERC
H330 Mini Monolithic, PERC
H730 Adapter, PERC H730
Mini Monolithic, PERC H730P
Adapter, PERC H730P Mini
Monolithic, PERC H740P
Adapter, PERC H740P Mini
RAID 0 RAID 1 Add a single disk
RAID 0 RAID 0, RAID 5 Add at least one additional
disk.
RAID 0 RAID 6 RAID 6 requires a minimum of
4 disks.
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