DISK MANAGEMENT

Disk management for administering or managing Hard Disk Drives

Using this we can create, delete, modify, partitions and volumes.

We can also implement software rate, and disk analysis.

To open Disk manager

Start – run – diskmgmt.msc

Or right click on my computer – select manage.

Creation of a primary partition:

Start – run – diskmgmt.msc

Select free space (black color)

R/C -new – partition – select primary

Alter the size - select drive letter

Select the type of format – ex: NTFS

Next – finish.

Creating extended partition:

Start – run – diskmgmt.msc

Right click on free space

New – partition – next – select extended partition

Don’t alter the size - next – finish

Creating Logical partitions:

Right click on the green color partition

New – logical – drive – next – alter the size

Next – drive letter

Type of file system

Next – finish

If we want to delete a partition, right click the partition and delete partition

Storage

Basic Disks – partition – primary partition – extended – Logical partitions

Dynamic disks: simple volume – spanned volume – stripped volume – mirrored volume – RAID – 5v

Basic Disk: These are referred to partitions.

Using basic disks we can create partitions like primary, extended, logical.

Basic disks are useful for providing backward compatibility with older OS. Like DOS, 95, 98 etc..

Basic disks are useful while implementing clustering and when we want to have dual OS in our computers.

Basic disks can have 1primary, 1 extended and logical partition

Or four primary or 3 primary 1 extended and so on.

Basic disks can be converted to dynamic disks

For converting it requires 1MB of free space.

Conversion of basic disk to dynamic:

We can convert form basic to dynamic but not vice versa.

Possible when we get advanced

Converting from basic to Dynamic: (requires 1MB of free space)

Go to disk management

Right click on the disk1

Convert to dynamic disk.

Volume: Volume is made up of free space club or merged fro more than one H.D. volumes avoid using of multiple drive letters or drives.

Easy to administer

Dynamic volume: Dynamic disks refer to volumes. Using dynamic disks we can implement and extend volumes and implement raid.

Dynamic disk can be attached or detached on the file.

Simple Volumes: simple volumes are similar to partitions which can be created only one Hard disk which do not offer fall tolerance.

Spanned Volume: A volume can be created by selecting the free space from more than 1 Hdd

Span volumes offer extending of volume.

Do not offer fall tolerance

Maximum 32 Hdds

Min 2 Hdds

Creating simple volumes:

Open disk management

Right click on the black bar

New – volume

Select simple volume

Alter the space – next

Drive letter

File system

Check box perform quick format

Next – finish

Creating a spanned volume:

Open disk management

Right click on black bar

New volume

Select span – next

Select disk1&2 reduce &specify the size.

Drive letter – next

Perform – quick format – finish

Extending volume:

Right click on the volume we want to extend

Extend volume - next

Select the drive on which we want to extend the volume

Specify the size - next – finish

RAID: (Redundancy Array Inexpensive Disks or Independent disks)

Raid offers fall tolerance

Fault Tolerance: It is a technique used for protecting data against hardware failures.

Software RAID: It can be implemented from the OS. Which is not a guaranteed fault tolerance?

Hardware RAID: can be implemented above the O.S. including the OS is protected.

Offers highest fault tolerance.

There are five RAID levels

RAID 0, 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 these are supported by NT/2000/2003

RAID 0: striping without parity

Striped volumes:

Requires min 2 Hdds, max 32 Hdds.

Offers no fault tolerance

Suitable when performance is criteria.

Data is written evenly on to all drives

If any one of the drives fails whole data is lost.

Space selected on all the drives should be of identical size.

RAID 1 or Disk mirroring:

Requires min.2Hdds max.also 2 Hdds

Offers fall tolerance

Data is written onto both the drives simultaneously.

If one drive fails data is still available in the second drive.

I/P performance: reading is fast and writing is slow.

Implementation of mirror:

Create a simple volume ex: 100mb

Right click on S.V. and add mirror

Break mirror: Breaks the mirror and retains the partition and data and changes the drive letter

Right click on desired drive

Select break mirror

Remove mirror: Removes the mirrored volume.

If we want to break or remove the volume

Right click on mirror volume

Select break or remove

RAID 5 Striping with parity

Requires min 3Hdds max 32 Hdds.

Offers highest fault tolerance

Data is written evenly on to all member striped volumes and

Parity information is also added.

Parity bit: It is mathematical calculation added to every piece of data and used for regenerating the data when any HDD fails.

Offers performance and availability

I/O performance: Reading and writing both are fast.

Mounting:

It is a feature of 2000 & 2003 used for accessing free space on the hard drive through a folder when drive letters get exhausted.

Using mounting:
open disk management

Create a simple volume

While creating select mount in the following MT, NTFS folder

Browse – new folder (create a folder here) – next – quick format – next Finish