Boost performance with disk striping

Creating a stripe set is an inexpensive way of dramatically increasing performance. Use these tips to create a stripe set, re-create a stripe set after disk failure, and remove a stripe set.

Create a stripe set
To create a stripe set with parity, follow these steps:

1. Go to Start | Programs | Administrative Tools | Disk Administrator.
2. Select three or more areas of free space on different physical disks.
3. From the Fault Tolerance menu, select Create Stripe Set With Parity.
4. Fill in the desired stripe size of the drive, and click OK.

Keep in mind that a stripe set will only use the lowest common disk space on each physical drive.

For example, if you create a stripe set with three disks of 200 MB, 100 MB, and 50 MB free, each part of the stripe set is only 50 MB, with a maximum 150-MB partition. In addition, you lose one-third of your drive to parity information, leaving you with only 100 MB for data storage.

Re-create a stripe set after disk failure
When a member fails in a set, you won't receive a warning. You must check the Event Log or run Disk Administrator.

To re-create a stripe set with parity after a member of the set fails, follow these steps:

1. Replace the faulty disk, and start Windows NT.
2. Go to Start | Programs | Administrative Tools | Disk Administrator.
3. Select the stripe set to repair, and choose an area of unpartitioned space on the new physical disk.
4. From the Fault Tolerance menu, select Regenerate.

Remove a stripe set
To remove a stripe set, follow these steps:

1. Go to Start | Programs | Administrative Tools | Disk Administrator.
2. Select the stripe set you want to delete.
3. Select Delete from the Partition drop-down list.
4. Confirm to delete the partition.

It's important to note that when you remove a stripe set, you'll lose all of the data on the set.