RAID5Volumes

RAID5Volumes refers to a storage volume that uses the RAID 5 level, combining multiple physical disks into a single logical device where data is striped across the disks with distributed parity. This configuration provides a balance of capacity, performance, and fault tolerance suitable for many set ups.

In a RAID 5 array, each stripe of data is written across all disks with one block of parity distributed among the disks. Parity information allows data recovery in the event of a single disk failure. Because parity is spread across all members of the array, no dedicated parity disk is required, and capacity scales with the number of disks.

Usable capacity in a RAID 5 volume is approximately (N-1) times the capacity of the smallest disk, where N is the number of disks. A minimum of three disks is required. The parity overhead means one disk’s worth of capacity is reserved for redundancy. Rebuilding a failed drive uses the remaining data and parity to reconstruct the lost information, a process that can take a long time on large arrays.

Performance characteristics include good read performance, since data can be read from multiple disks in parallel. Write performance is typically slower than RAID 0 or RAID 10 due to parity calculations and updates, and a failed disk reduces protection until a replacement is rebuilt. Arrays operating in degraded mode are more susceptible to data loss if another disk fails during rebuild. Regular monitoring, consistent scrub operations, and timely replacement of failed disks are recommended to maintain data integrity.

RAID 5 is commonly used for cost-effective storage when moderate fault tolerance is acceptable, but for larger arrays or higher write loads, RAID 6 or RAID 10 are often preferred alternatives.