Building RAID 50 on Ubuntu. How can I go about it?

linux and tech help
1

I am building a RAID 50 array for my Ubuntu server. I got me some four brand new Samsung PM9A3 2TB NVMe SSDs. It is meant to enable efficiency for a video editing workflow.

How do I go about the configuration process. I am using the mdadm commands. Pretty straightforward but the challenge is ability to manage individual drives within the nested RAID 0 and RAID 5.

Is there a simple way to streamline the entire process?

2

You can use LVM to streamline this with this step by step setup

  1. You would first of all have to partition each SSD: Use the command below

sgdisk -n 1:0:0 /dev/sdX
(repeat for all disks)

  1. After that, you should create 2 RAID 5 arrays:

mdadm --create /dev/md0 --level=5 --raid-devices=2 /dev/sdX /dev/sdY
(repeat for remaining disks)

  1. The next step is to turn RAID devices into physical volumes:

pvcreate /dev/md0 (repeat for md1)

  1. Combine PVs into a volume group: Use this command

vgcreate vg0 /dev/md0 /dev/md1

  1. Create a logical volume with the command below

lvcreate -L 100%FREE -n lv0 vg0

  1. And finally, format and mount the logical volume:

mkfs.ext4 /dev/vg0/lv0; sudo mkdir /mnt/raid50; sudo mount /dev/vg0/lv0 /mnt/raid50

3

hm. @Slys The minimum number of drives needed for a RAID 50 array is six.

This requirement stems from its nested structure: RAID 50 combines the distributed parity of RAID 5 with the striping of RAID 0.

Since a RAID 5 array requires at least three drives (to allow for one drive’s worth of parity data), and RAID 50 stripes across two such RAID 5 sets, you need at least two sets of three drives.

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