ZFS - moving from a zraid1 to zraid2 pool with 1.5tb disks

[Ronald Klop]

On Thu, 30 Dec 2010 12:40:00 +0100, Damien Fleuriot <ml at my.gd> wrote:

> Hello list,
>
>
>
> I currently have a ZFS zraid1 with 4x 1.5TB drives.
> The system is a zfs-only FreeBSD 8.1 with zfs version 14.
>
> I am concerned that in the event a drive fails, I won't be able to
> repair the disks in time before another actually fails.
>
>
>
>
> I wish to reinstall the OS on a dedicated drive (possibly SSD, doesn't
> matter, likely UFS) and dedicate the 1.5tb disks to storage only.
>
> I have ordered 5x new drives and would like to create a new zraid2
> mirrored pool.
>
> Then I plan on moving data from pool1 to pool2, removing drives from
> pool1 and adding them to pool2.
>
>
>
> My questions are as follows:
>
> With a total of 9x 1.5TB drives, should I be using zraid3 instead of
> zraid2 ? I will not be able to add any more drives so unnecessary parity
> drives = less storage room.
>
> What are the steps for properly removing my drives from the zraid1 pool
> and inserting them in the zraid2 pool ?
>
>
> Regards,
>
>
> dfl

Make sure you have spare drives so you can swap in a new one quickly and  
have off-line backups in case disaster strikes. Extra backups are always  
nice. Disks are not the only parts which can break and damage your data.

Ronald.