Chapter06 Managing Disks And Data Storage

Managing a Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Environment Chapter 6: Managing Disks and Data Storage

Objectives
Understand concepts related to disk management
Manage partitions and volumes on a Windows Server 2003 system
Understand the purpose of mounted drives and how to implement them
Understand the fault tolerant disk strategies natively supported in Windows Server 2003

Objectives (continued)
Determine disk and volume status information and import foreign disks
Maintain disks on a Windows Server 2003 system using a variety of native utilities

Disk Management Concepts
Windows Server 2003 supports two data storage types:
Basic disks
Uses traditional disk management techniques
Has primary partitions, extended partitions, logical drives
Dynamic disks
Does not use traditional disk partitioning
No restriction on number of volumes implemented on one disk

Basic Disks
Maximum of four primary partitions or three primary and one extended partition on a disk
Each primary partition:
Can use FAT, FAT32, or NTFS file system
Has a drive letter
Boot partition
Operating system files reside on boot partition
Can be located on a primary partition or logical drive

Primary Partitions
A basic drive must contain at least one and no more than four primary partitions
One partition is the system (or active) partition
Contains files to start operating system
Usually drive C on Windows
Can also be used for traditional data storage

Extended Partitions and Logical Drives
An extended partition:
Is created from free hard disk space that is not partitioned, formatted, or assigned a drive letter
Allows you to extend the four-partition limit
Can be divided into logical drives
Each drive is then formatted and assigned a drive letter

Volume Sets and Stripe Sets
Only on Windows NT Server 4.0
Volume set
Two or more partitions combined to look like one volume with a single drive letter
Stripe set
Two or more disks striped for RAID level 0 or 5
Windows Server 2003 and 2000 provide backward compatibility
Can use but not create

Dynamic Disks
Can set up a large number of volumes per disk
Volumes are similar to partitions but with additional capabilities
Reasons to implement dynamic disks include
Can extend NTFS volumes
Can configure RAID volumes for fault tolerance and performance
Can reactivate missing or offline disks
Can change disk settings with restarting computer

Simple Volume and Spanned Volume
A simple volume:
Dedicated, formatted portion of space on a dynamic disk
NTFS volumes can be extended (not system or boot)
A spanned volume:
Space in 2 to 32 dynamic disks
Treated as a single volume
Allows you to maximize use of scattered space across several disks

Striped Volume
Referred to as RAID level 0
Implemented for performance enhancement, particularly for storage of large files
Not fault tolerant
Requires from 2 to 32 disks
Data is written in 64 KB blocks across rows in the volume

Striped Volume (continued)

Managing Partitions and Volumes
Primary tool is Disk Management
Central facility for
Viewing information
Creating partitions and volumes
Deleting partitions and volumes
Converting basic disks to dynamic disks

Managing Partitions and Volumes (continued)

Managing Disk Properties
Disk Management:
Can be added to a custom MMC
Most commonly accessed via Storage section of Computer Management
Used for the creation, deletion, and management of disks, partitions, and volumes
Shares some property sheets with Windows Explorer, Device Manager

Managing Disk Properties (continued)

Activity 6-1: Viewing and Managing Disk Properties with Disk Management
Objective: Use Disk Management to view the properties of a hard disk and partition
From AdminXX account
Start  My Computer  Manage  Expand Storage  Disk Management
Explore information available for partitions, disks, and volumes as directed

Activity 6-2: Creating and Deleting a Primary Partition
Objective: Use Disk Management to create and delete a new primary partition
Create a new NTFS partition using the New Partition Wizard
Assign a drive letter
Verify that the new partition was created
Delete the partition

Activity 6-3: Creating an Extended Partition
6-3 Objective: To create an extended partition using the New Partition Wizard
Once an extended partition has been created, you can create a logical drive

Activity 6-4: Creating a Logical Drive
6-4 Objective: To create a logical drive within the new partition using the New Partition Wizard

Activity 6-5: Converting a Basic Disk to a Dynamic Disk
Objective: To convert a basic disk to a dynamic disk using Disk Management
Convert and verify according to exercise
If necessary to convert from dynamic to basic
Must be empty, backup first
Once a dynamic disk is available
Can create different types of volumes on the disk

Activity 6-6: Creating a Simple Volume
Objective: To create a simple volume on a dynamic disk
Create using New Volume Wizard
Format in NTFS file system
Assign a drive letter

Extending Volumes
Volume can be extended unless
Functioning as boot or system volume
Possible tools
Disk Management
DISKPART command-line utility

Activity 6-7: Extending a Volume Using DISKPART
Objective: To extend a volume using the DISKPART command
Open the command line and enter the DISKPART command
Select the simple volume and extend the size by 50 MB
Verify that the size of the volume has been increased

Mounted Drives
Mounting a drive is an alternative to assigning it a drive letter
A mounted drive is represented as a folder with a normal path
To mount a drive:
Must be on an NTFS volume
Must be an empty folder
Reasons:
26 drive letter limit
Path access is convenient
Backups

Activity 6-8: Mounting an NTFS Volume
Objective: To mount an NTFS volume
Create an empty folder
Use Disk Management to mount a drive to the folder
Test by creating a test folder on the drive and viewing it from the mounted folder

Fault Tolerant Disk Strategies
Fault tolerance
The ability to recover gracefully from hardware or software failure
Hard disks do fail periodically
Software RAID provides various levels of fault tolerance
A combination of RAID and backup can minimize disruption and loss of data

RAID Levels
Redundant Array of Independent Disk strategies
Set of standards for:
Lengthening disk life
Preventing data loss
Enabling uninterrupted access to data
Windows Server 2003 supports level 0, 1, and 5
RAID level 0
Striping with no other redundancy features
RAID level 1
Disk mirroring (duplicating data from main disk to backup disk)

RAID Levels (continued)
RAID level 2
Disk striping, error correction across all disks
RAID level 3
Disk striping, error correction on 1 disk
RAID level 4
Disk striping, error correction across all disks, checksum on 1 disk
RAID level 5
Disk striping, error correction across all disks, checksum across all disks

RAID Levels (continued)
Supported on FAT and NTFS
Either RAID level 1 or 5 is usually recommended
Considerations:
Placement of boot and system files
Number of disks required or supported
Cost (per megabyte of storage)
Amount of memory required
Read and write access speed

Striped Volume (RAID 0)
Reasons to use:
Reduce wear on disk drives by equalizing load
Increase disk performance
No specific fault tolerance support
Can be created using New Volume Wizard

Mirrored Volume (RAID 1)
Creates a copy of data on a backup disk
Requires 2 disks
Highly effective fault tolerance since a complete copy of data is available
Disk read performance is equal to non-mirrored
Disk write time is doubled
Created through New Volume Wizard

Mirrored Volume (continued)

RAID-5 Volume
Requires a minimum of 3 disks
Provides good fault tolerance
Parity information distributed across all drives
Performance slower than with a striped volume (parity information must be computed and stored)

RAID-5 Volume (continued)
Read access is equal to striped volume
Storage requirement for parity information is 1/n with n the number of disks
Created through New Volume Wizard

RAID-5 Volume (continued)

Software RAID and Hardware RAID
Software RAID uses existing hardware and implements particular software strategies
Hardware RAID requires specialized hardware (more expensive) but lessens the burden on the OS
Often implemented on the adapter for disk drives
Often includes a battery backup
Advantages include: faster read and write, mixed RAID levels, failed disk hot-swap, better setup options

Monitoring Disk Health and Importing Foreign Disks
Disk Management provides status information on disks and volumes
Number of different status descriptions
Windows Server 2003 provides the ability to import disks from other servers if necessary (foreign disks)

Disk and Volume Status Descriptions
Optimal descriptions:
Disk should be ONLINE
Volume should be HEALTHY
Common volume messages include:
Failed, failed redundancy, formatting, healthy, regenerating, resyncing, unknown
Common disk messages include:
Audio CD, foreign, initializing, missing, no media, not initialized, online, online (errors), offline, unreadable

Importing Foreign Disks
Used when a server fails
Disks from the server can be moved to another server
When first connected, the disk status will be foreign and it will not be accessible
Use the Import Foreign Disks option on the disk
If multiple disks are imported
Each disk is imported individually
Default is that disk will use its original drive letter but an available letter is chosen if there is a conflict

Other Disk Maintenance and Management Utilities
Introduces disk-related utilities other than Disk Management
Some provide extra features or functions
Some are similar but are accessible from the command line

Check Disk
Allows you to scan a disk for bad sectors and file system errors
Disk can’t be in use during scan
Two start options:
Automatically fix file system errors
Scan for and attempt recovery of bad sectors
CHKDSK command-line utility has similar functionality

CONVERT
CONVERT is a command-line utility
Converts existing FAT and FAT32 partitions or volumes to NTFS
Leaves existing data intact

Disk Cleanup
Allows an administrator to determine where disk space is being used and could potentially be freed
Files that can be removed include:
Temporary internet files
Downloaded program files
Files in recycle bin
Windows temporary files
No longer used Windows components and programs
Can also compress files
Command-line version is CLEANMGR

Disk Defragmenter
Free disk space eventually become fragmented as files are created and removed
Results in slower access and higher disk wear
Defragmentation attempts to place files in contiguous areas
Defragmentation should be done periodically

Activity 6-9: Using the Disk Defragmenter Utility
Objective: to analyze and defragment a volume using the Disk Defragmenter utility
The utility graphically displays the fragmentation status of the disk before and after defragmentation
Command-line version of command is DEFRAG
Can be used to schedule defragmentation when used with a batch file and Task Scheduler
Get complete syntax and options with DEFRAG /?

DISKPART
Command-line utility for managing disks, volumes, partitions
Uses include:
Configuring active partition, assigning drive letters, implementing fault tolerance schemes, etc.
Can manage disks from within scripts
Get the complete syntax and options with DISKPART /?

FORMAT
Used to implement a file system on an existing partition
Also used on MS-DOS and Windows 9X
Has a variety of advanced settings
Setting allocation unit (cluster) size
Command-line version can be run from scripts
Get the complete syntax and options with FORMAT /?

FSUTIL
Used with FAT, FAT32, and NTFS file systems
Includes many advanced features, requires experienced user
Information available includes:
Listings of drives, volume information, NTFS-specific data
Tasks include:
Managing disk quotas, displaying free space
Get complete information in Help and Support Center

MOUNTVOL
Used to create, delete, or list volume mount points from command line
VolumeName parameter is difficult to use
Complicates adding new mount point
Doesn’t affect removing mount points
Get complete syntax and options with MOUNTVOL /?

Summary
Windows Server 2003 supports data storage types:
Basic disk
Divided into 4 primary partitions or 3 primary and 1 extended partition with logical drives
Dynamic disk
Can be divided into a number of volumes on 1 disk
A number of disks can be configured in 1 volume
Support simple, spanned, striped, mirrored, RAID-5 volumes
Primary tool for disk management:
Disk Management

Summary (continued)
Fault tolerance implemented through RAID strategies
Most highly recommended are:
RAID level 1 (mirrored volumes)
RAID level 5 (striped, distributed parity info)
Hardware RAID very effective but more costly
A number of command-line tools and other utilities are available for disk management and cleanup

Chapter06 Managing Disks And Data Storage

by Raja Waseem Akhtar

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