Question 12 from TechExams.net - doubts

dzidekn1

12. You are the domain administrator of a large Windows 2003 domain. Two new servers just arrived that will function as members servers in the domain. You have a total of 5 new hard disks available and must implement fault tolerance to protect against disk failures on both servers.

What type of configuration would be most efficient in terms of disk space while meeting the fault tolerance requirement?
a. Create a mirrored volume on both servers
b. Create a RAID-5 volume on both servers
c. Create a spanned volume on both servers
d. Create a stripped volume on one server and a spanned volume on the other
e. Create a mirrored volume on one server and a RAID-5 volume on the other

Suggusted answer is E. I have chosen A because:
The question suggest creating a volume protecting system and user data. Is it possible to install W2K3 on RAID-5?
I have tried with no success.

What do you think?

dynamik

I can't remember if you can configure a software RAID-5 on a boot volume or not. However, it doesn't say anything about using Server 2003's RAID implementation. You could do it in hardware for sure. A hardware RAID-5 solution will just show up as a drive with X number of MB, just like any other disk. Windows won't know if it's a single drive, RAID-0, 1, 5 etc. The controller card abstracts whatever is going on behind the scenes and just gives windows a drive.

Just for the record, RAID-5 on the system drive would not be a best practice due to the performance penalty of calculating the parity information. You wouldn't want to use RAID-5 in a situation where there is a lot of intermittent disk activity, such as user profiles, page files, logging, etc.

bjaxx

dynamik wrote:

I can't remember if you can configure a software RAID-5 on a boot volume or not. However, it doesn't say anything about using Server 2003's RAID implementation. You could do it in hardware for sure. A hardware RAID-5 solution will just show up as a drive with X number of MB, just like any other disk. Windows won't know if it's a single drive, RAID-0, 1, 5 etc. The controller card abstracts whatever is going on behind the scenes and just gives windows a drive.

Just for the record, RAID-5 on the system drive would not be a best practice due to the performance penalty of calculating the parity information. You wouldn't want to use RAID-5 in a situation where there is a lot of intermittent disk activity, such as user profiles, page files, logging, etc.

The questions states 5 disks and you want to utilize all of them....for TWO servers, I believe the answers are mirror and raid 5...

royal

A - Wrong - using only 4 disks when you have 5
B - Wrong - Raid 5 requires 3 disks minimum and you only have 5 disks, not 6
C - Wrong - Spanned = JBOD where if any disk fails everything fails
D - Wrong - Same as C since requirement states you need redundancy on both servers
E - Correct - mirrored provides redundancy and is 2 disks and raid 5 provides 3 disks and is redundant. That gives you redundancy on both servers with the amount of disks provided.

Tontonsam

The answer of Royal is very clear. Answer E is correct as you are using all the disks. A remark in MS exams, I realize you have to think as MS thinks. If they say 5 disks, it means that you have to use all the 5 disks.

dzidekn1

That's right what you write!. RAID 1 & 5 is the best solution having 5 disks!

But the guestion doesn't state that you have to use all disks. I think about passing 70-290 not hardware test. I was wondering. What do thej want to know about me. Do I know that there is a Raid 1 & 5 in W2K3, or if I know that there is no possibility tu use RAID-5 as boot and system drive, using W2K3 RAID solution of course. I'm passing 70-290!

dynamik wrote:

I can't remember if you can configure a software RAID-5 on a boot volume or not. However, it doesn't say anything about using Server 2003's RAID implementation. You could do it in hardware for sure. A hardware RAID-5 solution will just show up as a drive with X number of MB, just like any other disk. Windows won't know if it's a single drive, RAID-0, 1, 5 etc. The controller card abstracts whatever is going on behind the scenes and just gives windows a drive.

Just for the record, RAID-5 on the system drive would not be a best practice due to the performance penalty of calculating the parity information. You wouldn't want to use RAID-5 in a situation where there is a lot of intermittent disk activity, such as user profiles, page files, logging, etc.

dynamik

Making the most efficient use of disk space is one of the requirements. You're not able to do that unless you use all the disks.