I currently have 1 pool (dspool1) consisting of 2 RaidZ2 vdevs, each having 8 disks in each vdev. I have 1 additional disk dedicated as a hot spare. I now want to increase the storage capacity of the box, and I have 13 more slots available in the box, which I have just filled with new hard drives. So my question has 3 parts.
- Is there any downside to adding more vdevs to the existing pool or is it a better approach to create a new pool altogether for these new drives? (Keep the old pool intact, just create an additional one)
- What is the best option for adding these drives to the pool?
- Create 2 new vdevs, each with 6 disks each (total of 12), and then dedicate the remaining 1 drive as an additional hot spare?
- Create 1 new vdev, consisting of 12 drives, then dedicating the remaining 1 drive as an additional hot spare?
- Create 2 new vdevs, each with 6 disks each (total of 12), and then dedicate the remaining 1 drive as an additional hot spare?
- If I am adding vdevs to the existing pool, what is the preferred method to add/expand the pool?
- Through the FreeNAS GUI using the “Extend volume” option
- Through the command line using “zpool add <existing poolname> raidz2 disk1 disk2 disk2, etc.
- Through the FreeNAS GUI using the “Extend volume” option