Documentation

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Working with Freespace

This section shows how freespace is represented in FAST and provides instructions for selecting freespace and working with freespace properties.

Understanding Freespace

Figure 1 shows how freespace is represented in the Disk view window.

Figure 1. Freespace represented in Disk view

Selecting Freespace

To select freespace, use any of the following methods:

Click an entire freespace
Use sizing handles
Use the FreeSpace Properties dialog box
Use the Tab and spacebar keys (see Selecting FAST Objects Using the Keyboard)

Selecting an Entire Freespace

To select an entire freespace, do the following:

Select Disk View from the View menu.
Click the freespace you want to select (Figure 2). The number inside the selected freespace is the size of the freespace.

Figure 2. Selecting an entire freespace
To select additional freespaces, hold down Ctrl while you click the other freespaces.

Using Sizing Handles

Use sizing handles to select part of a freespace (and to specify an offset, if appropriate).

To select freespace using sizing handles, do the following:

Select Disk View from the View menu.
Click the freespace and drag the sizing handles (Figure 3).

Figure 3. Selecting partial freespace
Note: To move the beginning and ending boundaries of the freespace in one-pixel increments, hold down Shift while moving the sizing handles. By default, the size is converted to rounded numbers while you drag the sizing handles.
To select freespaces on additional disks, hold down Ctrl while you select and define subsequent freespaces as you did in step 2.

Working with Freespace Properties

The FreeSpace Properties dialog box enables you to do the following:

Display the current status of the selected freespace
Change the selection specification
Select freespaces

To select freespace using the FreeSpace Properties dialog box, do the following:

Select Disk View from the View menu.
Select a freespace, and select Properties from the Edit menu (Figure 4).

Figure 4. Accessing the FreeSpace Properties dialog box

The FreeSpace Properties dialog box appears with the freespace's current settings (Figure 5).

Figure 5. FreeSpace Properties dialog box

Manuals



Working with Disk Space: Dell Flexible Array Storage Tool User's Guide Back to Contents Page Working with Disk Space: Dell™ Flexible Array Storage Tool User's Guide	Working with Freespace	Working with Partitions	Managing Partitions with Microsoft Windows Utilities


Dialog Box Element	Function
Freespace icon and FreeSpace	Displays the size of the selected freespace and the location of its offset
Disk ID	Displays the Disk ID (Bus:ID:LUN) of the disk on which the freespace is located
*Selection*
None button	Deselects the selected freespace
Full button	Selects the entire freespace
Partial button	Enables the Size and Offset boxes; is automatically enabled when you add, delete, or change data in the Size or Offset box or the corresponding units lists or when you click the left- or right-arrow buttons
*Partial*
Size box and units list	Lets you view and set the size of the partial freespace selection and specify a unit of measure in the adjacent list
	Makes the freespace as large as possible without changing the offset by moving the right sizing handle to the end (right side) of the freespace
Offset box and units list	Lets you view and set the offset in the unit of measure you select in the adjacent list
	Moves an existing offset (left sizing handle) to the beginning (left side) of the freespace
Align Size and Offset button	Automatically adjusts the freespace size and offset to 64 KB multiples (rounded up)
OK button	Accepts changes and closes the dialog box
Cancel button	Ignores changes and closes the dialog box

Select the entire freespace by selecting Full and clicking OK.
Deselect the selected freespace by selecting None and clicking OK.
Select partial freespace as follows:
1. Type the starting point of an offset in the Offset box. To specify the unit of measure, type the first letter of the unit immediately following the size (for example, type 322m for 322 Megabytes) or select a unit from the adjacent list. Alternatively, you can move an existing offset (left sizing handle) to the beginning (left side) of the freespace by clicking the button, as illustrated in Figure 6.
Figure 6. Using the button to adjust the offset
1. Type the size of the partial freespace selection in the Size box. To specify the unit of measure, type the first letter of the unit immediately following the size (for example, type 750m for 750 Megabytes) or select a unit from the adjacent list. Alternatively, you can make the freespace as large as possible without changing the offset by clicking the button to move the right sizing handle to the end (right side) of the freespace, as illustrated in Figure 7.
  
  Figure 7. Using the button to adjust the offset
2. Click OK.

Working with Partitions

This section describes how partitions are represented in FAST and provides instructions for working with partition properties.

Understanding Partitions

Figure 8 shows how partitions are represented in the Disk view window. Figure 9 shows how partitions are represented in the Container view window.

Figure 8. Partitions represented in Disk view

Figure 9. Partitions represented in Container view

Viewing Partition Properties

The Partition Properties dialog box contains information about a selected partition.

To access the Partition Properties dialog box, do the following:

Select Disk View or Container View from the View menu.
Select a partition.
Select Properties from the Edit menu.

The Partition Properties dialog box appears (Figure 10).

Figure 10. Partition Properties dialog box

Dialog Box Element Function

Partition icon and label Size and offset of the selected partition

Disk ID Disk ID (Bus:ID:LUN) of the disk on which the partition is located

Status Type of container that is using the partition as well as the status; for example, Used by container, Dead, or Unconfigured

Container icon and adjacent information Type of container that is using the partition, the container number, the container drive letter, and the size of the container

OK button Closes the dialog box

Working with Orphan and Dead Partitions

A partition that is part of a multi-partition container becomes an orphan partition when one or more of its constituent partitions cannot be found or configured. A partition is usually missing or not configurable because the disk on which it resides has been disconnected from the controller. Orphan partitions are represented in FAST as the non-phantom partitions of a phantom container (Figure 11).

A dead partition is a partition that is no longer usable by a container. Some reasons a partition may be designated as dead are as follows:

It is logically bad and therefore no longer needed
It is physically damaged
It resides on a disk that has been disconnected from and then reconnected to the controller

The following icons represent orphan and dead partitions:

Orphan partition

Dead partition

Figure 11 shows orphan partitions represented in Disk view and Container view.

Figure 11. Orphan partitions represented in
Container view and Disk view

Figure 12 shows dead partitions represented in Container view and Disk view.

Figure 12. Dead partitions represented in
Container view and Disk view

Removing Orphan/Dead Partitions

You can recover the space occupied by a disk's orphan and dead partitions using the Remove Orphan/Dead Partitions command. This command reverts all the orphan and dead partitions on a selected disk to freespace.

Before you remove a disk's orphan and dead partitions, consider the following:

For dead partitions
- If you are not sure why the partition is designated as dead, you should verify the disk using the Verify command from the Disk menu. (See Verifying a Disk for instructions.) You should not remove dead partitions that are damaged.
- If you know for certain that the dead partition is the result of a physically damaged disk, you should replace the disk. Whether you replace the disk immediately or later, you should not remove the dead partition.
For orphan partitions
- If you want to retain the container, try reconnecting the disks that contain the missing partitions to the controller.
- If reverting the partitions to freespace is acceptable, simply delete the associated phantom container.

To remove a disk's orphan and dead partitions, do the following:

Select Disk View from the View menu.
Select a disk that has one or more orphan and/or dead partitions.
Select Remove Orphan/Dead Partitions from the Disk menu.

The orphan and dead partitions revert to freespace.

Restoring Dead Partitions on a RAID-5 Set

Sometimes it is possible to recover the data from a RAID-5 set that contains one or more dead partitions. To restore multiple dead partitions in a RAID-5 set, do the following:

Reconnect the disks containing the dead partitions to the controller.
Select Rescan from the Controller menu.
Select the RAID-5 set, and select Restore RAID-5's Dead Partitions from the Container menu.

The Restore Multiple Dead Partition prompt appears (Figure 13).

Figure 13. Restore Multiple Dead Partitions prompt

Click Yes to restore the container. FAST attempts to restore the partition. If FAST is successful, select the RAID-5 set, and select Scrub from the Container menu. (See Scrubbing a RAID-5 Set for instructions.)
Save the data that was in the dead partition.
For NTFS, FAT, and FAT32 file systems, run chkdsk /f.

Managing Partitions with Microsoft Windows Utilities

This section contains information about managing partitions using Microsoft Disk Administrator (Windows NT) or Microsoft Disk Management utility (Windows 2000). For complete instructions on using Microsoft disk management utilities, see your Microsoft documentation.

Notes: To manage disk partitions on a NetWare^{^TM} system, use the install.nlm (NetWare 4.2) or the nwconfig.nlm (NetWare 5.0) utility on the NetWare console. For more information on using these utilities, see your NetWare documentation.

Do not confuse Windows NT or Windows 2000 volume, stripe, mirror, and duplex sets with controller-managed containers. Windows NT and Windows 2000 partitions cannot be managed by the controller management software; they can only be managed in Disk Administrator or Disk Management utility.

Figure 14 shows how containers are represented in Disk Administrator and FAST.

Note that the disk number on the container in the FAST Container view window is the disk number that appears in Disk Administrator's disk configuration view.

Figure 14. Containers 0 and 1 represented in FAST
and Disk Administrator

FAST uses two numeric designations for containers: the container number and the Windows NT or Windows 2000 disk number. When a container is deleted and a new one is created, the new container may retain the same Windows NT or Windows 2000 disk number, or the container may receive a new disk number. This behavior depends on the state of the operating system of the disk associated with the deleted container.

For example, if you enabled disk performance monitoring in Windows NT or Windows 2000 (using the diskperf command), the operating system keeps internal counters on all disks. When FAST deletes a container, however, the associated disk cannot be removed from the operating system's internal disk list. Therefore, new disks receive new disk numbers rather than reusing old ones. (This behavior may be demonstrated with non-RAID-attached SCSI disks also.) In addition, the Microsoft disk management utilities indicate the disk number previously used as no longer available until the next boot. This is normal behavior.

When you use FAST on Windows NT or Windows 2000 to create a new container, you normally assign the container a file system such as NTFS, FAT, or FAT32. Then FAST creates a single operating system partition on the container with the file system type you specified.

To create multiple operating-system partitions on a container, do the following:

Create the container in FAST, but do not assign it a file system. (Select None from the File system list in the Create Container¹ dialog box.)
Use Disk Administrator (on a Windows NT system) or the Disk Management utility (on Windows 2000) to create and format the partitions you want on the container you created in step 1. (See the Microsoft documentation for instructions.)
Note: When formatting partitions for a container using the Disk Administrator or Disk Management utility, we strongly recommend that you use the Quick Format option. The controller's disk verify (with bad block repair) and container scrub operations, which run in the background, will find (and repair) any bad blocks not detected during the quick format operation. (When the controller is busy, formatting partitions for a container can take a long time.)

Figure 15 shows how multiple operating-system partitions are represented in both FAST and Disk Administrator. Note that Disk Administrator represents the container's 200 MB on which a file system has not yet been created as freespace.

If there are more than four operating-system partitions on a container, FAST displays an ellipsis following the fourth file system icon. Use FAST to check the container's properties, or check the Microsoft disk management utility for information on the additional partitions.