How to choose the correct RAID level

For example, if you're looking for high-performance reads and writes, you'll probably want to use smaller disk drives and avoid RAID 6. If you want to store large amounts of data where rebuilds can occur in the background, RAID 5 and RAID 6 can be a good fit when properly configured to your application needs. If your concern is performance, you should consider a different RAID level to minimize or eliminate performance impacts when a disk drive fails, for example using RAID 1. In the end, it's going to come down to a balancing game between your budget dollars, performance requirements, data availability, capacity, energy consumption and survivability, along with application service requiremen

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When deciding which RAID level is right for your needs, consider the following:

Remember: RAID is not a substitute for backup and needs to be used in conjunction with some other form of data protection. By not combing RAID with some other data protection techniques and technology, if a file is deleted, it's gone. However if you have a backup, snapshot or other point-in-time copy or view of the data, then the file can be recovered.

Check out the entire RAID Handbook.

About the author: Greg Schulz is founder and senior analyst with the IT infrastructure analyst and consulting firm StorageIO Group. Greg is also the author and illustrator of Resilient Storage Networks (Elsevier) and has contributed material to Storage magazine and other TechTarget venues.

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