Hardware Controller Pass-through Devices
The Pass-thru Hardware Units in QuantaStor serves the purpose of configuring and utilizing pass-through RAID hardware units within the storage system. Pass-thru allows you to directly access individual drives connected to a hardware RAID controller without configuring them into traditional RAID arrays.
Select a controller to be used to create single disk (RAID0) units out of any unused disk devices under that controller.
The key purposes and benefits of the Pass-thru Hardware feature:
- Direct Drive Access: Pass-thru RAID0 enables direct access to individual drives connected to a hardware RAID controller. Instead of configuring the drives into RAID arrays with data redundancy, pass-thru mode allows each drive to be independently accessed by the operating system or file system. This is useful in certain scenarios where you want to bypass RAID functionality and have direct control over individual drives.
- Flexibility: Pass-thru mode provides flexibility in utilizing drives connected to a hardware RAID controller. Instead of being limited to traditional RAID configurations, you can create pass-thru (RAID0) hardware units to treat each drive independently. This flexibility can be beneficial in cases where you want to use specific drives for specific purposes or have different configurations for different drives.
- Performance Optimization: By creating pass-thru (RAID0) hardware units, you can optimize performance for certain workloads. RAID0 striping distributes data across multiple drives, allowing for improved read and write speeds by parallelizing I/O operations. This can be advantageous in situations where maximizing performance is a priority and data redundancy is not a requirement.
- Simplified Management: The "Create Pass-thru (RAID0) Hardware Units" feature provides a simplified management interface for configuring and utilizing pass-thru RAID0 units. You can select the individual drives connected to the hardware RAID controller and create pass-thru units without the complexities associated with configuring traditional RAID arrays.
- Integration with QuantaStor: Pass-thru (RAID0) hardware units created using this feature are seamlessly integrated with QuantaStor's management capabilities. You can monitor the health and status of the individual drives, perform maintenance tasks, and incorporate them into your overall storage management within the QuantaStor interface.
It's important to note that while pass-thru mode offers flexibility and performance benefits, it does not provide data redundancy. Data stored on individual drives in pass-thru (RAID0) hardware units is not protected against drive failures. Therefore, it's crucial to consider the trade-off between performance and data redundancy when deciding to use pass-thru (RAID0) configurations.
Overall, the "Create Pass-thru (RAID0) Hardware Units" feature in QuantaStor allows you to configure and utilize pass-through RAID0 hardware units, providing direct drive access, flexibility, performance optimization, and simplified management for specific scenarios where data redundancy is not a requirement.
Navigation: Storage Management --> Controllers & Enclosures --> Hardware Controller --> Create Pass-thru Units (toolbar)
