Robbie wrote:
Fucking amazing what you can find in the help text, innit, eh?
Dynamic disks and volumes
Dynamic disks provide features that basic disks do not, such as the ability
to create volumes that span multiple disks (spanned and striped volumes),
and the ability to create fault tolerant volumes (mirrored and RAID-5
volumes). All volumes on dynamic disks are known as dynamic volumes.
There are five types of dynamic volumes: simple, spanned, striped, mirrored,
and RAID-5. Mirrored and RAID-5 volumes are fault tolerant and are available
only on computers running Windows 2000 Server, Windows 2000 Advanced Server,
Windows 2000 Datacenter Server, or the Windows Server 2003 family of
operating systems. You can, however, use a computer running Windows XP
Professional to remotely create mirrored and RAID-5 volumes on these
operating systems.
Regardless of whether the dynamic disk uses the master boot record (MBR) or
GUID partition table (GPT) partition style, you can create up to 2,000
dynamic volumes, although the recommended number of dynamic volumes is 32 or
less.
For information about how to manage dynamic volumes, see Manage dynamic
volumes.
Considerations when using dynamic disks and dynamic volumes
When using dynamic volumes, the following considerations apply:
a.. Installing the Windows Server 2003 family of operating systems. You
can perform a fresh installation of the Windows Server 2003 family of
operating systems on a dynamic volume only if that volume was converted from
a basic boot volume or basic system volume. If the dynamic volume was
created from unallocated space on a dynamic disk, you cannot install the
Windows Server 2003 family of operating systems on that volume. This setup
limitation occurs because Setup for products in the Windows Server 2003
family recognizes only dynamic volumes that have an entry in the partition
table. You can, however, extend the volume (if it is a simple or spanned
volume).
Do not convert basic disks to dynamic disks if they contain multiple
installations of Windows 2000, Windows XP Professional, or the Windows
Server 2003 family of operating systems. After the conversion, it is
unlikely that you will be able to start the computer using that operating
system.
For information about basic volumes, see Basic disks and volumes.
b.. Portable computers and removable media. Dynamic disks are not
supported on portable computers, removable disks, detachable disks that use
Universal Serial Bus (USB) or IEEE 1394 (also called FireWire) interfaces,
or on disks connected to shared SCSI buses. If you are using a portable
computer and right-click a disk in the graphical or list view in Disk
Management, you will not see the option to convert the disk to dynamic.
c.. Boot and system partitions. You can convert a basic disk containing
the system or boot partitions to a dynamic disk. After the disk is
converted, these partitions become simple system or boot volumes (after
restarting the computer). You cannot mark an existing dynamic volume as
active. You can convert a basic disk containing the boot partition (which
contains the operating system) to a dynamic disk. After the disk is
converted, the boot partition becomes a simple boot volume (after restarting
the computer).
d.. Mirroring the boot and system volumes. If you convert the disk
containing the boot and system partitions to a dynamic disk, you can mirror
the boot and system volumes onto another dynamic disk. Then, if the disk
containing the boot and system volumes fails, you can start the computer
from the disk containing the mirrors of these volumes. For more information,
see To create and test a mirrored system or boot volume.
e.. Converting dynamic disks to basic disks. After you convert a basic
disk into a dynamic disk, you cannot change the dynamic volumes back to
partitions. Instead, you must move or back up your data, delete all dynamic
volumes on the disk and then convert the disk. For more information, see To
change a dynamic disk back to a basic disk.
f.. Shadow copies storage area. If you are using a basic disk as a storage
area for shadow copies and you intend to convert the disk into a dynamic
disk, it is important to take the following precaution to avoid data loss.
If the disk is a non-boot volume and is a different volume from where the
original files reside, you must first dismount and take offline the volume
containing the original files before you convert the disk containing shadow
copies to a dynamic disk. You must bring the volume containing the original
files back online within 20 minutes, otherwise, you will lose the data
stored in the existing shadow copies. If the shadow copies are located on a
boot volume, you can convert the disk to dynamic without losing shadow
copies.
You can use the mountvol command with the /p option to dismount the volume
and take it offline. You can mount the volume and bring it online using the
mountvol command or the Disk Management snap-in.
Basic disks and volumes
A basic disk is a physical disk that contains primary partitions, extended
partitions, or logical drives. Partitions and logical drives on basic disks
are known as basic volumes. You can only create basic volumes on basic
disks.
The number of partitions you can create on a basic disk depends on the
disk's partition style:
a.. On master boot record (MBR) disks, you can create up to four primary
partitions per disk, or you can create up to three primary partitions and
one extended partition. Within the extended partition, you can create
unlimited logical drives.
b.. On GUID partition table (GPT) disks, you can create up to 128 primary
partitions. Because GPT disks do not limit you to four partitions, you do
not need to create extended partitions or logical drives.
You can add more space to existing primary partitions and logical drives by
extending them into adjacent, contiguous unallocated space on the same disk.
To extend a basic volume, it must be formatted with the NTFS file system.
You can extend a logical drive within contiguous free space in the extended
partition that contains it. If you extend a logical drive beyond the free
space available in the extended partition, the extended partition grows to
contain the logical drive as long as the extended partition is followed by
contiguous unallocated space. For instructions describing how to extend a
basic volume, see To extend a basic volume.
Always use basic volumes, instead of dynamic volumes, on computers running
MS-DOS, Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows Millennium Edition, Windows NT 4.0,
or Windows XP Home Edition that are configured to dual-boot with Windows XP
Professional or the Windows Server 2003 family of operating systems. These
operating systems cannot access the data stored on dynamic volumes.
Windows XP Professional and the Windows Server 2003 family of operating
systems do not support multidisk basic volumes created using Windows NT 4.0
or earlier, such as volume sets, mirror sets, stripe sets, or stripe sets
with parity. For information about using Windows NT 4.0 multidisk basic
volumes, see Using Windows NT 4.0 multidisk storage.
For more information about dynamic volumes, see Dynamic disks and volumes.
