ZFS - CREATE DISK POOLS

This tutorial will cover how to create pools with different RAID levels.

  • singular/basic (no RAID)
  • raidz
  • raidz2
  • raid 0
  • raid 10

Creating the pools by specifying disks like /dev/sda and /dev/sdb is somewhat dangerous. Your pool could become degraded or disappear if you plug in another drive and all the letters change. To remedy this, use paths with /dev/disk/by-id/... instead.

Also, if your pool does become degraded because of the situation described above, running those export/import commands will fix the situation, even if you have already written data since the pool became degraded.

sudo zpool export [my pool name]
sudo zpool import -d [my pool name]

Single Disk (No RAID) #

sudo zpool create -f [new pool name] /dev/disk/by-id/ata-TOSHIBA_DT01ACA300_37U9AR2AS

NOTE

The -f prevents the error message from preventing the creation. Be careful when using this as you could overwrite existing pools/partitions.

Multiple Disk (RAID 0) #

sudo zpool create -f [new pool name] /dev/disk/by-id/ata-TOSHIBA_DT01ACA300_37U9AR2AS /dev/disk/by-id/ata-TOSHIBA_DT01ACA300_37U9DSYAS

Adding Drives #

sudo zpool add [existing pool name] /dev/sdd

Raid 1 #

To create a RAID1 pool (or mirror), simply add the command mirror when creating or adding drives. For example:

sudo zpool create  -f [new pool name] mirror /dev/sdb /dev/sdc

sudo zpool add [existing pool name] mirror /dev/sdd /dev/sde

RAID 10 #

sudo zpool create [pool name] \
  mirror disk1 disk2 \
  mirror disk3 disk4

The output of sudo zpool status would show:

pool: myPool
 state: ONLINE
  scan: none requested
config:

        NAME        STATE     READ WRITE CKSUM
        myPool      ONLINE       0     0     0
          mirror-0  ONLINE       0     0     0
            sdb     ONLINE       0     0     0
            sdc     ONLINE       0     0     0
          mirror-1  ONLINE       0     0     0
            sdd     ONLINE       0     0     0
            sde     ONLINE       0     0     0

RAID Z (RAID 5) #

sudo zpool create -f [pool name] raidz /dev/sdb /dev/sdc /dev/sdd

sudo zpool add -f [pool name] /dev/sde

pool: poolz
 state: ONLINE
  scan: none requested
config:

        NAME        STATE     READ WRITE CKSUM
        poolz       ONLINE       0     0     0
          raidz1-0  ONLINE       0     0     0
            sdb     ONLINE       0     0     0
            sdc     ONLINE       0     0     0
            sdd     ONLINE       0     0     0
            sde     ONLINE       0     0     0

RAIDz2 #

sudo zpool create -f [pool name] raidz2 /dev/sdb /dev/sdc /dev/sdd

NOTE

You need a minimum of 3 drives

RAIDz3 #

sudo zpool create -f [pool name] raidz3 /dev/sdb /dev/sdc /dev/sdd /dev/sde

Destroying Pools #

sudo zpool destroy [pool name]

References #