RAID, or Redundant Array of Independent Disks, is a technology of storing data on multiple hard drives which operate together as one logical unit. The drives can be physical or logical i.e. in the aforementioned case a single drive is split into individual ones through virtualization software. In any case, identical data is kept on all the drives and the key benefit of employing this type of a setup is that in case a drive stops working, the data shall still be available on the other ones. Having a RAID also improves the performance because the input and output operations will be spread among a number of drives. There are several kinds of RAID depending on how many hard disks are used, whether writing is done on all of the drives in real time or just on a single one, and how the information is synced between the hard drives - whether it's written in blocks on one drive after another or it is mirrored from one on the others. All of these factors show that the fault tolerance as well as the performance between the various RAID types can differ.
RAID in Cloud Website Hosting
The NVMe drives which our cutting-edge cloud Internet hosting platform employs for storage operate in RAID-Z. This kind of RAID is created to work with the ZFS file system which runs on the platform and it employs the so-called parity disk - a specific drive where info located on the other drives is cloned with an additional bit added to it. In the event that one of the disks fails, your websites shall continue working from the other ones and once we replace the malfunctioning one, the info which will be cloned on it will be recovered from what is stored on the remaining drives along with the information from the parity disk. This is done in order to be able to recalculate the elements of each and every file properly and to authenticate the integrity of the info duplicated on the new drive. This is an additional level of security for the information you upload to your cloud website hosting account in addition to the ZFS file system that compares a special digital fingerprint for each and every file on all the drives in real time.
RAID in Semi-dedicated Hosting
The NVMe drives that are used for storing any site content uploaded to the semi-dedicated hosting accounts that we provide function in RAID-Z. This is a specific configuration where one or more disk drives are used for parity i.e. the system will add an extra bit to any data copied on this kind of a hard drive. In the event that a disk fails and is substituted with a new one, what data will be duplicated on the latter will be a mix calculated between the data on the remaining hard disks and that on the parity one. This is done to ensure that the data on the new drive will be accurate. During the procedure, the RAID will continue working normally and the problematic drive will not have an effect on the normal operation of your Internet sites in any way. Working with NVMes in RAID-Z is an excellent addition to the ZFS file system that runs on our cutting-edge cloud platform with regard to preserving the integrity of your files since ZFS uses unique digital identifiers named checksums in order to prevent silent data corruption.
RAID in VPS
In case you take advantage of one of our virtual private server packages, any content that you upload will be kept on NVMe drives that operate in RAID. At least 1 drive is used for parity so as to ensure the integrity of the information. In simple terms, this is a special drive where info is copied with one bit added to it. In case a disk within the RAID stops working, your sites will continue working and when a new disk replaces the malfunctioning one, the bits of the info that will be duplicated on it are calculated using the healthy and the parity drives. By doing this, any possibility of corrupting data throughout the process is averted. We also use conventional hard drives which operate in RAID for storing backup copies, so in case you add this service to your VPS plan, your content will be kept on multiple drives and you won't ever have to worry about its integrity even in the event of multiple drive failures.