RAID, which stands short for Redundant Array of Independent Disks, is a software or hardware storage virtualization technology which makes it possible for a system to employ multiple hard drives as a single logical unit. Simply put, all of the drives are used as one and the information on all of them is the same. This kind of a setup has 2 major advantages over using just a single drive to store data - the first is redundancy, so in the event that one drive fails, the information will be accessed through the remaining ones, and the second one is improved performance because the input/output, or reading/writing operations will be spread among multiple drives. You can find different RAID types based on the number of drives are employed, whether reading and writing are both handled from all drives simultaneously, if data is written in blocks on one drive after another or is mirrored between drives in the same time, and so on. Depending on the particular setup, the error tolerance and the performance may vary.

RAID in Cloud Web Hosting

The NVMe drives which our cutting-edge cloud hosting platform uses for storage work in RAID-Z. This type of RAID is designed to work with the ZFS file system that runs on the platform and it takes advantage of the so-called parity disk - a special drive where info saved on the other drives is copied with an additional bit added to it. In the event that one of the disks stops working, your sites shall continue working from the other ones and as soon as we replace the malfunctioning one, the data which will be duplicated on it will be recovered from what is stored on the other drives as well as the info from the parity disk. This is done in order to be able to recalculate the bits of every single file properly and to validate the integrity of the information cloned on the new drive. This is another level of security for the content that you upload to your cloud web hosting account in addition to the ZFS file system that compares a unique digital fingerprint for each file on all the drives in real time.

RAID in Semi-dedicated Hosting

The data uploaded to any semi-dedicated hosting account is stored on NVMe drives that operate in RAID-Z. One of the drives in type of a setup is used for parity - each time data is copied on it, an additional bit is added. If a disk turns out to be faulty, it will be taken out of the RAID without interrupting the functioning of the websites because the data will load from the remaining drives, and when a new drive is included, the info which will be cloned on it will be a mix between the info on the parity disk and data stored on the other drives in the RAID. That is done in order to ensure that the information which is being copied is accurate, so the moment the new drive is rebuilt, it could be integrated into the RAID as a production one. This is an additional guarantee for the integrity of your info as the ZFS file system which runs on our cloud Internet hosting platform analyzes a unique checksum of all the copies of your files on the various drives to be able to avoid any possibility of silent data corruption.

RAID in VPS Hosting

In case you take advantage of one of our virtual private server plans, any content you upload will be kept on NVMe drives which function in RAID. At least 1 drive is intended for parity to ensure the integrity of the info. In simple terms, this is a special drive where information is copied with one bit added to it. In the event that a disk within the RAID fails, your websites will continue working and when a new disk takes the place of the flawed one, the bits of the information that will be cloned on it are calculated by using the healthy and the parity drives. By doing this, any potential for corrupting data throughout the process is averted. We also use regular hard drives which function in RAID for storing backup copies, so should you include this service to your VPS package, your content will be kept on multiple drives and you will never need to worry about its integrity even in the event of multiple drive breakdowns.