In a server with WS2012 Storage Spaces, do I still need hw/sw RAID?

Question

I'd like to utilize Windows Server Storage Spaces (introduced in Windows Server 2012) to increase resiliency against harddrive failures. It is a small server, high performance is not a priority and so Storage Spaces seem like a simple solution.

However, this is what I've just found in the FAQ (emphasis mine):

Storage Spaces cannot be used to host the Windows operating system. Storage Spaces is not a disaster recovery or data replication solution, nor is it a substitute for regular backups.

So this means that I will need HW RAID anyway to protect my C: drive?

Solution

How long is a piece of string? This is subjective. Hardware RAID offloads the responsibility of disk mirroring/striping/spanning to a dedicated set of silicon.

There will surely be performance bottlenecks, but what does it take to hit them?

If this is a simple file server, serving files to remote users over 100Mb LAN or maybe even Gb but the users are saving small files every few minutes or so, then yes, maybe Storage Spaces's simplicity and file mirroring will be sufficient.

If it were ME... I'd still be mirroring whatever drive I boot off of, I want this sucker to keep running until I intervene.

Comments

[Borek Bernard]

Can someone explain why is this not constructive? I feel this question is technical, there probably is a definitive answer to it (either yes or no, Storage Spaces can or cannot provide resiliency for 100% of files on the system) and is related to what ServerFault is about.

[HopelessN00b]

Too broad, subjective and (IMHO) basic would by why I's say it got closed as "not constructive." That's one of about 5 canned categories for thread closure, and the broadest one of them, so it get applied a lot to threads that don't fit other categories. See the category explanation right below: "not a good fit for our Q&A format ... this question will likely solicit debate, arguments, polling, or extended discussion"

[TomTom]

Iti s actually not too broad at all. The moment the Poster mentioned "C drive" it is "great the manual, storage spaces can not boot". No protection for the C drive here.

[Borek Bernard]

The question was whether Storage Spaces alone can protect me against HDD failures, no matter how performant or reliable it is. Because it seems to me from the FAQ that Storage Spaces will never cover 100% of files on my server so I'd just like to confirm that.

[SpacemanSpiff]

It does not appear that it protects the system and boot sector. Now... call me crazy, but even if it did are you going to trust your protection to a v1.0 software? :)

[SpacemanSpiff]

found some good information here: thestoragearchitect.com/2012/06/21/…