Redundant Array of Independent Disks, or RAID, is a way of storing content on a number of hard disk drives simultaneously. A RAID might be software or hardware based on the hard drives that are used - physical or logical ones, yet what’s common between them is that they all work as just one single unit where data is kept. The biggest advantage of using a RAID is redundancy since the info on all drives is identical at all times, so even in case one of the drives fails for whatever reason, the info will still be available on the remaining drives. The general performance is enhanced as well because the reading and writing processes could be split between different drives, so a single one will never be overloaded. There're different sorts of RAIDs where the performance and fault tolerance may differ according to the exact setup - whether info is written on all drives in real time or it's written on one drive and then mirrored on another, the number of drives are used for the RAID, and many others.

RAID in Web Hosting

The hard drives which we employ for storage with our outstanding cloud hosting platform are not the classic HDDs, but quick NVMes. They function in RAID-Z - a special setup designed for the ZFS file system which we work with. All the content that you add to your web hosting account will be saved on multiple drives and at least one of them shall be employed as a parity disk. This is a special drive where an extra bit is added to any content copied on it. In the event that a disk in the RAID stops functioning, it'll be replaced without any service interruptions and the info will be recovered on the new drive by recalculating its bits using the data on the parity disk plus that on the other disks. This is done to guarantee the integrity of the data and together with the real-time checksum validation that the ZFS file system performs on all drives, you will never need to concern yourself with losing any data no matter what.

RAID in Semi-dedicated Servers

The information uploaded to any semi-dedicated server account is saved on NVMe drives which work in RAID-Z. One of the drives in this kind of a setup is used for parity - whenever data is cloned on it, an additional bit is added. If a disk turns out to be faulty, it will be taken out of the RAID without disturbing the work of the websites as the data will load from the remaining drives, and when a brand new drive is included, the data that will be duplicated on it will be a combination between the data on the parity disk and data kept on the other hard disks in the RAID. This is done so as to ensure that the data which is being copied is correct, so once the new drive is rebuilt, it could be integrated into the RAID as a production one. This is one more warranty for the integrity of your data because the ZFS file system which runs on our cloud Internet hosting platform analyzes a special checksum of all the copies of the files on the separate drives so as to avoid any chance of silent data corruption.

RAID in VPS Servers

If you take advantage of one of our VPS server solutions, any content which you upload will be saved on NVMe drives that work in RAID. At least a single drive is used for parity so as to ensure the integrity of the info. In simple terms, this is a special drive where info is copied with one bit added to it. In case a disk inside the RAID breaks down, your Internet sites will continue working and when a new disk takes the place of the defective one, the bits of the data that will be copied on it are calculated by using the healthy and the parity drives. By doing this, any potential for corrupting data throughout the process is prevented. We also employ regular hard drives that operate in RAID for storing backup copies, so in case you add this service to your VPS package, your content will be stored on multiple drives and you won't ever need to worry about its integrity even in the event of multiple drive failures.