15.3.1 Failed Disk Drive Protected by a Hot Spare

If a disk drive in a logical drive fails and that logical drive is protected by a hot spare, the hot spare is automatically incorporated into the logical drive and takes over for the failed drive.

For example, if a disk drive fails in a RAID 5 logical drive, the logical drive is automatically rebuilt, with its data reconstructed using the hot spare in place of the failed drive. You can access the logical drive while it's rebuilding.

To recover from the failure:

  1. Remove and replace the failed disk drive, following the manufacturer's instructions.
  2. If the logical drive is protected with a dedicated hot spare, data is moved back to its original location once the controller detects that the failed drive has been replaced. Once the failed drive is replaced, the dedicated hot spare drive will be back to hot spare state and can protect another drive failure.
    If the logical drive is protected with an auto-replace hot spare, the spare becomes a permanent part of the array. You must designate a new hot spare to protect the logical drive(s) on that array.

    See 6 Protecting Your Data for more information about managing spares.