RAID Calculator

Whether you are planning or designing a new storage solution, capacity is traditionally the first thing you need to consider; our RAID calculator is designed to help with this task. For storage appliances such as NAS, SAN, or others; a RAID type should be selected during the initial storage set up. Storage volumes are configured using RAID by grouping multiple drives; to gain capacity, and also to improve performance and redundancy. These volumes are later presented to operating systems (OS) and applications.

Whether you are planning or designing a new storage solution, capacity is traditionally the first thing you need to consider; our RAID calculator is designed to help with this task. For storage appliances such as NAS, SAN, or others; a RAID type should be selected during the initial storage set up. Storage volumes are configured using RAID by grouping multiple drives; to gain capacity, and also to improve performance and redundancy. These volumes are later presented to operating systems (OS) and applications.

Popular types of RAID include 0, 1, 10, 5, 6, 50, and 60. RAID types based on the ext4 file system are the most used, but ZFS, another popular file system for storage is also an option. Similar to traditional RAID, ZFS uses RAID types like Z1, Z2, Z3, Stripe, and Mirror.

RAID selection is often considered the domain of SOHO or SMB solutions. New enterprise storage solutions typically come with fixed RAID-like configuration out-of-the-box. This configuration is commonly seen in All-Flash Arrays (AFAs), and the key specifications to pay attention to are not RAID type, but overall available capacity via compression, deduplication, and other capacity reduction techniques.

Aiming to help storage users to understand the implications of RAID set up, we have built a free and easy-to-use RAID calculator. Based on the RAID type selected, the calculator adjusts itself. By moving the mouse cursor over the boxes, you will see additional information. And after inputting data, an instant outcome is calculated based on different capacities specifications.

Besides essential capacity information, this calculator also offers you Mean Time Between Failures (MTBF) and Mean Time To Physical Replacement (MTTPR), helping to anticipate when a faulty driver should be physically replaced.