Redundant Array of Independent Disks, or RAID, is a way of keeping content on a number of hard drives at the same time. A RAID might be software or hardware depending on the HDDs which are used - physical or logical ones, yet what’s common between them is the fact that they all perform as just a single unit where info is saved. The biggest advantage of employing a RAID is redundancy since the data on all drives shall be exactly the same all of the time, so even if a drive fails for whatever reason, the info will still be available on the rest of the drives. The general performance is enhanced as well because the reading and writing processes could be split between multiple drives, so a single one will not be overloaded. There're different types of RAIDs where the functionality and fault tolerance could differ based on the particular setup - whether data is written on all the drives real-time or it's written on one drive and after that mirrored on another, what number of drives are used for the RAID, etc.

RAID in Cloud Hosting

The NVMe drives that our cutting-edge cloud hosting platform employs for storage work in RAID-Z. This kind of RAID is created to work with the ZFS file system which runs on the platform and it works by using the so-called parity disk - a specific drive where info saved on the other drives is cloned with an additional bit added to it. In the event that one of the disks fails, your websites shall continue working from the other ones and as soon as we replace the faulty one, the info which will be copied on it will be rebuilt from what is stored on the rest of the drives together with the info from the parity disk. This is performed in order to be able to recalculate the bits of each and every file correctly and to validate the integrity of the information copied on the new drive. This is another level of security for the content which you upload to your cloud hosting account along with the ZFS file system that analyzes a special digital fingerprint for each and every file on all of the disk drives in real time.

RAID in Semi-dedicated Hosting

The NVMe drives which are used for keeping any content uploaded to the semi-dedicated hosting accounts which we offer operate in RAID-Z. This is a specific configuration where one or more hard drives are employed for parity i.e. the system will include an extra bit to any data cloned on such a disk drive. If a disk fails and is replaced with a new one, what data will be cloned on the latter will be a combination calculated between the data on the other disks and that on the parity one. This is done to make sure that the data on the new drive will be correct. During the process, the RAID will continue operating normally and the faulty drive will not have an impact on the normal operation of your sites at all. Using NVMes in RAID-Z is an outstanding addition to the ZFS file system which runs on our revolutionary cloud platform with regard to preserving the integrity of your files because ZFS uses special digital identifiers named checksums to prevent silent data corruption.

RAID in VPS Hosting

If you employ one of our virtual private server solutions, any content which you upload will be stored on NVMe drives that function in RAID. At least a single drive is used for parity to guarantee the integrity of your information. In simple terms, this is a special drive where data is copied with one bit added to it. In case a disk part of the RAID breaks down, your sites will continue working and when a new disk takes the place of the defective one, the bits of the info that will be copied on it are calculated by using the healthy and the parity drives. That way, any potential for corrupting data throughout the process is averted. We also use conventional hard disks that operate in RAID for storing backups, so in case you include this service to your VPS package, your content will be stored on multiple drives and you will never need to worry about its integrity even in the event of multiple drive failures.