RAID, or Redundant Array of Independent Disks, is a technology for keeping data on a number hard drives that work together as a single logical unit. The drives could be physical or logical i.e. in the latter case one drive is divided into independent ones using virtualization software. In any case, the very same information is saved on all of the drives and the basic benefit of employing this type of a setup is that in case a drive breaks down, the data will still be available on the remaining ones. Employing a RAID also improves the overall performance since the input and output operations will be spread among a couple of drives. There are several kinds of RAID dependant upon how many drives are used, whether writing is carried out on all of the drives in real time or just on a single one, and how the info is synchronized between the hard drives - whether it's written in blocks on one drive after another or all of it is mirrored from one on the others. All these factors suggest that the error tolerance and the performance between the different RAID types could differ.
RAID in Website Hosting
The hard drives that we use for storage with our top-notch cloud web hosting platform are not the standard HDDs, but fast NVMes. They operate in RAID-Z - a special setup created for the ZFS file system which we employ. All the content that you upload to your website hosting account will be kept on multiple disk drives and at least one of them will be employed as a parity disk. This is a special drive where an additional bit is added to any content copied on it. In case a disk in the RAID stops working, it'll be replaced with no service disturbances and the information will be recovered on the new drive by recalculating its bits thanks to the data on the parity disk along with that on the remaining disks. This is done so as to guarantee the integrity of the info and along with the real-time checksum authentication that the ZFS file system performs on all drives, you will never have to concern yourself with the loss of any information no matter what.
RAID in Semi-dedicated Servers
The NVMe drives that are used for storing any website content uploaded to the semi-dedicated server accounts that we offer work in RAID-Z. This is a specific setup where one or more hard drives are used for parity i.e. the system will include an extra bit to any data duplicated on this type of a drive. In case that a disk fails and is substituted with a new one, what info will be copied on the latter will be a mix calculated between the data on the remaining drives and that on the parity one. This is done to guarantee that the information on the new drive shall be correct. During the process, the RAID will continue functioning adequately and the malfunctioning drive won't impact the adequate operation of your sites at all. Using NVMes in RAID-Z is a fantastic addition to the ZFS file system which runs on our cutting-edge cloud platform with regards to preserving the integrity of your files because ZFS uses specific digital identifiers named checksums to avoid silent data corruption.
RAID in VPS Servers
In case you use one of our VPS server plans, any content that you upload will be kept on NVMe drives which operate in RAID. At least 1 drive is intended for parity so as to ensure the integrity of your info. In simple terms, this is a special drive where info is copied with one bit added to it. In case a disk within the RAID stops functioning, your websites will continue working and when a new disk replaces the defective one, the bits of the data that will be cloned on it are calculated using the healthy and the parity drives. That way, any probability of corrupting data during the process is avoided. We also employ conventional hard disks that operate in RAID for storing backup copies, so in case you include this service to your VPS plan, your content will be kept on multiple drives and you'll never need to worry about its integrity even in the event of multiple drive breakdowns.