Creating a Thick or Thin Volume

  1. Go to Storage & Snapshots > Storage > Storage/Snapshots.
  2. Perform one of the following actions.

    NAS State

    Action

    No volumes or storage pools

    Click New Volume.

    One or more volumes or storage pools

    Click Create > New Volume.

    The Volume Creation Wizard window opens.

  3. Select the volume type.

    • Thick Volume

    • Thin Volume

    For details, see Volumes.

  4. Select a storage pool.

    You can select an existing storage pool or create a new storage pool immediately.

  5. Optional: Create a new storage pool.
    1. Click .

      The Create Storage Pool Wizard window opens.

    2. Click Next.
    3. Optional: Select an expansion unit from the Enclosure Unit list.
      Important:

      • You cannot select disks from multiple expansion units.

      • If the expansion unit is disconnected from the NAS, the storage pool becomes inaccessible until it is reconnected.

    4. Select one or more disks.
      Warning:

      All data on the selected disks will be deleted.

    5. Select a RAID type.

      QTS displays all available RAID types and automatically selects the most optimized RAID type.

      Number of disks

      Supported RAID Types

      Default RAID Type

      One

      Single

      Single

      Two

      JBOD, RAID 0, RAID 1

      RAID 1

      Three

      JBOD, RAID 0, RAID 5

      RAID 5

      Four

      JBOD, RAID 0, RAID 5, RAID 6, RAID 10

      RAID 5

      Five

      JBOD, RAID 0, RAID 5, RAID 6

      RAID 6

      Six or more

      JBOD, RAID 0, RAID 5, RAID 6, RAID 10, RAID 50

      Note:

      RAID 10 requires an even number of disks.

      RAID 6

      Eight or more

      JBOD, RAID 0, RAID 5, RAID 6, RAID 10, RAID 50, RAID 60

      RAID 6
      Tip:

      Use the default RAID type if you are unsure of which option to choose.

      For details, see RAID Types.

    6. Optional: Select the disk that will be used as a hot spare for this RAID group.

      The designated hot spare automatically replaces any disk in the RAID group that fails.

      For RAID 50 or RAID 60, a spare disk must be configured later. You should configure a global spare disk so that all subgroups share the same spare disk.

    7. Click Next.
    8. Optional: Configure SSD over-provisioning.

      Over-provisioning reserves a percentage of SSD storage space on each disk in the RAID group to improve write performance and extend the disk's lifespan. You can decrease the amount of space reserved for over-provisioning after QTS has created the RAID group.

      Tip:

      To determine the optimal amount of over-provisioning for your SSDs, download and run SSD Profiling Tool from App Center.

    9. Configure the alert threshold.

      QTS issues a warning notification when the percentage of used pool space is equal to or above the specified threshold.

    10. Click Next.
    11. Verify the storage pool information.
    12. Click Create.

      A confirmation message appears.

      Warning:

      Clicking OK deletes all data on the selected disks.

    13. Click OK.

    QTS creates the storage pool. The Create Storage Pool Wizard window closes.

  6. Click Next.
  7. Optional: Specify an alias for the volume.

    The alias must consist of 1 to 64 characters from any of the following groups:

    • Letters: A to Z, a to z

    • Numbers: 0 to 9

    • Special characters: Hyphen (-), underscore (_)

  8. Specify the capacity of the volume.

    The volume type determines the maximum volume capacity.

    Volume Type

    Maximum Size

    Thick

    Amount of free space in the parent storage pool.

    Thin

    Twenty times the amount of free space in the parent storage pool

    Setting the maximum size of a thin volume to a value that is greater than the amount of free space in the storage pool is called over-allocation.

  9. Specify the number of bytes per inode.

    The number of bytes per inode determines the maximum volume size and the number of files and folders that the volume can store. Increasing the number of bytes per inode results in a larger maximum volume size, but a lower maximum number of files and folders.

  10. Optional: Configure advanced settings.

    Setting

    Description

    User Actions

    Alert threshold

    QTS issues a warning notification when the percentage of used volume space is equal to or above the specified threshold.

    Specify a value.

    Encryption

    QTS encrypts all data on the volume with 256-bit AES encryption.

    • Specify an encryption password containing 8 to 32 characters, with any combination of letters, numbers and special characters. Spaces are not allowed.

    • Select Save encryption key to save a local copy of the encryption key on the NAS. This enables QTS to automatically unlock and mount the encrypted volume when the NAS starts up. If the encryption key is not saved, you must specify the encryption password each time the NAS restarts.

    Warning:

    • Saving the encryption key on the NAS can result in unauthorized data access if unauthorized personnel are able to physically access the NAS.

    • If you forget the encryption password, all data will become inaccessible.

    Accelerate performance with SSD cache

    QTS adds data from this volume to the SSD cache to improve read or write performance.

    		  

    Create a shared folder on the volume

    QTS automatically creates the shared folder when the volume is ready. Only the user account that creates the shared folder will have read/write access to the folder.

    Note:

    This setting is only available when logged in as "admin".

    • Specify a folder name.

    • Select Create this folder as a snapshot shared folder.

    A snapshot shared folder enables faster snapshot creation and restoration.
  11. Click Next.
  12. Click Finish.

QTS creates and initializes the volume, and then creates the optional shared folder.

Parent topic: Volume Creation