7 × 6 TB in RAID 5: the numbers
| Usable space | 36 TB (32.7 TB in Windows) |
|---|---|
| Raw space | 42 TB |
| Used for protection | 6 TB |
| Efficiency | 86% |
| Drives that can fail | Any 1 |
| Rebuild at 150 MB/s | 11 h |
| Rebuild at 50 MB/s (busy) | 33 h |
| Data read during rebuild | 36 TB |
| Read error risk, desktop drives | 94% |
| Read error risk, NAS drives | 25% |
Rebuild
Replacing a failed drive means writing a full 6 TB drive. At 150 MB/s with no other load that takes about 11 h; on a busy array running at 50 MB/s, about 33 h. The rebuild reads every surviving drive: 36 TB in total.
Read errors
Reading 36 TB, the chance of at least one unreadable sector is 94% with desktop drives (1 per 1014 bits) and 25% with NAS drives (1 per 1015). Nothing is left to correct it, so the affected file, or on some controllers the whole rebuild, fails. These are worst-case datasheet rates; real drives usually do better.
Our take
With 7 drives sharing one parity, a second failure during the rebuild gets more likely. RAID 6 gives 30 TB with two-drive protection.