Abstract: Methods and structure for initializing a RAID storage volume substantially in parallel with processing of host generated I/O requests. Initialization of a RAID volume may be performed as a background task in one aspect of the invention while host generated I/O requests proceed in parallel with the initialization. The initialization may preferably the performed by zeroing all data including parity for each stripe to thereby make each stripe XOR consistent. Host generated I/O requests to write information on the volume may utilize standard read-modify-write requests where the entire I/O request affects information in a portion of the volume already initialized by background processing. Other host I/O requests use standard techniques for generating parity for all stripes affected by the write requests. These and other features and aspects of the present invention make a newly defined RAID volume available for host processing is quickly as possible.

Abstract: The present invention is directed to a system and method for increased data availability. In an aspect of the present invention, a method includes receiving a SMART indication from a data storage device included in a plurality of data storage devices configured as a RAID array. Data from the data storage device which originated the SMART indication is replicated to a second data storage device. The second data storage device was not originally configured in the RAID array with the plurality of data storage devices for data storage. The data storage device which originated the SMART indication from the RAID array is removed, thereby resulting the second data storage device and the plurality of data storage devices configured as a RAID array.