Backup Exec 20.2 Administrator's Guide

Create a simple volume

A simple volume is a partition on a disk that contains a file system.

Format a volume

Disk volumes must be formatted before data can be stored on them.

Extend the size of a volume

If a disk contains some unallocated disk space that is adjacent to a functional volume, you can extend the volume to include the free space. To extend the volume, it must be either raw or formatted with the Windows NTFS file system.

Shrink the size of a volume

You can decrease the size of a volume by shrinking the volume into the contiguous, unallocated disk space that is on the same disk.

When you shrink a volume, there is no need to reformat the volume. Ordinary files are automatically relocated on the disk to create the new, unallocated disk space.

Create a spanned volume

A spanned volume spans more than one physical disk. You can create a spanned volume by spanning it across multiple physical disks, or by spanning the volume into unallocated disk space.

To create a spanned volume, you must have a startup volume and at least two dynamic volumes.

Create a striped volume

Striped volumes store data in stripes across two or more physical disks. Although striped volumes do not provide fault-tolerance protection, they do offer the best performance of all the volumes in Windows.

Create a mirrored volume

A mirrored volume provides a copy of the data that is written to a selected volume. Because all data is written to both the mirrored volume and the selected volume, mirroring reduces the capacity of both volumes by 50%.

View volume properties

You can view properties for each volume in the Current Disk Layout view or in the Original Disk Layout view.

Change an assigned drive letter

You can change assigned drive letters for all volumes if you want to organize your drive letters in a certain way.

Delete a volume

Deleting a volume erases all data from the volume; therefore, it is recommended that you use caution when considering the use of this option.

Convert a basic disk to a dynamic disk

Converting basic disks to dynamic disks lets you create the volumes that span multiple disks. Dynamic disks also let you create fault-tolerant volumes, such as mirrored volumes and RAID-5 volumes. All volumes on dynamic disks are referred to as dynamic volumes.

Convert a Master Boot Record (MBR) disk to a Guid Partition Table (GPT) disk

MBR disks use the standard BIOS interface. GPT disks use extensible firmware interface (EFI).

You can convert MBR disks to GPT disks if the disk does not contain partitions or volumes.

Convert a Guid Partition Table (GPT) disk to a Master Boot Record (MBR) disk

GPT disks use extensible firmware interface (EFI). Master boot record (MBR) disks use the standard BIOS interface.

GPT disks can be converted to MBR disks if the disk does not contain partitions or volumes.

View the original disk layout geometry

The original disk layout shows the actual hard disk layout that existed during the backup job. Within the simplified layout view, you can accept the disk geometry as it originally existed before the disaster, or you can alter the geometry by changing the volume sizes. Depending on the size of the existing disks, you can alter volume sizes in megabytes, gigabytes, or terabytes.

The simplified layout view has a Preview tab that lets you view the disk geometry as it presently exists. If you change the disk geometry and change volume sizes, click the Preview tab to see a graphical representation of your proposed changes.

If mismatched volumes appear in the simplified volume layout view, you can use the option Erase hard disks and recreate the volume layout shown above to automatically create a volume layout on the available hard disks. You can also manually create a volume layout by using the Advanced Disk Configuration option.