Patent ID: 6892276

Claim:
A system, comprising: a plurality of data storage devices capable of giving a SMART indication, the plurality of data storage device arranged as a RAID array, in which a SMART indication from a data storage device is issued, data from the data storage device which originated the SMART indication is replicated to a second data storage device that was not originally configured for data storage in the RAID array with the plurality of data storage devices, and the data storage device which originated the SMART indication from the RAID array is removed after replication is completed, thereby obtaining the second data storage device and the plurality of data storage devices configured as a RAID array, a data storage device of the plurality of data storage devices which did not originate the SMART indication being removed, the removed data storage device being replaced with the second data storage device so that data is replicated from the data storage device which originated the SMART indication to the second data storage device, once replication is complete, the data storage device which originated the SMART indication is replaced with the removed data storage device.