You can always expand your current Big Storage drive with more space (up to 40TB per Big Storage). Please note that not every filesystem / OS can handle disks larger than 2TB, so check if your filesystem / OS supports this before the upgrade.
This manual assumes that you have already linked and partitioned your existing Big Storage drive successfully. If that is not the case, follow the manual for Windows or Linux / BSD first.
Step 1
Log in to your control panel, navigate to the 'BladeVPS' tab and click the name of your VPS on the left.
Step 2
Directly below your VPS console, click the cogwheel next to 'Big Storage X TB'.
Step 3
You are now taken to the management page of your Big Storage. Click 'Manage' at the top right and select 'Upgrade'.
Step 4
You then expand your Big Storage by increasing the disk to the desired size with the 'plus' button. When you are finished, click 'Continue' and follow the indicated steps.
Is this extra disk space immediately visible in my OS?
You should be able to immediately see this disk space in your OS (with the exception of BSD, which requires a restart), but before the extra space can be used, it will first have to be added to a partition. You can create a new partition for this or you can expand your existing Big Storage partition.
Using the extra disk space in Linux / FreeBSD
If you use the XFS Big Storage drive as a filesystem (as we recommend in our manual), you can expand the disk space using a number of steps.
First, it is important that you have installed the correct version of parted on your VPS. Versions up to 3.0 and from 3.2 have the possibility to ‘resize’ a partition. If you use version 3.0 or 3.1 (which can be checked by using the 'parted -v' command), then you will first have to upgrade to version 3.2 or newer.
You can also use the "Linux Boot Rescue" environment of the console in which parted 3.3 is always available. You can start this by starting it on the console screen under 'Options'. Please note! This will restart your VPS, so do this at a time when your VPS is not used very actively.
Step 1
Start Parted with the following command:
parted /dev/vdb
If 'b' is not the letter of your Big Storage drive (can be checked with df -h), replace it with the letter that applies to you.
Step 2
Further in this tutorial you'll need the exact size of your upgraded Big Storage in GB's. This can be reviewed with the command:
print
You'll possibly first see a warning like below. Type 'fix' to correct the warning.
Warning: Not all fo the space available to /dev/vdb appears to be used, you can fix the GPT to use all of the space (an extra X blocks) or continue with the current setting?
Fix/Ignore? fix
Next, you'll see an output which will be comparible to the code below. vang van de Big Storage in dit voorbeeld is 4398GB (in bold). Noteer de waarde die je hier op jouw VPS terugziet.
Model: Virtio Block Device (virth1%) Disk /dev/vdb: 4398GB Sector size (logicial/physical):512B/512B Partition Table: gpt
You can also see the current total size and also where the current partitions begin and end.
Step 3
Now increase the partition via the following command (1 is the number of the partition you want to expand):
resizepart 1
Step 4
You'll be asked where the partition should end and here you fill in the (maximum) value of the Big Storage disk. In this example this value is 4398GB:
End? (2199GB)? 4398GB
Step 5
Now close parted with the command:
quit
If you use Linux Boot Rescue, start the VPS now (to mount the disk again). Please note: use the reset button in your control panel to restart your VPS. Linux Boot Rescue is started via a network boot. If you use a reboot commando to restart your VPS, this will also result in a network boot and you will see the installation screen of your OS instead of your login screen.
Step 6
Finally, expand the filesystem for ext4:
resize2fs /dev/vdb1
Or for xfs, expand the filesystem and partition via the commands:
xfs_growfs /mnt/bigstorage
growpart /dev/vdb 1
Without arguments, the maximum available space will be added to the partition by default. If you want to adjust this, use the argument:'-D [SIZE IN BLOCKS]':
xfs_growfs -D [SIZE IN BLOCKS] /mnt/bigstorage
You can request information about the available blocks using the command:
xfs_info /mnt/bigstorage
Windows Server
For Windows Server, there is a separate manual with regard to expanding the space of your Big Storage drive. You can find this here.
Should you have any questions left regarding this article, do not hesitate to contact our support department. You can reach them via the ‘Contact Us’ button at the bottom of this page. If you want to discuss this article with other users, please leave a message under 'Comments'.