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We have a Windows 2008 R2 Server running on a Dell PowerEdge R310 Server with Bitlocker enabled. There are two physical Hard disks configured as RAID 1. One of the disks recently started having an issue, so we have now have a warranty covered replacement for it, But we were curious if there will be any issues hot swapping the new drive in due to BitLocker being enabled?

Has anyone had a similar experience with scenario?

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    I'm going to say that it'll be fine because the RAID is abstracted beyond the level at which bitlocker operates, but I'm not 100% sure. Good news is that if someone finds your old drive and gets it working, it will be encrypted ;) Jun 29, 2012 at 2:04
  • Using BitLocker on server isn't not terrible recommended in the first place unless the server is in a unsecured environment (a place server should never be anyway). This is one of the reasons why.
    – Chris S
    Jun 29, 2012 at 2:22

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It should work, yes. Hardware RAID is listed as supported in the Technet documentation on BitLocker. And here's a quote from a 2006 MS Bitlocker Team chat session.

Jamie [MS] (Expert):

Q: How does BitLocker work with hot swapping RAID drives?

A: BitLocker works at the Logical volume level (technically, above the volume management driver). As long as the hardware presents a logical volume to the OS that is handled by volume management, BitLocker should have no problems with it. Although at this time we have not tested hot swapping RAID drives, I dont forsee an issue with this.

Looks like you're good.

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  • +1 Yep, works just fine with hardware RAID.
    – Chris S
    Jun 29, 2012 at 2:22
  • Thanks, I suspect it will work as well, we also checked with Dell tech support and they seemed pretty confident we should be good to go. I'll accept the answer once we do the swap and verify that all is well. I'll also add any details in the event there are any gotchas encountered. Jun 29, 2012 at 2:34

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