RAID, and my 2 new hdds

Posts: 336 · Modder Joined: 16 May 2004 Posts: 336

so now that i got 2 hdds, I intend to set them up raid style, but a few questions i need answered first.(i dont actually have them yet, as they are on order, but hey). which type of raid do i want... 0, 1? for the best performance. i guess i would also just like some general info on this. anything really would help, along with hints on setting it up and that stuff

Posts: 2723 · Posted: Fri Aug 13, 2004 10:28 pm Post subject:

Raid 0 = performance, Raid 1 = data security. You're going to have to get the motherboard's Raid drivers on a floppy so that they can be installed before you pop the HDDs in to format. Impact knows more than I do, but that should getcha started.

Posts: 3257 · Posted: Fri Aug 13, 2004 10:46 pm Post subject:

A brief tutorial, mostly what I've read/experienced:

RAID-0: Also known as striped. The easiest way to explain this is, if you have a file that consists of 6 "blocks" (arbitrary size), instead of putting blocks 1-6 on the hard drive, and reading them in order, you put 1,3,5 on drive 1, and 2,4,6 on drive two. Allowing you to read from two locations simulaneously, nearly doubling the read/write speed. Obviously it is a bit more complex, just the best way I can explain.

RAID-1: Also known as Mirrored. Take the example above, except write blocks 1-6 on both drives. You can read at almost 2x the speed, due to being able to read from two locations, but takes longer to write (two locations). The advantage is, if a HD goes bad, you have a backup.

Other notes: Make sure to have HD1 and HD2 on separate controllers as you can only read/write to one device per controller at a time...

If you stripe two 120gb drives, windows will see 1 large 240gb drive, if Mirroring two 120s, it will see 1 120...

Next thing is: Hardware or Software RAID?
Hardware RAID: Has its own mini-CPU to control the RAID process for read/write, so its normally a bit quicker. But not all boards have it..
Software RAID: Windows has a built-in RAID utility, quite easy to work with, easy to setup.

Problem is, if you choose software RAID, you cant have windows on the RAIDed drives (should be obvious why)...
As for the driver disk to install RAID drivers to have windows on the RAID drives... Good luck... I've had the worst luck with that... But I know people who swear by it... Anyhow, would run better if windows was on the striped drive (hardware RAID-0).

Lots to be considered.. If you can, I would go Windows on a Hardware RAID-0 drive.

Another thing, if you have windows on a main drive, and then stripe the 2 others (software RAID), if you reformat/reinstall windows on the separate drive, it will pick up the 2 RAIDed drives, and you wont lose data. Good way to keep files backed up...