RAID

Rohan

I'm running my desktop currently on two drives, a 250GB SATA drive for Windows and programs, and a 1TB SATA for games, documents, music and editing. Now, it's not happened in years, but I still remember the horror of losing a hard drive, and the thought of everything sitting on just one drive makes me very, very nervous. So, I've decided to get two 2TB drives (I'm running out of space anyway) and use a RAID setup so that whatever is written to one drive, gets written to the other. I'm pretty sure I read somewhere that RAID can do this?

I have absolutely no knowledge of what is needed, and how to set it all up. I think RAID 1 is what I want, but I have no idea how to go about setting it up, what software (if any) is needed in Windows, etc. Everything will be copied off the 1TB, which will then go towards our media pc, so it will just be the 250GB Windows drive and the two new 2TB drives. I'd really appreciate some information on how I can go about and get it all up and running. My motherboard is an Asus P5Q Pro, if that's of any use.

HydroSqueegee

well it all depends. what OS do you have? Win7 (and i think Vista) ultimate, professional and enterprise can mirror the disk in a software raid 1 environment, so you wont need a board with a raid controller or a raid card.

If you dont have one of the aforementioned OS loads, you'll have to set up the raid 1 config in the raid bios.

Azio

If data integrity is what you're concerned about, you might be better off just doing a weekly backup. RAID can only protect you from hardware failure, it does not protect you from viruses or other kinds of software failure. If you keep a backup and one day your install gets fucked over by viruses or something you can just restore from the backup.

Having said that it is quite easy to setup RAID, if that is what you desire. Each RAID controller has its own setup tool so you can check your motherboard manual for instructions.

Rohan

I'm running Windows 7 Ultimate x64 at the moment, if I can set it all up within the os, then that'll be perfect. I have no issues messing about with the bios but working in a gui is obviously preferable. And yeah, I know it won't protect me from my machine getting struck with viruses or anything, but I have had several drives fail on me in the past and I really don't like the idea of having everything on one drive. I do use backup but as I said earlier, I'm running out of space anyway on the 1TB, so a new drive was in the innings.

HydroSqueegee

http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/17926/use-drive-mirroring-for-instant-backup-in-windows-7/

knock yourself out.

Azio

Rohan wrote: »

I'm running Windows 7 Ultimate x64 at the moment, if I can set it all up within the os, then that'll be perfect. I have no issues messing about with the bios but working in a gui is obviously preferable. And yeah, I know it won't protect me from my machine getting struck with viruses or anything, but I have had several drives fail on me in the past and I really don't like the idea of having everything on one drive. I do use backup but as I said earlier, I'm running out of space anyway on the 1TB, so a new drive was in the innings.

Right, well, RAID for data integrity is really more for data centers and enterprise situations where you need to be able to get back online very quickly in the event of hardware failure. Backup is probably a better solution for your needs.

Tinche

One more vote for 'just set up backups'. RAIDs are neat and all, but they are more for when you need your data to stay online when a hard drive fries itself. Backups will protect you from more things than a RAID 1 will, and will provide some additional benefits (for example, using a little less power and keeping the wear down on your backup drive, since it can be spun and powered down for like 99% of the time).

Also, see here.