About to attempt a Raid 0 Clone, but need advice

[DRGONZO777]

Hello all,

I have backed up all my photos and music, and here I go... But I am afraid. If I lose my OS and all my favorite little programs I will cry and then get really drunk.

I am attempting to clone my 250 Gig Raid 0 on an Nvidia controller onto a 1 Terabyte raid 0 configuration on an Silicon Inc. raid controller, both controllers are on my Asus motherboard.

Ultimately, I would like the 1 Terabyte of Raid back on the Nvidia controller, as it has a slightly better bus rate. But if that is not possible, I wont worry about it.


Question #1. Can I install 2 Raid 0's on one controller? And not mess around with installing the drivers and such for the second controller? Yes, there is enough SATA ports on the Nvida controller.

Question #2. Do I have to format the HD's before I clone? I am assuming I do.

Question #3. Will Norton Ghost do the trick?

Question #4. If I install the drivers for the Silicone Inc. controller, and clone the raid there, Can I then switch the drives over to the Nvidia controller and reinstall the raid drivers? This is my most currious question.

Question #5. What is going to make my job easier. Never cloned anything before...

Thanks for the help! I will be ripping out my Mother board to add the 2 new 500 Gig WD Caviar Black HDD's into my case, but I will monitor my laptop for any suggestions...

 

[VirtualLarry]

I have heard that Norton Ghost is a no-go for RAID setups. At least with the DOS version of Ghost, haven't played with any newer versions.

 

[CJM]

I just did a clone between 2 RAID 1 arrays last week, using acronis true image. It worked very well.

as for your questions, 1) probably not 2) might depend on the tool but with a sector-by-sector tool like true image you do not 4) as long as the drivers for both controllers are installed you should be able to swap the drives between the 2 controllers without an issue.

 

[DRGONZO777]

thanks for the replys

currently I am formatting 1000gigs, so not a whole lot going on.

Could not find the Silicone Image sil3114 raid host controller driver. The Sil website lists it, but the mirror is not downloading it. And all the other sites that say they have it are frauds-- they want you to download realtec automated driver update manager, or some such crap.

And no, the driver is NOT on the original Asus A8N-sli deluxe motherboard disk?!! BUT, the manual is?

Sooooo, I just hooked up the 2 new drives to the Nvidia controller (which is SATA 3 gig and the Sil was SATA 1.5 btw) and had to do some configuring in the bios. But I was able to set up the second stripped array.

They came out to a whopping 931.52 Gig of Raid 0. Unfortunately, they didnt have a drive letter assigned, so Norton Ghost did not recognize them. So I am currently formating them, and hopefully I can clone over my OS and programs using Ghost...

By the way these 2 Western Digitals run almost completely silent! Nice.

 

[skyking]

I cloned a raid0 over to a single disk with acronis. Same thing failed with ghost.

 

[Rubycon]

Ghost is obsolete. Use Acronis True Image Echo. Works with most RAID arrays and NICs in PCs.

 

[Nothinman]

I have heard that Norton Ghost is a no-go for RAID setups. At least with the DOS version of Ghost, haven't played with any newer versions.

If you have DOS drivers for both controllers you'll be fine. There's also Ghost32 which can run inside of WinPE so that's an option if you have it.

Your biggest problem will be Windows because you're switching controllers. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't.

 

[DRGONZO777]

Here's where Im at. And I have some NEW Questions:

I was able to set up a second raid 0 on the same Nvidia controller, as I was not able to find the sil3114 chip driver. No prob there.

I have the new HD's formated and I have the old HD's defraged. I am about to try Ghost, if that is a no go, I will opt for the Acronis. Is that a download???

Here is my next noob question. My old 250 Gig hard drive was partitioned. OS and programs on C: and 150 gig of music, Game maps, pictures, photoshop stuff on the other partition.

So, should I clone the first partition, and then use partition magic to expand that partition before cloning the second partition??? So as to not "split up" the logical drives? I dont want my OS and programs to have to jump back and forth over my music and pictures, or does this not matter?

 

[DRGONZO777]

Update:

Norton Ghost will not let me clone a raid 0 to raid 0...

One odd thing though. I have my OS on C: and Pictures on E: New drive is F: Ghost will let me choose F: as a source and either C or E as destination. BUT, when I choose C: as a source, it will only let me choose the E for the destination, but not F? F is greyed out...

Acronis, youre next.

 

[DRGONZO777]

Acronis Worked!!! Yeah

Thanks for all the help all. Good call on the Acronis True Image. AND a few FULL Version 15 day trial.

Good program...

Now I have kept all my programs intact, and tripled my storage, AND kept my beloved Raid 0...

NICE.

Oh, and these new WD Caviar Black 500G on New Egg for 69.99 free shipping are so quiet I cant tell when they are running. And large files, like my 12000+ mp3's open and initialize quicker.

HAPPY HAPPY JOY JOY