Clear up RAID vs. AHCI on ASUS Z97 MB with SSD and HDD's

[Matt_Stevens]

Gang, I am going to start my first new build in four years tomorrow. But I am still a bit confused on how to handle some settings. Am I picking RAID or AHCI in my MB settings for the Intel SATA ports on my ASUS Z97 Pro wifi mb?

I will have a Samsung 850 Pro 256GB SSD as my OS drive (Win7).
Then my D drive will consist of two 500GB Samsung drives in a RAID 0 (stripe).
My E drive will be a single 1TB WD Black.

I keep reading SSD's need the MB set to AHCI, but of course, to run a RAID the MB needs to be set to RAID and not AHCI, right?

The ASUS Z97 Pro has both Intel and ASMedia SATA ports.

The ASMedia ports are verifiable slower than the Intels (Google it), so I should avoid putting anything other than my slow ass green storage drive on it. Not to mention Intel rocks so I need to use those ports and run Intel Rapid Storage Tech (as I do on my current system).

My confusion only grows with the following...

The Intel ports consist of:
1 x SATA Express port, compatible with 2 x SATA 6.0 Gb/s ports
4 x SATA 6Gb/s ports

Okay, so am I correct that the SATA Express port can be used as two seperate SATA connections? Meaning I can use one for my SSD and one for my DVD drive?

I can then plug in my two RAID 0 drives to the 4 X SATA ports, plus my 1TB WD Black and finally my absolutely needed BD-ROM drive?

Forgive me, but I am not an expert. it's been so long that I am really freaking out and just want to be sure of what I am doing.

My MB...
http://www.asus.com/us/Motherboards/Z97PROWiFi_ac/specifications/

 

[inachu]

In short a short answer: You will not know until you try.
See how it works out with what does and does not work.
------------------------------------------------------------------
Intel® Z97 chipset :
1 x SATA Express port, compatible with 2 x SATA 6.0 Gb/s ports
1 x M.2 Socket 3, with M Key, type 2260/2280 storage devices support (both SATA & PCIE mode)*3
4 x SATA 6Gb/s port(s), gray
Support Raid 0, 1, 5, 10
Supports Intel® Smart Response Technology, Intel® Rapid Start Technology, Intel® Smart Connect Technology *4
ASMedia® PCIe SATA controller : *5
2 x SATA 6Gb/s port(s), black
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The motherboard could handle any setup if you used a dedicated card for raid.

 

[Matt_Stevens]

That is not in any way shape or form what I want to do. Trial and error and having to install windows two or three times is exactly what happened to me four years ago. The stress sent me through the moon.

I would very much like to avoid such stress this time. i'd like to do it right from the get-go.

 

[Ketchup]

Hi Matt,

I wanted to give others a chance to respond before I jumped into your second thread about this issue.

I'll be honest, as I mentioned in the other thread, you probably needed something like this the first go-around:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816115114&cm_re=raid-_-16-115-114-_-Product

But now, with your NAS, it is still a very viable option. With ever-changing technology, there is no way (that I know of) to guarantee you 100% that RAID arrays are going to move from one chipset to another with no data loss.

Back up your data, set up your arrays on a good controller, such as the one linked, and don't worry about this issue for MANY years.

One tip though: if you are planning on upgrading to Windows 10, I would look for a card that has Windows 10 compatibility (might be hard to do right now) or call the manufacturer and ask them what current card is most likely to have Windows 10 compatibility.

 

[Matt_Stevens]

Thanks for the information and link. I can always order this and return the other(s) if they do not work out. This is going to be a crazy ride.