HDD - RAID - multiple issues - urgent attention

[sunandoghosh]

Respected nerds, techs, geeks and dear fellow members

I am having presently one hard disk drive seagate of 80 GB...

I am about to buy a hard disk tommorow....

In this contect can anyone plz clarify my following doubts...

A. I have heard that we can set up two HDD with RAID connection for striping and mirroring (I dont know what these means)...

((a)) Do i need to buy the second hard disk also of size 80 GB so that i can set up RAID connection with my previous hard disk of 80 GB...???

Or is it that i can purchase 200 GB (say) of HDD tommorow and with my previous 80 GB...I can still set up RAID Connection...????????

I mean is it mandatory that both HDDs be of same size for setting up RAID connection...????

() Also to set up RAID connection is it necessary that both hard disk should be from same company....?????

Or can i have say one seagate HDD set up with say another samsung HDD in RAID...?????

((c)) Can we have three hard disk drives and still set RAID connection....????

Or is it only restricted to two HDD...????

() what exactly is RAID connection and what benefits it offers....?????????

((e)) Can i still create drive image of my hard disk after setting up RAID connection......????????????????

Now as my computer and technical knowledge is very very limited (as i am a hardcore finance guy), my best and only recourse are wonderful forums like the one where i am posting right now. Its really great to have advice and suggestion of knowledgeable people here who do not have any self interest and are very helping in nature. So again I am daring to ask a few queries (infact more than few) and again hope that u people will really really help me out as u have always helped me in the past.

Thanks from deepest core of my heart for taking so much time effort and patience in READING and possibly replying...Its truly really and geniuenly appreciated....

And yes if anyone would like to add anything or say something else or suggest something better which i may be missing plz feel free to do so...

best regards

sunando

sunandoghosh at rediffmail dot com

 

[TankGuys]

RAID 0: Splits your data between drives. "improves performance" supposedly, but in real work uses only sees a very, very small increase. Also makes you twices as likely to lose your data in a drive failure. Stay away from this.

RAID 1: Mirors your data. Keeps a constant working backup. But, you only get "half" the drive space. If you have 2 80Gb drives, you only get 80 Gb of storage, since the other 80 is used as a "backup". This is nice for people who desire data security, as it is more reliable than a single drive, but it's still possible to lose data.

I would say for 99.9% of home users, RAID is not worth your time and money. RAID 0 has too many risks, RAID 1 doubles your costs and greatly enhances your protection against data loss, but you have to ask yourself if it's worth it to you.

 

[SuperFreaky]

You do not need identical drives, but for best performance they should as similar as possible. Also, there is no point buying one larger than 80GB as the extra space would not be used

 

[aatf510]

It would be best if you manage to have two identical models.

 

[imported_tiburon]

tack another question on here, if you buy say a new Asus mobo, that supports raid 0,1,5 etc, do you still need a raid controller card or does the mobo take care of this for you?

 

[t3h l337 n3wb]

Originally posted by: tiburon
tack another question on here, if you buy say a new Asus mobo, that supports raid 0,1,5 etc, do you still need a raid controller card or does the mobo take care of this for you?

No, your motherboard either has a RAID controller card built on or just some onboard software RAID.

 

[imported_tiburon]

so to clarify, something like the P5WD2 has a built in controller for sata drives,right, but if you wanted scsi you would have to buy a controller card for that

 

[Quasmo]

DONT DO IT!!! unless you're gonna mirror the drives, dont go and hook up raid 0, its barely noticeablt and puts unnecesary strain on the drives. You actually wont see any performance increase with raid0... I have two drives in raid 0 and regret it. If you want it for capasity, use the JBOD feature that way you can atleast get your data back if a drive fails.