How to set up Raid 0

[dannyboy731]

I am going to be setting up a Raid 0 array on two Seagate ST3160812AS drives, and I'm running on an Asus A8N32-Deluxe mobo. Can anyone give me some pointers on how to set this up? I don't have a PCI Raid card, so I suppose that means I'm doing software Raid. I want to set the drives up with three partitions, one at like 10gb for WinXP, and split the rest between games and apps. I also need to add in the IDE drive (outside of the array) I'm using now after I get them set up, so I can use it for storage and backups. What is the best way to do it without too much hassle?

 

[amdskip]

http://www.pcstats.com/articleview.cfm?articleid=830&page=5

 

[Madwand1]

You should use the MB RAID capabilities. They tend to be very well documented in the manual.

You need to create a driver floppy -- usually off the MB CD; via a utility or manual instructions. You'll need these drivers during the OS install so that the OS recognizes the array as a drive. You'll need to create the array via BIOS beforehand.

If you don't have a floppy in this computer, you can either learn how to create a slipstreamed OS install that includes the drivers, or simply temporarily borrow a floppy and return it afterwards.

I suggest installing the OS with all the drives attached so that there is no subsequent confusion with drive letters changing.

 

[dannyboy731]

Thanks madwand, I found the drivers on my mobo cd, but it's got a couple different versions. There's an nVidia nForce 32bit driver, and an nVidia 64bit driver (no nForce?), is there any difference there? There's also some for the Sil controller but from what I've heard I probably want to use the nVidia one.

 

[RebateMonger]

First, I'm NOT a RAID 0 expert. And I've hardly used software RAID. I normally prefer a separate hardware RAID card.

I don't think you can BOOT to a RAID 0 array when using Windows software RAID. Until Windows is loaded, there's no way for the PC to understand how the RAID 0 data is laid out.

You could install Windows on a 10GB NTFS partition on a single drive, use Windows to change both disks from Basic to Dynamic, and then create additional striped volumes on the unpartitioned space on the two drives. You'll have an unstriped 10GB space remaining on the second drive, which you can format and use it as a simple volume.

 

[dannyboy731]

I've read before that you definitely can't boot to the RAID array if you're using Windows software RAID. But if I use the nVidia RAID capabilities on my mobo as madwand suggested, and set up a bootable array through the BIOS (I found the directions on the mobo cd), that should work right? And trust me, I'm wayyyy less of an expert at this than anyone

 

[Madwand1]

Yes, you can install the OS on NVidia RAID using the drivers. The 64-bit ones would be for XP-64 or 2003 Server x64. You need the 32-bit ones for normal XP.

 

[dannyboy731]

Cool, thanks a lot guys. I think I've got it figured out now, but we'll see!

 

[RebateMonger]

You aren't going to make us repeat the standard warnings about keeping ongoing backups of important data, are you? ESPECIALLY when using RAID 0, which is FAR more prone to data loss than any other drive configuration.