RAID for Personal Computer

[mosley]

Recently the HDD crashed on my personal home desktop. Fortunately I backed up most of my data onto DVDs, but I did lose some of it. Because of this I have been looking into RAID. It looks like I could have two drives and everything would be written to both drives, so if one drive crashed I would have everything on the other drive.

Am I understanding this correctly? What else do I need to consider for this?

Thanks

 

[Captante]

The type of array you are talking about is called RAID 1 or mirroring & is the only type I still suggest for home users. Ideally you'll want two identical HD's or at least drives that are close in size & performance, also its best to use a PCI-card based controller because that way if your motherboard craps out on you, you'll have a much better chance of success moving the array to the replacement.

You'll also need to have the drivers for the RAID controller on a 3.5 inch floppy for Win 2k/XP installation (Vista supports CD's & flash drives)
so you can specify the driver for Windows setup, otherwise it most likely won't be able to see the array.

The most important thing to keep in mind however is that RAID 1 is no substitute for performing regular backups of data & really only protects you from mechanical HD failure ... because all data is written to both drives, any virus/malware related failure or one caused by RAM errors will most likely take out both drives.

 

[chusteczka]

Originally posted by: Captante
... also its best to use a PCI-card based controller because that way if your motherboard craps out on you, you'll have a much better chance of success moving the array to the replacement. ....

This is a very interesting point that I had not thought of yet. Thank you.

However, this is not entirely true for a RAID 1 mirrored array. Considering a RAID 1 mirrors the same data on both drives, in the event of a RAID controller or motherboard failure, each drive possesses the same data. With exception for the data written during the failure.

Since both drives still possess the same data, either of the drives may be attached to another motherboard with all of the data intact and retrievable.

 

[Captante]

The issue isn't wether or not your data remains intact on the RAID 1 array, but rather wether the correct driver is present that will enable the array to be properly recognized by Windows.
Its much less of a problem if the RAID is not being used as a boot-drive, but still is a good idea, plus it allows for the use of a more robust hardware-based controller which is a rarity on enthusiest motherboards.

 

[mosley]

Thanks for your help. I searched for PCI RAID controllers and found hundreds of types from $10 up to $1000. Whats the difference here? What am I looking for? Like I said this is for my home computer.

I have been also trying to read up on RAID, but it seems there is so much on this topic I am not sure where to begin. Any suggestions for a home user?

 

[RebateMonger]

Originally posted by: mosley
Thanks for your help. I searched for PCI RAID controllers and found hundreds of types from $10 up to $1000. Whats the difference here? What am I looking for? Like I said this is for my home computer.

My recommendation for someone considering RAID is to FIRST make sure that a solid backup method is implemented. Personally, I wouldn't trust DVDs with important backups. The odds of data loss are too high and it's too much work to make the backups. USB or SATA external hard drives are dirt cheap nowadays and SO easy to use.

AFTER you've got a solid backup process, THEN take a look at RAID. You may decide it's no longer worth the extra cost and complication.

If I had a choice of putting my important data on either a PC with a RAID 1 array or on a different PC with an ongoing backup to an external hard drive, I'd use the PC that's being backed up. I've seen too many failed redundant RAID arrays.

 

[mosley]

OK, i was thinking of this after my post. Maybe I should be thinking about backing up before thinking about RAID (horse before the carriage).

How should I be backing up, as a home user? How should I do it? Where should I back up to? How often? and so on... I only thought of RAID because I heard about it and thought this was the way to go, but maybe its not...

 

[RebateMonger]

You could consider this scenario:

Buy the largest USB external hard drive that makes sense to you. If you want, you can build your own and usually save quite a bit of money.

Make a monthly FULL SYSTEM BACKUP of all your important PCs. This will allow you to restore them from scratch if need be.

Make a weekly INCREMENTAL BACKUP of all the files that changed on your PCs. These backups are usually pretty small.

The time schedule you follow really depends on how much you can afford to lose in case of disaster. Always, ANY backup is better than none at all.

Between backups, I recommend disconnecting the USB hard drive and moving it to a "safe" place. That might be a closet somewhere, where it's less likely to be stolen along with all your PCs if you are burglarized.

You can either use the free NTBackup program available for XP Home and Professional or else the software that comes with every pre-built USB external hard drive.

 

[Captante]

Originally posted by: RebateMonger
You could consider this scenario:

Buy the largest USB external hard drive that makes sense to you. If you want, you can build your own and usually save quite a bit of money.

Make a monthly FULL SYSTEM BACKUP of all your important PCs. This will allow you to restore them from scratch if need be.

Make a weekly INCREMENTAL BACKUP of all the files that changed on your PCs. These backups are usually pretty small.

The time schedule you follow really depends on how much you can afford to lose in case of disaster. Always, ANY backup is better than none at all.

Between backups, I recommend disconnecting the USB hard drive and moving it to a "safe" place. That might be a closet somewhere, where it's less likely to be stolen along with all your PCs if you are burglarized.

You can either use the free NTBackup program available for XP Home and Professional or else the software that comes with every pre-built USB external hard drive.

Good advice here! :thumbsup:

An effective & regular backup plan is the best way to protect your data by far.


Edit:

This Promise controller is a decent hardware-assisted RAID controller ... I've used the SATA 1 version with much success & although its not a true hardware controller its performance is quite good & its more reliable then most onboard solutions.

This 3Ware controller is about the cheapest high quality true hardware SATA RAID controller I could find with a quick search ... it will provide a more robust RAID array then onboard solutions or the Promis controller listed above, plus it will off-load HD control from the CPU 100% although this won't result in much of a performance increase in a desktop PC. *(note that this card is limited to SATA 150mbs & is only 2 ports)