RAID Questions

[rmyablon]

I am using an ASUS P4P800E-Deluxe motherboard...

I am planning to purchase 2 Seagate 200GB IDE drives so I can have my data backed up in RAID 1. Will I have any trouble creating a Linux/XP dual boot (with the 2 necessary partitions) with the use of RAID 1?

Also, I am considering purchasing 2 more of the same drives later for a 400GB total RAID 0+1 configuration. Will I be able to do this and still have my dual boot? Does the MOBO even support 4 IDE drives in RAID 0+1?

Finally, can I create the RAID 0+1 from RAID 1 without reformatting my drives? What if I start with RAID 0 and then change to RAID 0+1?

Thanks... I am new to RAID, but I have successfully set up the dual boot without RAID on my old computer (ASUS P2B).

 

[OLtimrNewbie]

I'm not familiar with the P4P800E motherboard; but I've used raid 1 & raid 0 on my PC's for the past 4 years.
In Raid 1 two drives really look like 1 drive. What ever you can do on one drive ( partition; dual-boot etc.)you can do in raid1.
Again I don't know if that board supports Raid 0+1; but if it does --- starting in raid 0 then adding the raid 1 protection should work. But going the other way starting with raid 1 (mirrored) then going to striping is unlikely to work. I guess that's why they call it Raid 0+1 and not 1+0 ! The raid1 is a mirror of the raid 0; which is 'striping' or writing each bit or byte alternately to each drive. I've used raid that is built into the boards and have had very little problem. I tried a PCI raid card and it was a headache! If the P4P800 has the onboard raid, go for it. Hope this helps.
:thumbsup: