Software RAID - issues to look out for?

[Modular]

This is on Windows 7 Pro 64 bit.

I'm in the process of rebuilding my HTPC and I'm going to upgrade the boot drive to an SSD. I'm going to be using 2 4tb spindle drives for storage in a RAID 1 array. The motherboard can't recognize the drives as 4tb so I'll be using Windows software RAID.

Is there anything to look out for? The data array will store all of our home videos and pictures so I can't have it be flaky. If need be, I can easily upgrade the Mobo to one thay can hardware RAID 4 tb drives. We will be backing up to Carbonite as well just to be sure.

Also, what SSD is recommended these days? I have a crucial M4 and it rocks, but are there better values?

 

[smitbret]

Other than looking out for where the extra $150 for the mirrored drive went, you should be fine with just about any RAID 1 setup. It's pretty uncomplicated and resource light. Keep in mind that you are probably going to see a real world benefit of next to nothing for your stated purposes especially because it sounds like you are smart enough to have a real backup plan in place.

 

[Doomer]

Mine was forever getting out of sync. I finally gave up and went with HW RAID.

 

[Cerb]

If you're going Intel, just get a board that supports Intel's chipset RAID, and use that. Or, sync your data between the drives, instead of doing RAID. Intel's RAID under Windows is rather nice, if high performance is not a requirement.

SSD: Toshiba Q, Samsung 840 Evo, Crucial M500, Sandisk Ultra Plus, Corsair Neutron, Plextor M5S...in all cases, ~250GB is the performance/size/cost sweet spot, most of the time (~500GB and up right now, but that's just because we're in between the pre-BF sales and BF sales).

 

[Makaveli]

i've been using intel software raid with SSD's for almost a year now and not a single issue.

 

[_Rick_]

I would make sure to put the machine on a small UPS, as each unexpected shutdown will trigger a full rebuild. That's the only thing to worry about.