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Newbie to RAID

K

Kris

Gawd
Joined
Jun 27, 2004
Messages
618
I recently built a new computer with an Abit KN9S motherboard which includes 4 SATA 3.0GB ports. It says it also supports "SATA RAID 0/1/0+1/5/JBOD"

I'm assuming it means my motherboard supports the following:
  • Raid 0
  • Raid 1
  • Raid 0+1
  • Raid 5
  • JBOD (Just a Bunch of Disks (Spanning))

Did I read that correctly?

Also, if I set this up, does the KN9S Motherboard allow me to choose which hard drives I want to include in the RAID or is it all or no with RAID setup? Will I require any special drivers to get this to work with Windows or any other OS for that matter (this will be used as secondary storage but it would be useful to know if I could even boot off of this without additional drivers as well).

Last question: I want to setup a RAID between 2 drives (probably 2 320GB drives but I may go larger). I want to set it up for reliability (meaning I DO NOT want to lose any data). Should I go with Raid 1 or Raid 5? I've looked at the Wikipedia entry but can't figure out which one has the advantage in reliability (I don't care much about speed as these are storage drivers).

Thanks
 
I'll try to answer all of your questions.

Yes, you have read the list correctly.

You can pick and choose which drive(s) to use in which array(s).

You can use this in Windows. Your KN9S motherboard should have shipped with drivers on the CDROM, or you can download the drivers off of the website.

Yes, you can set the RAID array as the boot device. You will probably need to press the F6 key during Windows Setup to specify where the RAID drivers are located (usually requires a floppy disk with the drivers, may be ways around the floppy)

RAID 1 is your best bet. That is a mirror setup. You have to have at least three physical drives for a RAID 5 setup (striping with parity).

If you're looking to boot off of this mirror, first load the OS onto one of the two drives. Install the 3rd party RAID drivers so that Windows can see both drives. Then reboot the computer, and create a mirror set using the data off of the first drive to create the mirror. When that process is complete, you should be up and running on a mirrored boot drive. YMMV. I don't know the specifics of the RAID controller chipset on your board. However, I've gone this route with a cheap PCI controller card.

Note with RAID 1 --- You gain: Increased read speed (two disks rather than one) and data redundancy. You may sacrifice some write performance. Overall, I think a mirrored disk set will work well as a boot device due to the increase in read performance.

I hope that helps. Let us know how it turns out!
 
Thanks a lot! I will probably go with 2 hard drives and a RAID 1 setup, however; I have enough space and SATA channels with my computer that I may be thinking of going with 3. Does RAID 5 offer any real advantage over a mirror in terms of data reliability?
 
RAID-5 will probably be more expensive in terms of overhead if you're doing this via software (i.e. not a dedicated RAID controller card with memory, etc.)

The mirror setup will work out nice for you I think.
 
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