RAID 1 & HDD Partitioning?

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Limp Gawd
Joined
Aug 30, 2007
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I am putting the final touches on my new PC & waiting for the last parts, two 750GB WD HDDs, to arrive via slow (free) UPS ground today.

The Mobo has the P35 + ICH9R chipset and I am planning to run the two drives in RAID1 (mirror). I am far more concerned with data integrity and reliability than I am about ultimate speed. Since I am moving up from a 7 year old very slow PC to a Q6600 with 4GB RAM & 8800GTS, the new PC will seem blindingly fast ti me anyways, therefore I am choosing RAID 1 instead of RAID 0. I was going to go with RAID 5 but my budget says only 2 HDDs for now.

I have always partitioned my HDDs to keep the OS and other programs separate from my data, music and photos. In fact my current HDD partitions are:
  • Windows
  • Data
  • Music
  • Photos (Music & Photos are in an extended partition)
In RAID 1 is it still possilbe/common to use drive partitioning or is it impossible? I have not found a good answer on the web after a bit of searching and this will be my first PC cofigured using RAID.

If it is possible, do I partition the two drives identically prior to running the RAID 1 setup or afterwards, or do I just partition the first one and the RAID 1 setup will mirror everything onto the second HDD? I would be using Partition Magic to do the partitioning as always.

I would greatly appreciate your input and help.

If you use a RAID setup on your own PC, what do you find to be the most workable solution for organizing files vs. programs?

Thanks!
 
Depends on the controller and software capabilities, and if we assume that they don't totally suck, you will be able to. The Raid array will present itself as a logical disk that you can treat exactly like a physical disk, including making partitons, and sometimes you can use them in other raid arrays too.

My answer will likely be totally useless for you because I have linux installed on my computer, and additionally I use software raid 1, so I can raid partitions.

I have three disks, on each is a 10 gig partition, and those three are part of a ten gig RAID 1 array that I use for all my 'precious' materials (ie digital photos and my work). Then, I have an 80 gig two device RAID 1 partition that holds my /home partition, which is analogous to 'Documents and Settings', except that it doesn't suck like DaS. There are 3 or 4 other partitions for other stuff that I don't feel like describing in detail.

if you use a RAID setup on your own PC, what do you find to be the most workable solution for organizing files vs. programs?
Click to expand...
 
Windows will see the RAID as one drive as if you only had one disk.

Setup RAID in the RAID BIOS.
Start the OS install (F6 to install RAID drivers for XP). The installer should see the RAID as a single disk.
Create whatever partitions as desired - the rest of the setup is no different than installing to a single HDD.
 
I came up with a very workable solution.

I couldn't afford 2 more 750GB drives but I did find a killer deal on two 150GB SATAII HDDs.

Now the plan is to run the OS and prgorams from the 2 smaller drives running in RAID1, and keep my data in the second RAID1 array comprised of the two 750GB drives.

I could go with RAID0 for the OS, but I prefer reliability to the small speed hit using RAID 1 vs. 0.

Unfortunately I am now experiencing the following issue: http://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1221038
 
I recently built a similar computer as yours, a P35 board from gigabyte and a new c2duo. I built a raid 1 array using the intel chipset ICH9R on the motherboard and used vista 32 bit. You load the drivers for the raid that you find from your motherboard manufacturer before you install the OS. I created a OS partition and 2 data partitions just as you are looking to do. So it is possible to do if you motherboard will support it, or you could buy a dedicated card to do it for you.
 
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