Removing and reconnecting RAID array

[kumquat]

I'm trying to come up with a good, cheap way to back up my WHS. I have been backing up all the data, and the desktop backups, to a single 2 TB drive that I keep in the office most of the time.

The data has grown to about 3 TB so it's too big to all fit onto a single drive. I'm trying to come up with a way to have a portable RAID 0 array so I can RAID a pair of 2TB drives into a 4 TB one and use that. There are cheap NAS units that seem like they might work, but the quality and speed on the cheap ones seems very poor so I'd like to avoid that.

I'm thinking I could get a second 2 TB drive and plug them in inside my desktop and configure them as a RAID 0 array.. but if I disconnect them and bring them to the office, will I be able to bring them back home, plug them back in, and have the array still function?

Is there any sort of decent quality external enclosure I could put the drives in and use them as USB or eSATA?

I really want to avoid backing up to two individual drives because one of the shares is just over 2 TB already and micromanaging the folders across individual drives would be a minor nightmare.

 

[Old Hippie]

The data has grown to about 3 TB so it's too big to all fit onto a single drive.

I use a 3TB drive.

 

[mwroobel]

I'm trying to come up with a good, cheap way to back up my WHS. I have been backing up all the data, and the desktop backups, to a single 2 TB drive that I keep in the office most of the time.

The data has grown to about 3 TB so it's too big to all fit onto a single drive. I'm trying to come up with a way to have a portable RAID 0 array so I can RAID a pair of 2TB drives into a 4 TB one and use that. There are cheap NAS units that seem like they might work, but the quality and speed on the cheap ones seems very poor so I'd like to avoid that.

I'm thinking I could get a second 2 TB drive and plug them in inside my desktop and configure them as a RAID 0 array.. but if I disconnect them and bring them to the office, will I be able to bring them back home, plug them back in, and have the array still function?

Is there any sort of decent quality external enclosure I could put the drives in and use them as USB or eSATA?

I really want to avoid backing up to two individual drives because one of the shares is just over 2 TB already and micromanaging the folders across individual drives would be a minor nightmare.

As I posted in the other thread, using RAID0 as your backup target is just asking for trouble. Going with the enclosure I suggested in the other thread you can mount it as 2 seperate volumes. Without micromanaging dragging folder to folder and worrying about folder sizes, you can use something like syncback pro http://www.2brightsparks.com/syncback/sbpro-features.html to manage what goes where, and it has an intuitive scripting feature which will make it easy as folder sizes change and even breach volume/fiolder sizes. I think you will be happier in the long run and have fewer problems by doing something like that.