Which RAID Level to use?

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Weaksauce
Joined
Nov 25, 2007
Messages
113
I prefer redundancy versus over space.

Will be using 4 drives.

Would having ( 3 x 640gb in raid 5 + 1 x 1.5tb in raid 1 of the raid 5 ) or raid 10 of ( 4 x 640gb ) be more secure? in case of drive failures?

If raid 5+1 is more secure, can this be handled my by adaptec 3405

Thanks!
 
Mixing the 640gb drives with the 1.5tb like that is a bad idea. As for security, RAID 10 can sustain the same number of drive failures as RAID 5 at worst. On average, it is slightly better in terms of the number of drive failures it can sustain. Rebuilding the array is also going to be considerably faster.
 
RAID 6 can sustain 2 drive failures, but there is a lot of overhead for parity. I wouldn't use it with just 4 drives (but it is the most secure of the lot). RAID 10 can sustain either 1 or 2 drive failures with 4 drives. It all depends on whether or not the second drive failure is within the same nested array.
 
I'd do the 640GB drives in RAID-5 then have the 1.5TB in a removable tray. Copy the RAID array to the 1.5TB, then pull the 1.5TB and put in a secure undisclosed location away from the physical location of the RAID array. Do this at least once a month.

There are 101 ways to lose data, hard drive failure is merely one of them.
 
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