Windows 8 Multiple Drives with 1 Drive Letter

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SpeedyVV

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My head is spinning trying to figure this out :D

Let's say I have a SSD for my C: Drive. No problem there.

Let's say I have 5 additional HDDs of different sizes and speeds. Let's say 3x1TB, 1X2TB, and 1X3TB.

Can I get a drive letter that treats all of them as a single drive with 8TB of space, but...

Let's say I have an external docking station for backups, with 2 HDDs, 1x4TB, 1x6TB.

Should any of my internal HDDs die, I would like to be able to replace that failed drive, and restore it from backup.

Is that possible? If so, how?
 
Philmatic said:
Sounds like you're looking for some kind of pooling solutions. Look into Microsoft's Storage Spaces. There are third party options as well, such as StableBit's DrivePool and Division M's DriveBender.
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I looked into Storage Spaces, but it looks like unless if 1 disk fails, all disks go bad, so I cant just restore the one drive from backup.

DrivePool and DriveBender look like exactly the functionality I am looking for. Wonder which one is better.
 
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Philmatic said:
You backup files, not disks.
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Interesting you should say that, and I not saying you are wrong, but I always looked at backup from a disk perspective.

Maybe I should rethink that. Coming from a soft dev background, I tend to think as files by themselves as not the best unit of management.

Change sets is how I usually think of management unit. change sets being a collection of directories and files.

Maybe that makes sense for configuration management, but not backup approach.

As an example, in the past, I never thought of my audio files as single files, but as collections of things like an Album, and Artist, a Genre, playlists with associated titles.

And ultimately the whole thing as my audio as a library, including some audio projects (Pro-tools, Audacity) which are multiple files that need to be in sync.

My mistake (maybe) is I tend to organise my "collections" of stuff as being on specific disks, and since I think more about disks failing, as opposed to files (which is only an assumption) I think of backups mostly as drive backups in my backup strategy.

Case in point, I think of my OS drive (C: ) as my System Drive, and I backup that drive as a whole, as opposed to individual files.

However, I have never been 100% happy with that approach, so I would love for you to elaborate on the file based approach to backups.
 
With those utilities what happens when a single drive dies?

As you don't know what files are where how do you know what to restore? (say if half the files in a folder are on a different disk do you have to check to see if every file is there?).

so I would love for you to elaborate on the file based approach to backups.
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I use a similar method to you single drives or arrays for specific stuff (Music TV ect) . But instead of backing up the the "drive" I just backup all of the files , If my music drive dies then I just restore all of my music to the replacement drive.

You OS drive is a bit different as imaging that can make restoring a lot easier (you can't just copy/paste your OS drive to another and expect it to work).

PS I'm assuming you use some sort of disk imaging software to backup each drive.
 
Butcher9_9 said:
With those utilities what happens when a single drive dies?

As you don't know what files are where how do you know what to restore? (say if half the files in a folder are on a different disk do you have to check to see if every file is there?).


I use a similar method to you single drives or arrays for specific stuff (Music TV ect) . But instead of backing up the the "drive" I just backup all of the files , If my music drive dies then I just restore all of my music to the replacement drive.

You OS drive is a bit different as imaging that can make restoring a lot easier (you can't just copy/paste your OS drive to another and expect it to work).

PS I'm assuming you use some sort of disk imaging software to backup each drive.
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I use EaseTodo backup to backup whole drives.

After thinking about the points made here, I came to realise, as you point out, that I don't have to treat all my backups the same way.

BTW, part of the reason I always backed up drives, was because of the Time to Recovery.

Well, I have changed my mind.

Now I will use EaseTodo back up to backup for my system drive, and duplicity for my "non system" folders.

Now the question is, how do I properly organise my folders :p But I'll leave them for now as they are.

Thanks for all the input so far.
 
There is a real easy way to do this that keeps the data in tact if one goes bad, and it uses completely built in methods.

You make an empty folder on the C:\ drive. For example "C:\Media". Then you go to Computer Management and select one of the drives you want hidden and change the Mount Point from a Drive Letter, like D:\, to instead use the folder Media.

I use this on my laptop for mounting an SD card like it's part of the C:\ file system. At any point you can change the mount point back to a letter (in fact you can have both at the same time). And if the drive fails its not actually attached to the main drives data.

You can even partition the hidden drive and then mount each partition to it's own folder.

The downside is having to make choices about the sizes of the "folders". The upside is that is requires no special software and it's very safe.

volumeadd2.jpg
 
westrock2000 said:
There is a real easy way to do this that keeps the data in tact if one goes bad, and it uses completely built in methods.

You make an empty folder on the C:\ drive. For example "C:\Media". Then you go to Computer Management and select one of the drives you want hidden and change the Mount Point from a Drive Letter, like D:\, to instead use the folder Media.

I use this on my laptop for mounting an SD card like it's part of the C:\ file system. At any point you can change the mount point back to a letter (in fact you can have both at the same time). And if the drive fails its not actually attached to the main drives data.

You can even partition the hidden drive and then mount each partition to it's own folder.

The downside is having to make choices about the sizes of the "folders". The upside is that is requires no special software and it's very safe.

volumeadd2.jpg
Click to expand...

What this does not give me is something I mentioned in the OP
Can I get a drive letter that treats all of them as a single drive with 8TB of space, but...
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Seriously, Stablebit DrivePool is great. I use it on my server. Presents pool with one drive letter. Uses NTFS. Can turn on folder or pool duplication to guard against a drive failure. There will be at least 2 copies of files on different drives, but can do 3 copies. Plus, I believe there's a 30 day free trial.
 
SpeedyVV said:
Interesting you should say that, and I not saying you are wrong, but I always looked at backup from a disk perspective.
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I'm not entirely sure what he meant but with Windows 8 you no longer backup the entire disk, the system backs up files in certain folders (using many different methods).

You can still do an .ISO backup using Win8 but there is no longer "Back up and Restore" that we are used to.
 
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