Best way to set up Hardrives

littleredspot

Hi,
I'm in the process of installing 2 hardrives in RAID 1 to use for my media library. Is the difference in speed noticeable enough to warrant adding another 2 drives and setting it up as RAID 0+1. Most of the files are my music library. Also If I go ahead and just use 2 drives in RAID 1 could I later add another 2 and then change it to RAID 1+0?

On a similar note what would you tend to leave on the C drive? Just the OS, with other programs on a seperate drive, or OS and programs? Or third option OS in one partition and other programs in a second partition on the same disc?

Thanks

littleredspot

Someone must have done this before?

Dublin_Gunner

TBH I wouldn't bother with RAID0 at all - at least not if you want to be sure of not losing all your data.

It can help give a slight speed boost in certain scenario's, but its really not worth the bother - at least not unless you get a decent RAID controller.

RAID 0+1 while better, is still not ideal, as you are just mirroring a striped array with another stripe. I'd go RAID 5 if at all, at least you're getting redundancy not based on a stripe, plus you're getting the stripe for your main array, and the small speed boost that comes with it.

RAID 5 or 6 both give parity across drives (6 giving double parity) so if a drive fails, your data is not lost. 5 can take 1 drive failure, while 6 can take 2 drive failures.

Both can be rebuilt without a loss of data.

You would have to partition your RAID to do what you wish. I personally wouldn't bother, but thats just me.

I generally have my OS / drivers on one partition, and programs & data on another. Its really just a personal preference, becuase at least if your OS bombs, you haven't lost your programs or data if you need to format the OS drive.

youcancallmeal

I have two 2TB hard drives which I am going setup in a RAID 1 configuration over the next few days. I have built up quite a large amount of data over the last few years spread out over numerous hard drives. Up until now I have just backed up vital files to an external hard drive every so often. I don't like doing this because I tend to forget to do it and then I could go weeks without backing up. I plan to have my os and apps on a seperate hard drive and then basically everything else on the raid setup. I have no idea what to expect speed wise but I'm hoping it is not an issue because I plan to watch movies/listen to music which will be stored on the raid setup.

Anyway I'll let you know how I get on with this setup when it is installed.

littleredspot

Thanks for the info guys

Dublin Gunner your post makes more sense now that its edited;)

Al, I'm in the exact same boat as you. Lost a lot of music due to my rubbish backup routine and failed HD. Two shiney new 2TB drives ready for action. Gonna go with RAID1 for the data storage and leave the OS and programs on a separate drive. Will repartition it and maybe upgrade it to a velociraptor next time it goes pear shape.

gman2k

Is there an external Raid drive bay that people could recommend?
Basically I'm looking for 2 x 1tb drives to back up all my music and photo collection.

youcancallmeal

I have the hard drives and will have a go at setting up the RAID 1 array when I get home tonight. I've done a bit of research and this is what I plan to do:

1) Go into the BIOS and enable RAID, then I should be able to get into the RAID control screen by pressing <Ctrl> + <I> at the post screen.

2) After setting up my array and saving everything then I reboot.

3) Once Windows has booted up install the Intel AHCI/RAID Drivers (I'm not actually sure if this is necessary because I'm using Windows 7?)

4) Install the Intel Matrix Storage Manager Driver (Optional as far as I know but handy for checking on the status of the array).

5) Finally use disk manager to format and assign a drive letter.

PogMoThoin

Can confirm step 3 isn't required with win 7 64bit, using raid 0 on my os drives

youcancallmeal

PogMoThoin wrote: »

Can confirm step 3 isn't required with win 7 64bit, using raid 0 on my os drives

I wonder though if you don't install the drivers does that mean Windows is managing the RAID array which in turn might affect performance?

PogMoThoin

youcancallme>al wrote: »

I wonder though if you don't install the drivers does that mean Windows is managing the RAID array which in turn might affect performance?

Nope, Win 7 has the Intel driver and will update to the latest one through windows update thereafter when one is released. It recognises what chipset You got, and the latest chipset driver is backward compatible with older chipsets.
In fact I changed from a p35 to p45 chipset motherboard (both Asus boards, p5k deluxe to p5q deluxe) a few weeks ago using the same raid 0 array for my OS drive without a reinstall, worked fine, as I was using the latest driver before I changed mobo, Win 7 saw no difference. Worked perfect for over a week until I got time to do a full reinstall. I was expecting BSOD's whern I tried it, but got none

youcancallmeal

Well that didnt go as smoothly as I hoped for
Turns out that the setting in the BIOS for either IDE,AHCI or RAID cannot be changed after you have installed Windows, IDE is default. If you try to change it to RAID after you have installed Windows then you just get BSOD when booting. Anyway after googling around I found THIS registry hack to change it without re-installing Windows, worked a treat and I now have my RAID set up running smoothly

littleredspot

F@!) that looks confusing! Gonna be next week before I get to doing it, thanks for the tips. I'm on XP and using a Lindy PCI sata raid controller. Don't know what difference that'll make. I'll probably be back soon looking for help;)

youcancallmeal

littleredspot wrote: »

F@!) that looks confusing! Gonna be next week before I get to doing it, thanks for the tips. I'm on XP and using a Lindy PCI sata raid controller. Don't know what difference that'll make. I'll probably be back soon looking for help;)

I think that link I posted is only related to Windows 7 and Intel raid controllers. You may not have the problem I had at all?

Anyway I'm now having trouble trying to get my DVD drive to show up, presumably because it is IDE? Its not even showing up in the device manager?

PogMoThoin

No idea what You try there. You can get an ide to sata converter cable on ebay, but its prob not much more expensive get a new sata dvd drive.

Although saying that, dvd is probably at the latter end of its lifespan, will disappear someday soon, but its a curse to not have one. I can manage on my netbook, but not my pc, although the times I use it are dwindling

Dublin_Gunner

youcancallme>al wrote: »

Well that didnt go as smoothly as I hoped for
Turns out that the setting in the BIOS for either IDE,AHCI or RAID cannot be changed after you have installed Windows, IDE is default. If you try to change it to RAID after you have installed Windows then you just get BSOD when booting. Anyway after googling around I found THIS registry hack to change it without re-installing Windows, worked a treat and I now have my RAID set up running smoothly

Yeah, generally changing the AHCI/IDE setting will not allow Windows to boot. i.e you installed with AHCI - changing to IDE/Legacy afterwards and Windows will not boot.

Didn't think it would happen when setting up RAID though? At least you got it fixed

littleredspot

Just wondering how do people feel about hard drive cooling? This:

https://www.komplett.ie/k/ki.aspx?sku=300271&view=links#ProductTabs

seems to be a good idea (with the added bonus of reducing the noise) especially with a fan mounted nearby. Or am I worrying about a problem that doesn't exist? I'm going to end up with 6 HDs in my ATX case, which is cooled with 1 inlet and 1 outlet 120mm fans. I don't do any overclocking and the Graphics card and CPU fan have been upgraded. Another option is this:

https://www.komplett.ie/k/ki.aspx?sku=430937&view=detailed#ProductTabs

Any opinions appreciated.

Dublin_Gunner

I've personally never found the need for much if any hdd cooling.

If your drives are getting some decent airflow from your fan there shouldn't really be an issue.

However, you could maybe install another quiet fan inside you case and direct it at the drives.

That Zalman cooler - you'd have to buy one for each of your drives - a bit on the overkill and very expensive side for a problem that never really raises its head.

PogMoThoin

Hard drives don't suffer from heat and rarely get over case temperature, improve the airflow in Your case is better

youcancallmeal

Got my DVD drive working. I had to enable an option in the bios for "Extra raid/ide controller"