Quote:
Originally Posted by 357
ECO drives as in evironmentally friendly?
I don't think it would be a problem. The RAID is supported by the SATA controller on the motherboard, the drives don't know the difference. Most all of them support RAID 0 and RAID 1. Some also support RAID 5.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAID
RAID, an acronym for Redundant Array of Independent Disks (Changed from its original term Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks),
RAID 0 (block-level striping without parity or mirroring) has no (or zero) redundancy. It provides improved performance and additional storage but no fault tolerance. Hence simple stripe sets are normally referred to as RAID 0. Any disk failure destroys the array, and the likelihood of failure increases with more disks in the array... (not what you want)
RAID 1 (mirroring without parity or striping), data is written identically to multiple disks (a "mirrored set"). Although many implementations create sets of 2 disks, sets may contain 3 or more disks. Array provides fault tolerance from disk errors or failures and continues to operate as long as at least one drive in the mirrored set is functioning. With appropriate operating system support, there can be increased read performance, and only a minimal (i.e. almost no) write performance reduction.
It's really simple to setup. When you plug in both drives and boot up you may have to hit a function key to get into the BIOS or Array Configuration, create a new volume/array, add both disks, choose RAID 1 and save your changes. The options and wording may differ slightly, but if you only have two disks, the only options will be RAID 0 or RAID 1. So long as Windows 7 has a driver for your motherboard, you just install Windows as normal. Most of the array controllers will have some kind of notification if a drive fails. Otherwise you won't even notice, since you'll still be up and running. All you do is shutdown, replace bad drive, and boot back up. The array controller should automatically mirror the data onto the new disk. As long as it is the same architecture (SATA) and = or larger than the other disk, it will work. It doesn't have to be exactly the same. |
I'm gonna be firing up six disks when I start up, but I'm with you.
I read the wiki stuff yesterday. I'll find a "how to" later. I think you've done sold me.
I'll be running a 300gb boot disk, a 1.5 tb storage, and a 2tb storage, all redundant.
I'm, thinking that if I get serious about tossing garbage, I won't have all that much to transfer, and it won't be a big deal. I may start that today.
I'm getting pretty itchy about pulling the trigger on the hardware...