RAID question?

[AP4LIFETN]

Ok I wiki'd RAID 5 and now im really lost. I guess what I was trying to state woth my first quest was could I RAID 0 the two Seagate drives for faaster perfomance and them install the WD drive and used as a seperate secondary storage. I want the WD available just to move information on to, and not really set up into any type of automatic information storage (RAID 5). Am I making any sense here?
To OnlyCurious- No demand intended here

thats what im doing...using my 2 WD's for performance, and a 500GB for storage of my important/big files...you could install an OS on that too so if it fails you waste no time in getting online again

 

[Bot2011]

If you are going to use RAID you have to decide what is th array you want.

RAID 0 has been tested and shows marginal speed improvements over a single hd setup. Alot of gamers are under the impression that it makes you load into games faster and such. Depending on the game and whether or not the data is loaded from the memory or the hd will determine if that is actually the case. Another thing to note about RAID 0 is that if you lose 1 hd you will lose ALL the data on the RAID 0 array(both hd's). This array is called striping as part of the information is stored on hd1 and the other part is on hd2. Kind of like half of this sentence is on hd1 while the second half is on hd2 and without both hd's working the data is not readable and therefore corrupted.

RAID 1 is used to provide extra data security. This is used when you are wanting to make sure that you have your data backed-up in the event you lose a hd. The speed is still faster than a single hd but not as fast in some aspects of performance when compared to the other RAID arrays. One thing to note about this RAID array is you lose 1 hd you can pull out that bad hd and replace it with a new hd and you won't skip a beat because the second hd is an exact mirror of the other hd. This array is called mirroring because both hd's have the same information.

RAID 5 is basically the same as RAID 0 but with more hd's and the data is split over all the hds which can be good and can be bad.

Anything past RAID 0 or RAID 1 will start to cost more cash because it starts requiring 3+ hd's to operate. What you have to decide is what RAID setup do you want. Do you want some speed increase or do you want data security?

Some people say don't use RAID 1 as a backup and you should always backup in addition to what the RAID 1 array is already conducting. This is true for the most part, but its a far more forgiving setup if you forget, get busy, get lazy about backing up your system for a month or 2.

There are pros and cons for each one. You have to decide which is best for you.

To answer your question about could you RAID 0 the 2 seagates and use the wd for storage. Yes you could. Just keep in mind that the performance increase for a RAID 0 will be variable depending on what you use the system for. Also since you will not have an automatic backup you need to make sure you back up any data that you cannot live without in the event you lose a hd.

 

[Ice8168]

Ok well the floppy is no problem. I've got an old drive around here somewhere.

So is the RAID array set up rpior to installing windows. Pardon my stupidity

 

[Bot2011]

It is installed while you are installing the OS. YOu need the RAID drivers on a floppy to be able to setup the RAID array.

 

[Ice8168]

Ah I see, its slowly starting to make sense.

 

[Gabb]

oh crap so I actually need a floppy drive? They don't make a USB bootable thing? jeez who uses floppy drives anymore now adays anyways