RAID question set-up! Thanks!!

[briana06]

OK SO I am building a new beast machine and wanted to look into the raid set up options..

I have been reading all about RAID set up and want to know which way I should go. I want performance increase, but with drive protection. Only thing is my antec 900 only has 3 hard drive slots.. My new motheboard supports SATA RAID 0/1/0+1.

If I cant have both performance and mirroring I would just go with the mirror drives. One other question I have is how good is on board raid controllers compared to an external raid controller for MY set-up..

I am also aware that I would have to purchase a raid controller in order to run a different raid set-up.
THANKS!!!

 

[Ste]

RAID 5 is what you want. Needs at least three hard Drives, preferably of Same size and model.

Which I guess is RAID 0+1 on your mobo, but for best performence I suggest a Separate PCI RAID Card with RAID 5 capabilities.

 

[briana06]

I am looking for raid cards on new egg.. raid 5 cards seem to be expensive.. Do I need a card with 4x sata II ports thus I will be hooking up 3 HD's?

Dont you need a minimum of 4 hard drives for 0 + 1?

 

[Ste]

RAID 0+1 and RAID 5 although similar are slightly different. I do not know the exact differences though.
RAID Cards will be expensive because they are hardware RAID and not software, and therefore they are more reliable, faster and use less system resources.

So yes you would need a PCI or PCI X one with at least 4 SATA ports. You can have more than 3 Drives with RAID 5, but 3 is minimum.

 

[briana06]

Great, thanks guys. I will be doing a raid 1 set up until I get my additional hard drive as well as raid controller. Thank you for the help guys! Anything else I should know?

 

[Ste]

I would still suggest buying three Harddrives.
A 500 GB external one for back ups and two 250GB internal ones for RAID 0.

This way you can still have the speed and backs ups.

Or Terabyte Drive external and two 500 GB's internals in RAID 0.

 

[briana06]

That sounds like a good idea, then I could run raid zero for performance off the motherboard, and then the 3rd for back up. I would much rather do that since the mobo supports that set up. How would i go about backing up all my files onto the 3rd one? Copy / paste or should I get a program.

 

[Ste]

I usually just manually copy and paste whatever I deem to be important. Hasn't failed me yet.

A program may be good for someone that may not be too computer litterate or may not know what needs to be backed up.

Oh, you can get a cheaper external HD by buying an internal HD and the enclosure separtely and just putting it together.

newegg has a large selection of enclosures..
make sure you get one with a fan, AC adapter, internal Sata connector and external USB and or firewire and or SATA.

 

[briana06]

I will stick with the copy / paste idea.. wow man thanks a bunch! I hope the mobo raid controller will work well.. well for me I guess anything will since I am upgrading from a IDE 5400 HD to raid 0 7200 sata II

Great info STE and thanks again!