Question Filenames and RAID 0

[DullFact]

I had 2 SSDs in RAID 0, and one drive is dead. Are the filenames in NTFS recoverable from the good drive?

 

[4745454b]

Filename? I doubt it. 50% gets wrote to one drive, 50% gets wrote to the other.

Really, for anyone reading this, drop RAID in your home build. Just because it makes sense for a business to use it doesn't mean you should. RAID is for uptime. That's it. Use an external drive for backups, no need for AID0 in any system we normal people would use.

 

[DullFact]

Filename? I doubt it. 50% gets wrote to one drive, 50% gets wrote to the other.

All I want is the list of files, without any file contents. I was hoping for a slim chance that the NTFS master file table is recoverable, even if the data is not.

 

[ex_bubblehead]

All I want is the list of files, without any file contents. I was hoping for a slim chance that the NTFS master file table is recoverable, even if the data is not.

Your data is gone... All of it, including the directories.

 

[DullFact]

Your data is gone... All of it, including the directories.

Fortunately, all those files can be redownloaded. That's why I only want the filenames. Anyway, thanks for the help, 4745454b and ex_bubblehead!

 

[fzabkar]

Each file has a record in the MFT. Each record is 1024 bytes. If the drive had 1000 files, then the size of the MFT would have been 1MB. This is much larger than the typical stripe size in a RAID.

A tool such as DMDE would probably still find half your file names. In fact it would be interesting to see if DMDE could build a virtual RAID consisting of your good SSD and a NULL disk.

 

[Deleted member 14196]

Raid anything for home users is USELESS. I don’t know why people think they’re going to get great performance out of it they’re not even going to notice a difference

 

[USAFRet]

If you are talking about performance yes, but in my experience most home users are after safety rather than performance. So a RAID 5 and 6 are still good options.

Not really.
That wards off loss due to physical drive damage. And only if you need the actual uninterrupted uptime.
Does nothing for the more common forms of data loss.

Accidental deletion, ransomeware, 'oops, I formatted the wrong partition', etc, etc,etc.

RAID of any type does nothing for all of that.

An actual backup routine does.

 

[Deleted member 14196]

If you are talking about performance yes, but in my experience most home users are after safety rather than performance. So a RAID 5 and 6 are still good options.

safety... LOL... no, no safety at all in RAID 0, not even RAID 1, it's for uptime not backups

if a user even half cared about their data they would make backups... .if not too bad for them I guess.

 

[USAFRet]

As I said RAID 5 and RAID 6 are good options.

Again, physical drive redundancy.
Not data redundancy.

Accidentally format or delete a partition in a RAID 5...poof....all gone.

 

[USAFRet]

Agreed. I was just referring to the type of RAID, not without a backup option. Also recovering deleted or reformatted data from RAIDs is what we specialize in. So is the data normally gone. No. But of course it should be backed up.

And many many people hear "RAID" and assume it is a backup.
We see that here daily.
It is not.

If a person can suffer through an hour of downtime for recovery from a real backup, RAID of any type is not needed.

And that hour downtime (or much much more) would need to be done anyway, after a replacement drive is swapped in.

$50 and free software for a local backup, vs a couple of weeks and $300 plus for a data recovery company for a maybe.
I know which way I'd go.

 

[alceryes]

Are the filenames in NTFS recoverable from the good drive?

No. Having just one good drive of a RAID 0 array is just as bad as having no drives of a RAID 0 array. The data (including filenames) is completely unrecoverable unless the data on the failed drive can be recovered.

 

[USAFRet]

You are totally misunderstanding my reply. My initial reply was to the comment that RAID for home use are useless. I said they are not. A R5 and R6 offers protection against drive failure. So having a RAID 5 or R6 is better than a single drive in that regard. Assuming the user does not have a backup of any kind (like 75% of users) then at least there is some safety in the event of drive failure.

Of course having a backup is the number one thing people should be doing. In fact two, offline and Cloud.

We are in agreement on the "RAID 5 as drive failure protection" concept.
But that's it.

But we've gone far out in left field regarding the OP's problem with his RAID 0.
Left field, over the fence, out in the parking lot.

So lets agree to disagree on the usefulness of a RAID array for most home use.