GPT or MBR?

[Flying-Q]

A new computer is going to have 3 drives in it. The OS will be on a Samsung EVO 240GB SSD and data will be stored on a pair of WesternDigital 4TB Red drives in RAID1. Obviously the pair of 4TB drives will need to be GPT in order to access their full capacity, but what about the SSD? Should the SSD be MBR or GPT knowing that the OS will be Win8.1/64bit?

 

[laviniuc]

unless you plan to use dual boot and other os it doesn't matter. win8.1 supports gpt so you can just use the same for both.

 

[MalakiArtook]

GPT is newer and superior to MBR. If you have a newer motherboard with an UEFI based firmware GPT is the preferred partition layout.

 

[Ravi Gagan]

Despite the many advantages of GPT-based disks over MBR drives, many vendors still utilize the MBR technology since it is still predominantly used in the real world. GPT disks are gaining popularity with their benefits in terms of partition size, number of partitions, and resilience. Windows Failover Clusters now support GPT-based disks which will broaden their use in enterprise data centers
the many advantages of GPT-based drives make them an attractive choice

See this article http://www.petri.co.il/gpt-vs-mbr-based-disks.htm#

 

[Hawkeye22]

Just something to consider... if you use older backup software, it most likely won't be able to backup/restore to a GPT partitioned drive.

Other than that, if you have UEFI motherboard, modern OS's should have no problem with GPT partitioned drives.

 

[JohnnyLucky]

Actually, there is no requirement or need to manually format and partition a Samsung 840 EVO 240GB ssd. The ssd is too small to warrant it. Instead, let Windows take care of it automatically when you do a fresh clean install of Microsoft Windows to the ssd. One large drive. No muss. No fuss. No bother.

When you build your new pc only connect the ssd to the motherboard. Do not connect the hard drives. Install Windows on the ssd. Then reboot and immediately go into the system BIOS and set it to RAID mode instead of ACHI mode. That is okay. ACHI is included in RAID. It will work. Also set the ssd as the primary boot drive.

Once you are satisfied the ssd is performing correctly you can go ahead and connect the hard drives and do your raid configuration.

BTW - I am curious. If you have a 240GB SSD with the operating system, software applications, utilities, and games installed on the ssd, then why are you setting up a RAID array for your hard drives?

 

[Flying-Q]

Actually, there is no requirement or need to manually format and partition a Samsung 840 EVO 240GB ssd. The ssd is too small to warrant it. Instead, let Windows take care of it automatically when you do a fresh clean install of Microsoft Windows to the ssd. One large drive. No muss. No fuss. No bother.

When you build your new pc only connect the ssd to the motherboard. Do not connect the hard drives. Install Windows on the ssd. Then reboot and immediately go into the system BIOS and set it to RAID mode instead of ACHI mode. That is okay. ACHI is included in RAID. It will work. Also set the ssd as the primary boot drive.

Once you are satisfied the ssd is performing correctly you can go ahead and connect the hard drives and do your raid configuration.

BTW - I am curious. If you have a 240GB SSD with the operating system, software applications, utilities, and games installed on the ssd, then why are you setting up a RAID array for your hard drives?

Yes, I was planning on having the SSD as a single partition (plus the little ones spawned during the windows install). I have read elsewhere about changing AHCI to RAID after install but there appear to be various opinions as to whether setting RAID as the SATA type before first install is better, or indeed needed. I don't mind doing a fresh install to the SSD under AHCI and changing after to RAID as if it does go wrong I have time to redo it under RAID from the start.

As for the need for a RAID array in the first place, this machine is to be a media and games machine. The media in question is a vast collection of DVDs and music which my adult son wants stored to allow him to reclaim part of his living room as well as have space for increasing his collection with HD content and eventually 4K content. He also is mildly paranoid having previously lost a huge swath of content due to a drive failure, hence the need for a RAID 1 array.

 

[popatim]

As long as you both understand that no form of raid is a backup. If you, the kids, a virus deletes a file its gone from both drives.

Rather than raid I would suggest using the 4tb drives separately and have the system backup one to the other nightly.

 

[JohnnyLucky]

^5 +1 what popatim said.

 

[Flying-Q]

As long as you both understand that no form of raid is a backup. If you, the kids, a virus deletes a file its gone from both drives.

Rather than raid I would suggest using the 4tb drives separately and have the system backup one to the other nightly.

Initially I thought this was a good idea, then I started thinking about who this machine is for and how he behaves. My son is autistic and has certain routines which he is comfortable with as well as certain beliefs that are rigid in nature.

He suffered a data loss due to a failed drive some years ago and the next machine I built for him in 2007 had an OS drive and a RAID 1 for data under Vista. Last year it lost a drive and he was over the moon when I visited with a replacement drive to rebuild the array and showed him he hadn't lost any of his music. He has asked for another RAID 1 setup on this new machine to protect his data. I'm happy to build it that way.