Hard Drive failed - help rebuilding Raid system

[lations]

Hi, I just had my hard drive fail on me. Terrible stuff, but at least I can upgrade now. I had a setup where my fast drive was the C drive with 2 drives in RAID 0 and then one HD for data. The C drive is what failed.

I want to order two more drives and link them up in RAID 0 for the C drive now. (Please spare the lectures...I've cried myself out already)

First question: is it easy to set up a RAID 0 for C drive with an ASUS P6T MB? I've not dealt with this before, and when I mean "easy" it is relative to a computer idiot.

Second question: Any recommendations on a couple fast HDs with pretty decent storage capacity? Are SSDs still not something to look at based on either price or stability?

OK I thought of a 3rd: My Large drive for data is pretty slow and makes my fast PC not really so fast anymore. If I bought 4 HDs at this point, would it be easy/possible to have 2 in RAID 0 for C drive and then 2 in RAID 0 for D drive (I'm assuming a failure of one there would only take out the C or D drive respectively and not all four).

Is there any configuration you guys can think of that's better? I mean get creative if you want, I don't know if RAID 10 is viable and then just have one really big C drive in RAID 10 with fast HDs.

Thanks for any and all input guys!

 

[Mu33rto]

You can do 3 HDD raid 0 for main and 1 for backup. Or 1 SSD main & 2 hdd RAID 0 for DATA drive and 1 for backup. The RAID 0 for C & D is a BIG NO NO!!! You are asking for trouble.. If all possible make sure the backup drive is not connected to the system %100 of the time. Only when you are going to Backup the drives. That way if for some reason something happens to your system (electrical,mechanical or a thief) you still have your files store safely some were else.

 

[lations]

Thanks. I dont really understand 3 drives in raid 0. I does that mean 1/3 of each file is stored on each drive and I still get 3x the space (3 500GB drives = 1.5 TB at faster speed)?

I know this is an insanely newb question, but I'm wondering how a backup drive works. When I try to do a backup of a drive onto an external drive it always ends up being some really small file compared to what I tried to copy. I would like a backup drive to essentially work like Raid 1.

Is there a way to have 3 drives in raid 0 (say 1.5 TB capacity), then have a slow backup drive (1.5 TB) that automatically acts like raid 1 and just mirrors everything on the raid 0 drive?

 

[Mu33rto]

Thanks. I dont really understand 3 drives in raid 0. I does that mean 1/3 of each file is stored on each drive and I still get 3x the space (3 500GB drives = 1.5 TB at faster speed)?

Yes 3x space and greater speed than only 2 hdd. What type of software are you using to backup the system? Also are you making Full Backup,Incremental Backup, or Differential Backup? Are you using windows or linux?

 

[lations]

I'm using windows 7. I guess I know nothing about backups, because I've never heard of incremental or differential...I'm was assuming it was full backup. I was just using my Norton 360 software. I honestly have never had any issue with a HD, so I never opened these much smaller files it's claiming are a backup.

 

[lations]

Oh, I also just thought of another question. I know both drives lost their data when one failed, but is the other one still functional so I could add it into a 3 drive raid 0 setup?

 

[Mu33rto]

Norton 360 is not making a full backup of your files. Maybe just coping your bookmarks, documents, or what ever Norton thinks you should have backup of. Use a real backup software to take snapshots of your OS and data drives. I wouldn't be able to name any software since I use linux and use scripts to make my backups. You can setup those software to run on idle so you don't have to manually run the software.Unless you want to make every week.


How did your previous raid fail? Do both hdd pass SMART test? If so you can still recover the data. If one of the drive works you can still use it for raid or any other setup you want..Just format it.

 

[quilciri]

Your motherboard supports raid 5. I'd recommend that over raid 10.

You'll need at least 3 physical hdd's, and it will use 1 hdd worth of space for the parity bits (though it will only use 1 hdd worth of space no matter how many are in the array, so if you have 5 hdd's in raid 5, you have 4 hdd's worth of space).

It's almost as fast as Raid 0, and you won't lose your data if a hdd fails.

 

[lations]

@mu33rto: thanks, I will look into real software. I dont know what a smart test is. When my comp says it wont boot and tech support says drive failed, I thought that was that.

@quilciri: This raid 5 sounds damn near too good to be true. So you say I could have 4 500GB HDDs, 1.5 TB usable space, and it would all be mirrored? AND it would be near raid 0 speed? I am on board if this is how it works.