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Thread ID: 110056 2010-06-01 21:50:00 Figuring a backup plan Nomad (952) Press F1
Post ID Timestamp Content User
1105898 2010-06-02 04:44:00 Hey, if you have 1 HDD with software on it ... and you wanna make it a RAID, can you just plug in a new HDD or do you have to redo Windows?

Meaning "hardware RAID via the motherboard" not using Windows Dynamic Disk.

you will need specific drivers so reinstalling windows is the only option i believe 		Gobe1 (6290)
1105899 2010-06-02 07:06:00 Should I or should I not ... :D

My head is going around in circles thinking whether I should employ a RAID 1 now and get Win7 back online ........

So far it is about downtime I gathered for RAID 1. You have to have a series of images, double tripled backed up ..... 		Nomad (952)
1105900 2010-06-02 21:32:00 Ah ... :nerd:

After much thinking. I have decided against RAID 1 for now.
If I had a part time business maybe.

For now:
C: - Single HD. System only.
D: - Single HD. Data only.

E: Single HD. External. eSATA.

I will move all my files to the D: now. Under one parent folder so each evening backing up is just one "action". I will also have my multiple versions of system image(s). So on each of the 3 drives I will have my image(s) and my data.

If I did go for RAID I would need to buy more HDs and clog space in my case. It's only personal use, from experience the Windows Image takes < an hour to restore.


So I am about to get a eSATA enclosure (2yr late) and a WD Caviar Black 500MB or 1TB drive (64MB Cache). Don't think I will use that Seagate with the weak data connector for my impt stuff now.

Question: I have a SATA-2 motherboard. Should I use my Seagate SATA-2 500GB or my new Western Digital Caviar Black as my main drive or as my data drive? 		Nomad (952)
1105901 2010-06-03 09:13:00 Why don't you use software RAID 1? if you have a pro (or above) version of Windows it is built in and you don't need to reload windows to set it up, performance between software RAID 1 and the onboard RAID controller (which is also technically software raid) is nothing, there is actually very little CPU overhead for RAID 0, 1 or 10 anyway as there is no parity calculations involved. Deimos (5715)
1105902 2010-06-03 21:11:00 Thanks for that.

My toys should arrive today.
Yeah I could go for software raid. I just have a windows system these days. Thing is I need to buy the 2nd new HDD :p

I can take that onboard later.

For now:
1a: 100GB. System. WD Caviar.
1b: 400GB. Data (redundancy).
2: 500GB Seagate Data (main).
3: 500GB Seagate eSATA. Backup.

Each drives have my multiple system image(s) and my data.
Should I add a extra drive I can easily pop it into a RAID 1.

PS. Still thinking about RAID. Ah .... . 		Nomad (952)
1105903 2010-06-03 21:33:00 Food for thought:

I read that h/w RAID if the motherboard or the RAID controller goes bad, there goes the data if you cannot get the same/similar one down the road (and I keep a computer for 4+ years) :rolleyes: 		Nomad (952)
1105904 2010-06-04 00:34:00 Same manufacturer is okay Nomad...ie: ICH8\9\10 will carries the array over.... SolMiester (139)
1105905 2010-06-04 01:35:00 Food for thought:

I read that h/w RAID if the motherboard or the RAID controller goes bad, there goes the data if you cannot get the same/similar one down the road (and I keep a computer for 4+ years) :rolleyes:

That only really matters for RAID levels that stripe the data e . g . Raid 0, 10, 3, 5, 6 . you can "break" a RAID 1 array and the data will remain intact no matter what you plug the drive in to .

Also, if you note down the raid settings (stripe size etc) there is a chance that you can get the data off on a different controller but I havn't had any luck with this . 		Deimos (5715)
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