Raid Setup/Benefits

[shred444]

Are any MP users running Raid groups on their system?

Right now i have 2 drives,
Drive1: OS, records everything from tuner1
Drive2: records everything from tuner2

Is it beneficial to Raid 0 these drives (striping) to speed up read/write?

[eloo]

Without a doubt, but you are taking a change. If one drive dies in striping, you loose all your data. I use mirroring, you get read speed and safety. Right now I am considering moving to RAID 5 using 3*500GB SATAII WD RE2 drives.

[ASiDiE]

I should be getting another 160GB drive tomorrow.. and then I will add it to my system... I am going to hack windows xp and to software raid... Then I will have 1 320gb drive.. in raid format for all my tv shows...

[shred444]

what does the hack to windows xp entail?

[ASiDiE]

I think you just need to bring in a couple of files into a hex editor.. and then edit them... Then when you are setting up your drives you should have either grayed out options or new options to put some drives into raid...

HERE is toms hardware guide talking about....

[eloo]

Hi Asidie,

I am not so convinced with software raid, and now with MBs shipping with RAID 5 for 100$ I think thats the way to go.

[nylonhof]

I have a hardware RAID5 and the HTPC is connected over a WLAN. Works like a charm (execpt some in rare instances when the WLAN connection is dropped )

If possible, one should avoid software raid systems. The utilization of the CPU when calculating the checksums is a killer. BTW, many of the onboard raid controller still require the CPU to do the calculations and are therefore to be considered a software raid system.

Regards
nylonhof

[jawbroken]

Personally I wouldn't recommend motherboard RAID over software RAID. As said, most of them calculate on the CPU anyway, and if the motherboard dies you are screwed unless you can find the same motherboard or compatible chipset. I am thinking of building a dedicated NAS with software RAID, as hardware RAID cards are expensive and if one fails I need to find an identical/compatible one to replace it with. CPU utilisation shouldn't be an issue because it will be a dedicated computer.

[ASiDiE]

Well like I said in my first post... I did get my 160GB drive and put it into my HTPC. I then followed THIS link. I edited the files and copied them over using the recovery manager... I now have several options when I create my raid setup.

Here are the files you will need (already Edited).

[recosta]

Hi there,
I'm using MP for a couple of months in a RAID0 setup. I'm fully aware of the possible harddisk failure but the greater performance is nice to have.
I use the Promise FastTrak TX4300 controller to manage 2 seperate RAID0 environments (both 160Gb).
My C-drive is RAID0 and my D-drive is RAID0 aswell. I have some spare HD's and I'm in the luxury of having a LTO1 tapedrive and several tapes to backup my files. In my safe I store the installation CD's of WinXP Pro + SP2 and Symantec Backup Exec for Windows ànd the tapes ;-)
OS is installed on C-drive and muziek is on D-drive.
One extra SATA disk is connected to the mobo directly. On this disk I installed WinXP aswell. By simply change the startup sequence in the BIOS I can boot from this disk and do my things.
I'm aware I have a possible different configuration than most of PC-users but all I want to say is that you can NEVER RELY ON RAID0 (in the past I had some HD-dying so I learned the hardway.....)

Enjoy the performance of RAID0 but have your disasterrecovery plan ready!
Have fun,
Recosta