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New HDDs: raid 0 and/or matrix

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redgar

Registered
Joined
Oct 26, 2008
I've been planning to buy two hard drives for a few months and set up a raid0. Now my hard drives are here and I see this matrix raid stuff that I've never even heard of. I've read for the past 2 hours about how to set it up, the speeds and recommendations. Well, I'm really confused about a few things and I wondered if anyone could clear it up.

First, can I run the matrix raid with my gigabyte motherboard? I saw it requires an intel southbridge and I don't know if my southbridge is compatible. I have a GIGABYTE GA-965P-DS3 mobo.

2) My hard drives are western digital WD6401AALS 640GB 7200s. Running a raid0, can I use all 640gb of both hdds? If I run matrix, do I need to have the redundant drive?

3) What is generally the best setup for an all out matrix raid 0 (if such a setup exists)? Do I create just one raid as raid0? I've also read about creating slices in order to stripe each differently (64kb or 128kb) to read certain types of files faster. I was thinking about having a slice to contain OS partitions, then another slice for partitions containing programs and data files. Does this make sense?

4) Where and when do I create "slices"? Where and when do I create partitions on a fresh install. I presently use partition magic 8 and created my second partition on my present hdd to run windows 7. Should I, or would I need Partition magic to manage partitions on my raid drive?

Can someone who has done this guide me through these details. Again, I've read the matrix raid threads but theres still a bunch of things that don't make sense yet...

All I want to know how to do is create a matrix raid0 with 2 separate "slices", one for OS partitions and one for programs/data partitions. I want to create 2 OS partitions on slice 1 and 3 partitions on slice 2 - 2 for program files, 1 for data etc. Does this like a good idea and is it plausible?

Help appreciated!!! :santa2:
 
Hey I am thinking about doing similar set up also, hope someone could reply this :).
 
I'm trying to figure out if the raid0 volume in matrix is faster than a normal raid0. That will help me determine whether I need to do matrix.

If I don't need a separate redundancy slice, do I even need to go with matrix?
 
here is what i did and why.

Raid 0 is fast. its also "unreliable" (although in 6 years of raid 0's, i have never had an issue).

To make things less complicated, setup a raid 0, and consider everything on there volitile. every week, every month, back it up to some external device.

I mean, if a hard drive fails, i would think you would spend less time building a raid0 array from scratch, then restoring your data than to restore some complicated matrix raid.

but thats just my .02$

raid 0 only. external or nas for backup/copy
 
Well I have another hard drive besides the two I set up in raid to use for making ghost backups etc.

I need to know if I can do two raid 0 slices with matrix and if its faster than a normal raid 0. I now know my southbridge is intel so I should be fine.

I guess I'll just be testing it all out myself tonight.
 
Putting two raid 0 partitions will not get you any gains. The beginning of the primary raid 0 partition is the fastest & everything kinda tapers off beyond that. If you did 2 partitions the 2nd would be much slower than the first. You're better off with just the 1 raid 0 partition & your backup drive, IMO.

Oh... and :welcome:
 
I have two raptors in matrix raid 0. I have two raid 0 partitions. One is smaller and is used for os and software. The other is for storage. The first partition is supposed to be faster because it uses the outside of the platter. However, if you just do a regular raid 0 and partition it it's supposed to offer the same performance since raid uses the fast part of the drive first. This is what I was told when I posted in the matrix thread. Also the matrix console does some smart monitoring which is nice
 
I thought writing began at the inside of the plates... giving the drive faster access..

-D
 
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