Matrix, Raid 1, or Single drive + Backup?

My new parts are coming in, going to use two Seagate 7200.10 drives with Vista 64, but I don't know which combination will be in my best interest. I've done Raid0 in the past, never really noticed a difference in gaming and had a catastrophic crash at one time. So....say I do a Matrix setup, put games and CS3 on the Raid0 and Vista on the Raid1 - what exactly does that do for me? If one drive bites the dust, I loose everything in the Raid0 portion but can rebuild the Raid1 segment? What striping size should I use for each Raid type?

My second choice would be a Raid1 versus single drive + backup drive setup. Is the Raid1 going to be noticeably slower than a single drive? Is there any point to a single drive if you have a couple already?

Thanks!

"Higher quality RAID 1 controllers can outperform single drive implementations by making both drives active for read operations. This can in theory reduce file access times (requests are sent to whichever drive is closer to the desired data) as well as potentially doubling data throughput on reads (both drives can read different data simultaneously). Most consumer RAID 1 controllers do not provide this level of sophistication, however..."

From anandtech. Anyone know if Intel's latest chipset has this ability?

Edit: I found a quote on Intel's site that mentioned their chipsets possessing the ability to split the reads on a Raid1. Guess I will try a Matrix setup.

no it doesnt.

at least not for me under ICH9R, when i ran HDTune or HDtach they showed performance of a single drive.

"Also, due to drive load balancing, even systems with RAID 1 can take advantage of faster boot times and data reads."

From Intel's Matrix page:
http://www.intel.com/design/chipsets/matrixstorage_sb.htm

performance wise, the raid 1 would give you better performance if the controller can infact split the reads between the disks. For data security and recovery the single disk + backup disk (in an external enclosure) would be best.