2 drives into RAID1 without losing data

i have (2) 1TB drives and id like to make them into RAID 1 without lossing data. currently one drive is full and has 2 OSes, a data partition where everything important is saved, and a backup partition where other computers backup to over network. the other drive is currently blank.

the problem i am seeing is that after creating the RAID 1 volume, it deletes all partitions. i even ignored the warning and ended up havibng to use a partition undeleter to recover everything. also i dont have any way to backup 1TB of important data without using about 200 DVDs or 20 hard drives. being that the data will pretty much remain in contact (unlike stripping of raid 0) i tried undeleteing the partitions after making the RAID volume but my partitioning software crashes when raid is pressent. anyone have a way to get raid 1 to work without lossing data?

Not that I know of. You need to find some backup software to create an image, then drop the image on your new array.

You can do it with "software RAID" in Windows. Run Disk Manager (Start>Run>diskmgmt.msc), and convert the first drive (with the data on it) to a "dynamic disk". Do the same to the second drive. Right click on the first drive, and there should be an "Add Mirror" or similar option.

EDIT: After re-reading your first post... Having the boot/system partition on the same drive might be a problem.

yuck. i could never trust software raid. plus i cant manage my partitions the way i want and it took me alot of time to convert from dynamic back to basic so i would be able to. id rather go buy a new hard drive jsut to store the backups on before i do that

Or buy a $50 program to have backups like you should have in the first place to protect your data....ESPECIALLY in a RAID environment.

i do have backups but i dont have enough space to backup 750gb which is why im going to use RAID 1 along with backups. when i had my 500gb drive dedicated to backups, i was fine but that drive had to go to another computer. now my backup space is limited to only the most important data but that doesnt mean i can lose everything else. also i already have a blank 1tb drive waiting to be used

also i like RAID1 over backups. i had 2 seperate full system backups and they both failed me when i needed them most. managed to get a good amount of data off of one with alot of work but alot was also corrupted and unreadable. where raid 1 has yet to give me problems.

RAID, is not a backup!!!

i know its not a backup but i much perfer RAID1 over making my other drive for backup only. thats all i wanna do is make it RAID1. ill do a backyp drive whenever i get another drive for it

petteyg359 said:

You can do it with "software RAID" in Windows. Run Disk Manager (Start>Run>diskmgmt.msc), and convert the first drive (with the data on it) to a "dynamic disk". Do the same to the second drive. Right click on the first drive, and there should be an "Add Mirror" or similar option.

Click to expand...

/on topic
Should be able to mirror the data partition.

/off topic to everyone

This is not a raid/backup discussion thread.