Best/correct way to setup a Raid0

[mrapoc]

Ok ive got two 320gb 7200.10 hdds coming from specialtech tomorrow. I hope to raid0 these together and using them as my primary storage - my current 200gb will be in icybox as an external backup. Whats the correct way to setup my raid and the best way to get my data off the external. I want to keep my new hdd install as fast as anything. Im guessing i just install windows on the new hdds, setup everything then connect the external up, copy what i want across then format the external so I have a full storage solution (with no windows) - will this work?

I remember reading something about putting the windows install on another partition?

Also when raided together will it show ONE drive as 640gb or what?

Thanks guys, just getting my head around it

 

[Doddsy]

Yeah sounds about right. Although I am tired so I may be missing something. Just remember to have your raid drivers on a floppy disk (not sure if you can do it with a usb). Te drive will show up as around 640GB, remember it's 320 unformatted. So you'll lose like 30Gb or something.

 

[!TIMMY!]

yeah it does sound right, Ill be doing the same with 2x250gb HD's when I can be bothered to order the 2nd HD.

I think you can partition on RAID 0 as its usefull for if you have to format you wont lose all your files on the other partition(s).

As for needing a floppy i think you can use a usb pen with a floppy emulator if your mobo supports booting from usb.

 

[ionicle]

The drive will show up as around 640GB, remember it's 320 unformatted. So you'll lose like 30Gb or something.

its because manufacturers use 1000mb = 1 Gb, rather than 1024, so you loose a proportional amount from each hard drive, you loose 24mb per gigabyte

 

[PV5150]

As for needing a floppy i think you can use a usb pen with a floppy emulator if your mobo supports booting from usb.

Just use Nlite and make yourself a slipstreamed disk with RAID drivers. Because I no longer have a floppy drive I use virtual floppy and extract the ICH8R drivers to it. Then include those drivers into your Nlite install along with whatever else you want to include; adjust your install settings and away you go. Easy peasy

 

[mrapoc]

OK ^^

Do i treat it as a single drive from there on? Any special ways to configure windows other than one big partition for a performance boost/less fragmentation?

dont think i have any other questions lol

 

[Rastalovich]

its because manufacturers use 1000mb = 1 Gb, rather than 1024, so you loose a proportional amount from each hard drive, you loose 24mb per gigabyte

err, nope - from the manufacturer 1024mb = 1g.

Formatting with fat, ntfs, cdfs, ffs etc cuts the size available to the OS.

Raw size is always as indicated. If u wrote to the drive sector by sector without a format, u will get the full amount. Pretty sure Windose won`t do it without a 3rd party hack, mac the same, linux probably will.

 

[FarFarAway]

He is correct that manufacturers state the size in gb's where 1000mb = 1gb

But ye obviously the OS and formatting breaks it down

 

[Rastalovich]

Where`s that stated ? I`ll have to check that out.

 

[FarFarAway]

There's lots of references to it. One here

I bought a 6.4 GB hard drive. When I look at the size of the hard drive by using DriveSpace3 or Right-Clicking on Drive C in My Computer I get a total amount of 5.99 GB. Where is the rest of my space?

This has to do with the way nearly every hard drive manufacturer in existence calculates hard drive size. They all define 1 gigabyte = 1,000,000,000 bytes instead of the 1 gigabyte = 1,073,741,824 bytes which it *really* is.

This is called "binary" vs "decimal" sizes. If you look at the *fine print* you will always see "[Company X] defines 1 gigabyte as 1 billion bytes". This is standard industry practice, unfortunately were a drive manufacturer (Western Digital for example) to be *honest* about this then their drives as advertised would all appear smaller than the competitors, when in fact they would not be. Shoppers would be comparing "apples to oranges" rather than "apples to apples".

Put another way in reality your hard drive is 6400 million bytes rather than 6400 megabytes. A 6.4 GB drive is actually closer to a 6 GB drive when viewed from a *real world* standpoint.

 

[Rastalovich]

In the old days it was common to find hard drives with a capacity of just 5MB, nowadays it is hard to buy a new hard drive with less than 40GB, that's 40,960 Megabytes !

40x 1024m

The same website tells u this.

Eitherway, u write to a hard drive that is 200g, it will be 200g (200x1024mb).

Whatever OS/format u do to it will lessen it

If u want the write to it sector by sector u will get the full amount. It is detrementally possible to create a drive that works on decimal instead of binary, but u would need to design them a whole different way. They are created to the power 2 - that`s just the way it is.

 

[FarFarAway]

A 250gb hard drive is 250 000mb's, not 256000mb. That's just the way it's always been. Drive manufacturers do this so the drives look like they are bigger when they sell them but in reality it's actually incorrect. This is why a 80gb drive never comes out as 80gb even before the OS get's anywhere near it.

 

[Rastalovich]

Ah I see where u`r coming from now, the manufactures lying about the drive sizes.

Never always used to be like that.

 

[FarFarAway]

Aye that be it

Like this

 

[Rastalovich]

Aye that be it

Like this

U`r screenie of the drive`s pie chart is about right for 750g.

Each track has a header, inside each sector has a header, all of which is in a massed table around track0sector0 (boot sector, block allocation memory [bam]).

Depending on how many tracks the drive has, probably around 5 to 10 million, I can`t remember whether NTFS/FAT uses 12 or 16 x 512 sectors x tracks.

16 x 512 x 6 million (maybe)

+ bam

+ 750.xxx.xxx.xxx from the pie

is in the ball park of 750 x 1024 to me.

U know drives are formatted before they`re shipped ? Perhaps they`re informing u of the formatted size.

pfft either way.

 

[ionicle]

WD Raptors are the only ones i've seen to be honest so far

at 36, and 74Gb, they have been correct, even when formatted, everyone else lies about there hard drive sizes

 

[FarFarAway]

Nah the drive is stating what it is - 750000mb's mate, that's just the way it is

 

[ionicle]

its the only one that is correct then, it says 36gb, or 74, and you get 36, or 74 gb respectively, everyone else says like 80, and you get 74 - 76gb, which makes it incorrect to your average punter, who doesnt know anything

 

[Rastalovich]

I guess it runs alongside units they teach people today.

1024 x 1024 mb is now called a gibibyte

1000 x 1000 mb is a gigabyte.

I`m not so sure a megabyte is 1024 x 1024k, think they teach megi or mebibyte or something.

I blame microsoft :nono: dunno why, easy target - maybe Bush or Blair.

 

[JN]

I guess it runs alongside units they teach people today.

1024 x 1024 mb is now called a gibibyte

1000 x 1000 mb is a gigabyte.

I`m not so sure a megabyte is 1024 x 1024k, think they teach megi or mebibyte or something.

I blame microsoft :nono: dunno why, easy target - maybe Bush or Blair.

Ye its a mebibyte