Intel Matrix RAID

[Sovereign]

So the big boys always poo-poo anything short of a hardware-backed RAID system. Fine. Me, being a college student with strict money limits, it was either RAID card and no additional drives (RAID0--not RAID at all) or a 2TB GreenPower. Obviously, I chose the GreenPower. I have an abit IP35-Pro motherboard with an Intel ICH9R southbridge which supports Intel Matrix RAID. From my understanding, Intel Matrix RAID would let me get away with something like this:

Actual, Physical Drives Available
- 750GB "A"
- 750GB "B"
- 2000GB "C"

Drives, as seen by Windows
[[750GB A][750GB B][750GB Partition of C]] = RAID5
[1250GB Partition of C] = No RAID

The partitions, of course, come from the 2TB GreenPower.

Anyone know how "good" or "reliable" Intel Matrix RAID is? It's firmware RAID so it inhabits a world between software (boo) and hardware (yay).

[bubba]

I could be wrong, but I don't think that will work. Don't think you can use parts of drives to create a RAID with, one of those all or nothing type deals as the controller see full drives not partitions. When it sets up the RAID it nukes what ever is on the drive to build the RAID.

You could do A+B in a RAID1 though, that would give you some redundancy.

[Sovereign]

I could be wrong, but I don't think that will work. Don't think you can use parts of drives to create a RAID with, one of those all or nothing type deals as the controller see full drives not partitions. When it sets up the RAID it nukes what ever is on the drive to build the RAID.

You could do A+B in a RAID1 though, that would give you some redundancy.

The point with Matrix RAID is that it permits "different areas (e.g. partitions or logical volumes) on the same disk can be assigned to different RAID devices. Currently -- in the ICH10R -- RAID 0, RAID 1, RAID 10, and RAID 5 are supported." (Wikipedia--further information from this Intel source).

[bubba]

It using the whole drive and the controller is making the RAID volumes.

The Controller will see the two disks A and B, you can the set up two RAID Volumes one being a RAID 1 and another being RAID 0. The RAID1 volume would have 375GB (redundant), the RAID0(no redundancy) would have 750GB. Then Windows would see the RAID volumes as logical drives that then can then be partitioned and formatted.

If you want a RAID 5, pick up another 750GB drive then you can have a 750GB RAID5 and a ~1TB RAID0.

From a performance aspect if you do something that causes the system to access both volumes at once you will notice it. It will slow down A LOT. Its the down side to putting two RAID volumes on the the same two disks.