Iwill ATA100 RAID

[klnyc]

Hi guys,

I just got my Iwill ATA100 RAID card and heres the questin.Do i need to connect each HD in different IDE PORTS?.
If im using pri IDE 0, can I just link two HD to together?, or use sperate?, one for primary master and other is secondary master?.
And also i read some where on Goolge, they said you need to set your bios into scsi boot mode..i dont know if this true or not.

thanks guys

[MaxVal]

It is always best to dedicate one disk per channel due to the fact that both controllers can be accessed simultaneously.
With both disks on one channel, only one disk can be accessed at a time.
An additional controller is treated as a SCSI device, therefore the BIOS should be set for boot SCSI.

MAX

[klnyc]

Thanks Maxval,

I give a try tonite, and i also want to know, what block size you set yours at?. I have on 64k and im on win2k server..What if i go lower to 32 or 16k, will this slow it down or speed it up?.


thanks

[otheos]

Small size for maximum STR
large size for better multitasking.

It's up to you. I'd personally keep the two drives as two individual ones, load OS on the first, programs on the other and keep a partition in each for data (to move across as they're processed.

As RAID0 is not actually faster unless used for its purposes and it's twice as likely to fail make sure you back up A LOT!

[klnyc]

Theo,

Well I want configure as RAID 1..So im using 2 drive( 1 of them is hidden).So everything will install on the C: drive, I dont you cant intall on the 2ndry drive at all ( cuz its hidden).

[otheos]

You must be having really mission critical data on this to make it RAID 1, otherwise I see no reason to waste a full hard drive on it. Still your call.

Remember writes/reads in RAID 1 is as fast as the slowest drives. Reads may be a bit faster than one drive (assuming two identical drives) as the drive with the head closest to the data will read first. Multitasking is enhanced in reading due to that. You'll get no stripping out of RAID1 however, all the data will be read from one of the drives.

[MaxVal]

Klnyc,
What is it you want? Disk speed (striping, RAID 0), or data redundancy (mirroring, RAID 1)?
MAX

[klnyc]

RAID 1 i want is for my home server...I got it work thanks guys.