RAID 5?

Ok, I did a search and can't seem to find the answer I'm looking for. I see a lot of posts in regards to RAID 0 & 1, but not 5.
Here is the situation. I have a Mini running 10.4.3, and I'm looking to buy an external Firewire drive/s. The one I am looking at currently, is a Firewire Tower, capable of holding 8 Drives, up to 400GB Each, for a wild 2.8Tb WOW!. What I'd like to do is fill the tower with 8 drives, not necessarily with 400's but something around the 200 Gb range, and set it up as a RAID 5. Does the regular version of Tiger support RAID 5 on a Firewire, or would I need to go with the ServerX?
On a second thought, if not possible to install it on the mini in a RAID 5, could I use an x86 box, install Darwin on it, and use the drive over the network?
Timothy N. Couch

I am in a similar situation as you sans mac mini. I have a lot of old video projects I want to archive and am kind of miffed that as you have found there are no software raid 5 solutions (That I am aware of) on OS X. Most other unix compatible variants have software raid 5 support so I was a bit surprised to find that it wasn't built in.
Having used Red Hat Linux for years my solution is similar to what you have proposed. I am planning on throwing a bunch of drives in an old (well ventilated) case and installing Fedora (Red Hat's free version). I will then use software raid 5 on the disks and either use "built-in" SMB support or install the latest version of Netatalk.
I have had zero experience using darwin but in this situation it seems that a mature linux flavor such as Fedora might suit your needs better meerly form an installation standpoint. Lik eI said I have never used darwin so it may also have a nice gui installer and be ready to go out of the box.
Let me know if you have any more questions especially if you aren't familiar with anything I've mentioned here.
-peel
Dual G5 2.5, TiBook 550 Mac OS X (10.4.3)

Similar Messages

How to: make one or two partions at a raid system?

Hey
how can i make one or more a partions at a raid system?
i will make the partions at a 250gb raid. one with 120gb for the bootsector, and the other for documents, etc.
is there a hwo to anywhere? dont find one?
please read my second question.... 2 raids at one mac pro?
regarads

O.K., i was looking the hole day to get that partions on a raid working.
to make the partions on each HD with the same volume, this is no problem. when you then create the first raid, works fine. but when you make the second raid, you get a massage, that this raid is not found.
then you see both raids at the disc utilty, but only at the first you seen the volumen down under, by the second not. the first works, the second is not avabiele.
so, now i have only one big mirrowed raid for my boot sector, and its runs fast, quick and without big noise... thats what i want, and the second big raid for my files.
2 raids at one mac pro with 4 hd. one with 2 x 250 gb hd for the bootsector, and the other with 2 x 500gb for files
thx to all, and you kappy
regards

To RAID or not to RAID, that is the question

People often ask: Should I raid my disks?
The question is simple, unfortunately the answer is not. So here I'm going to give you another guide to help you decide when a raid array is advantageous and how to go about it. Notice that this guide also applies to SSD's, with the expection of the parts about mechanical failure.
What is a RAID?
RAID is the acronym for "Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks". The concept originated at the University of Berkely in 1987 and was intended to create large storage capacity with smaller disks without the need for very expensive and reliable disks, that were very expensive at that time, often a tenfold of smaller disks. Today prices of hard disks have fallen so much that it often is more attractive to buy a single 1 TB disk than two 500 GB disks. That is the reason that today RAID is often described as "Redundant Array of Independent Disks".
The idea behind RAID is to have a number of disks co-operate in such a way that it looks like one big disk. Note that 'Spanning' is not in any way comparable to RAID, it is just a way, like inverse partitioning, to extend the base partition to use multiple disks, without changing the method of reading and writing to that extended partition.
Why use a RAID?
Now with these lower disks prices today, why would a video editor consider a raid array? There are two reasons:
1. Redundancy (or security)
2. Performance
Notice that it can be a combination of both reasons, it is not an 'either/or' reason.
Does a video editor need RAID?
No, if the above two reasons, redundancy and performance are not relevant. Yes if either or both reasons are relevant.
Re 1. Redundancy
Every mechanical disk will eventually fail, sometimes on the first day of use, sometimes only after several years of usage. When that happens, all data on that disk are lost and the only solution is to get a new disk and recreate the data from a backup (if you have one) or through tedious and time-consuming work. If that does not bother you and you can spare the time to recreate the data that were lost, then redundancy is not an issue for you. Keep in mind that disk failures often occur at inconvenient moments, on a weekend when the shops are closed and you can't get a replacement disk, or when you have a tight deadline.
Re 2. Performance
Opponents of RAID will often say that any modern disk is fast enough for video editing and they are right, but only to a certain extent. As fill rates of disks go up, performance goes down, sometimes by 50%. As the number of disk activities on the disk go up , like accessing (reading or writing) pagefile, media cache, previews, media, project file, output file, performance goes down the drain. The more tracks you have in your project, the more strain is put on your disk. 10 tracks require 10 times the bandwidth of a single track. The more applications you have open, the more your pagefile is used. This is especially apparent on systems with limited memory.
The following chart shows how fill rates on a single disk will impact performance:
Remember that I said previously the idea behind RAID is to have a number of disks co-operate in such a way that it looks like one big disk. That means a RAID will not fill up as fast as a single disk and not experience the same performance degradation.
RAID basics
Now that we have established the reasons why people may consider RAID, let's have a look at some of the basics.
Single or Multiple?
There are three methods to configure a RAID array: mirroring, striping and parity check. These are called levels and levels are subdivided in single or multiple levels, depending on the method used. A single level RAID0 is striping only and a multiple level RAID15 is a combination of mirroring (1) and parity check (5). Multiple levels are designated by combining two single levels, like a multiple RAID10, which is a combination of single level RAID0 with a single level RAID1.
Hardware or Software?
The difference is quite simple: hardware RAID controllers have their own processor and usually their own cache. Software RAID controllers use the CPU and the RAM on the motherboard. Hardware controllers are faster but also more expensive. For RAID levels without parity check like Raid0, Raid1 and Raid10 software controllers are quite good with a fast PC.
The common Promise and Highpoint cards are all software controllers that (mis)use the CPU and RAM memory. Real hardware RAID controllers all use their own IOP (I/O Processor) and cache (ever wondered why these hardware controllers are expensive?).
There are two kinds of software RAID's. One is controlled by the BIOS/drivers (like Promise/Highpoint) and the other is solely OS dependent. The first kind can be booted from, the second one can only be accessed after the OS has started. In performance terms they do not differ significantly.
For the technically inclined: Cluster size, Block size and Chunk size
In short: Cluster size applies to the partition and Block or Stripe size applies to the array.
With a cluster size of 4 KB, data are distributed across the partition in 4 KB parts. Suppose you have a 10 KB file, three full clusters will be occupied: 4 KB - 4 KB - 2 KB. The remaining 2 KB is called slackspace and can not be used by other files. With a block size (stripe) of 64 KB, data are distributed across the array disks in 64 KB parts. Suppose you have a 200 KB file, the first part of 64 KB is located on disk A, the second 64 KB is located on disk B, the third 64 KB is located on disk C and the remaining 8 KB on disk D. Here there is no slackspace, because the block size is subdivided into clusters. When working with audio/video material a large block size is faster than smaller block size. Working with smaller files a smaller block size is preferred.
Sometimes you have an option to set 'Chunk size', depending on the controller. It is the minimal size of a data request from the controller to a disk in the array and only useful when striping is used. Suppose you have a block size of 16 KB and you want to read a 1 MB file. The controller needs to read 64 times a block of 16 KB. With a chunk size of 32 KB the first two blocks will be read from the first disk, the next two blocks from the next disk, and so on. If the chunk size is 128 KB. the first 8 blocks will be read from the first disk, the next 8 block from the second disk, etcetera. Smaller chunks are advisable with smaller filer, larger chunks are better for larger (audio/video) files.
RAID Levels
For a full explanation of various RAID levels, look here: http://www.acnc.com/04_01_00/html
What are the benefits of each RAID level for video editing and what are the risks and benefits of each level to help you achieve better redundancy and/or better performance? I will try to summarize them below.
RAID0
The Band AID of RAID. There is no redundancy! There is a risk of losing all data that is a multiplier of the number of disks in the array. A 2 disk array carries twice the risk over a single disk, a X disk array carries X times the risk of losing it all.
A RAID0 is perfectly OK for data that you will not worry about if you lose them. Like pagefile, media cache, previews or rendered files. It may be a hassle if you have media files on it, because it requires recapturing, but not the end-of-the-world. It will be disastrous for project files.
Performance wise a RAID0 is almost X times as fast as a single disk, X being the number of disks in the array.
RAID1
The RAID level for the paranoid. It gives no performance gain whatsoever. It gives you redundancy, at the cost of a disk. If you are meticulous about backups and make them all the time, RAID1 may be a better solution, because you can never forget to make a backup, you can restore instantly. Remember backups require a disk as well. This RAID1 level can only be advised for the C drive IMO if you do not have any trust in the reliability of modern-day disks. It is of no use for video editing.
RAID3
The RAID level for video editors. There is redundancy! There is only a small performance hit when rebuilding an array after a disk failure due to the dedicated parity disk. There is quite a perfomance gain achieveable, but the drawback is that it requires a hardware controller from Areca. You could do worse, but apart from it being the Rolls-Royce amongst the hardware controllers, it is expensive like the car.
Performance wise it will achieve around 85% (X-1) on reads and 60% (X-1) on writes over a single disk with X being the number of disks in the array. So with a 6 disk array in RAID3, you get around 0.85x (6-1) = 425% the performance of a single disk on reads and 300% on writes.
RAID5 & RAID6
The RAID level for non-video applications with distributed parity. This makes for a somewhat severe hit in performance in case of a disk failure. The double parity in RAID6 makes it ideal for NAS applications.
The performance gain is slightly lower than with a RAID3. RAID6 requires a dedicated hardware controller, RAID5 can be run on a software controller but the CPU overhead negates to a large extent the performance gain.
RAID10
The RAID level for paranoids in a hurry. It delivers the same redundancy as RAID 1, but since it is a multilevel RAID, combined with a RAID0, delivers twice the performance of a single disk at four times the cost, apart from the controller. The main advantage is that you can have two disk failures at the same time without losing data, but what are the chances of that happening?
RAID30, 50 & 60
Just striped arrays of RAID 3, 5 or 6 which doubles the speed while keeping redundancy at the same level.
EXTRAS
RAID level 0 is striping, RAID level 1 is mirroring and RAID levels 3, 5 & 6 are parity check methods. For parity check methods, dedicated controllers offer the possibility of defining a hot-spare disk. A hot-spare disk is an extra disk that does not belong to the array, but is instantly available to take over from a failed disk in the array. Suppose you have a 6 disk RAID3 array with a single hot-spare disk and assume one disk fails. What happens? The data on the failed disk can be reconstructed in the background, while you keep working with negligeable impact on performance, to the hot-spare. In mere minutes your system is back at the performance level you were before the disk failure. Sometime later you take out the failed drive, replace it for a new drive and define that as the new hot-spare.
As stated earlier, dedicated hardware controllers use their own IOP and their own cache instead of using the memory on the mobo. The larger the cache on the controller, the better the performance, but the main benefits of cache memory are when handling random R+W activities. For sequential activities, like with video editing it does not pay to use more than 2 GB of cache maximum.
REDUNDANCY(or security)
Not using RAID entails the risk of a drive failing and losing all data. The same applies to using RAID0 (or better said AID0), only multiplied by the number of disks in the array.
RAID1 or 10 overcomes that risk by offering a mirror, an instant backup in case of failure at high cost.
RAID3, 5 or 6 offers protection for disk failure by reconstructing the lost data in the background (1 disk for RAID3 & 5, 2 disks for RAID6) while continuing your work. This is even enhanced by the use of hot-spares (a double assurance).
PERFORMANCE
RAID0 offers the best performance increase over a single disk, followed by RAID3, then RAID5 amd finally RAID6. RAID1 does not offer any performance increase.
Hardware RAID controllers offer the best performance and the best options (like adjustable block/stripe size and hot-spares), but they are costly.
SUMMARY
If you only have 3 or 4 disks in total, forget about RAID. Set them up as individual disks, or the better alternative, get more disks for better redundancy and better performance. What does it cost today to buy an extra disk when compared to the downtime you have when a single disk fails?
If you have room for at least 4 or more disks, apart from the OS disk, consider a RAID3 if you have an Areca controller, otherwise consider a RAID5.
If you have even more disks, consider a multilevel array by striping a parity check array to form a RAID30, 50 or 60.
If you can afford the investment get an Areca controller with battery backup module (BBM) and 2 GB of cache. Avoid as much as possible the use of software raids, especially under Windows if you can.
RAID, if properly configured will give you added redundancy (or security) to protect you from disk failure while you can continue working and will give you increased performance.
Look carefully at this chart to see what a properly configured RAID can do to performance and compare it to the earlier single disk chart to see the performance difference, while taking into consideration that you can have one disks (in each array) fail at the same time without data loss:
Hope this helps in deciding whether RAID is worthwhile for you.
WARNING: If you have a power outage without a UPS, all bets are off.
A power outage can destroy the contents of all your disks if you don't have a proper UPS. A BBM may not be sufficient to help in that case.

Harm,
thanks for your comment.
Your understanding was absolutely right.
Sorry my mistake its QNAP 639 PRO, populated with 5 1TB, one is empty.
So for my understanding, in my configuration you suggest NOT to use RAID-0. Im not willing to have more drives in my workstation becouse if my projekts are finished, i archiv on QNAP or archiv on other external drive.
My only intention is to have as much speed and as much performance as possible during developing a projekt
BTW QNAP i also use as media-center in combination with Sony PS3 to run the encoded files.
For my final understanding:
C: i understand
D: i understand
E and F: does it mean, when i create a projekt on E, all my captured and project-used MPEG - files should be situated in F? Or which media in F you mean?
Following your suggestions in want to rebulid Harms-Best Vista64-Benchmark comp to reach maximum speed and performance. Can i use in general the those hardware components (exept so many HD drives and exept Areca raid controller ) in my drive configuration C to F. Or would you suggest some changings in my situation?

Intel Raid Vs Marvel Raid on Big Bang B3 Marshall (Non OS Drives) via win7 setup

I apologise in advance if this seems lazy but has anybody tried setting up RAID 1 mirroring of two non-essential data hard drives within Windows 7 64-bit as opposed to a bios setup?
I only need to mirror a games hard drive so as not to have to do manually backup the hard drive with Acronis software backup every other day or so.
I have a Acronis backup of the game hard drive as I am aware that creating a raid array on both drives will delete all data on both drives but I can restore my games software later.
As it was a non-essential raid array (non-OS drives) on my previous hardware setup for these two identical games drives before upgrading to the MSI big-band Marshall B3 I totally forgot to set up the raid whilst doing a fresh install of Windows 7 on a dual boot with a previously restored/Acronis universal restore of windows 7 which also had this raid array.
If that all makes sense I'm hoping you guys can put me in the right direction as to Intel on Marvel (I seem to remember reading in the past that Marvel Raid drivers had issues) preferences for a setup within Windows 7 64-bit rather than the bios setup which would mean starting from scratch which I'm not prepared to do on a non-essential, non-OS Raid array.
If however I was doing an essential OS drives Raid array then it's a no-brainer to do a BIOS setup with a fresh install.
Any thoughts much appreciated, cheers

I don't think you are looking at the right areas.
Quote:
Sonnet Tempo cards are compatible with most external SATA storage. However, external hard drives with USB 2.0/eSATA dual interface based on the Oxford Semiconductor OXU931DS storage controller chip may not be compatible with Mac OS X when connected via SATA. Known issues are kernel panics occurring when the drive is connected, or the drive not being recognized by the operating system.
Western Digital manufactures Desktop edition (WD Caviar, Caviar SE, Caviar SE16, and Raptor X) hard drives and Enterprise (RAID) Edition (WD RE, RE2, and Raptor) hard drives. Each type of hard drive is designed to work specifically in either a desktop computer environment, or connected to a RAID controller (hardware or software-based). If you intend to configure Western Digital drives in a RAID set, Sonnet and WD recommend using only their Enterprise edition hard drives. For more information, see this Western Digital FAQ.
EndQuote
http://www.sonnettech.com/product/temposatae4p.html
Not everyone follows guidelines like they use to. Enterprise and RAID Edition drives - even Green RE4 series - not noise. You want a good drive enclosure with adequate cooling from air flow and fans. These are not silent and any drive noise is just background hum and noise that they are working.
http://macperformanceguide.com/RecommendedESATAEnclosures.html
There are dozens of reviews on drive storage. If noise is over riding then you aren't a candidate for RAID, but you are for SSD and Green, and would find SilentPCReview up your alley.
http://www.silentpcreview.com/

WinXP-64 bit corrupts existing RAID array

I've got an MSI K8N Neo2 Platinum motherboard running Win XP Pro SP2 on two 36 gig SATA Raptors. Everything was working fine, but I wanted to try the 64 bit version of XP. Grabbed an old 80 gig PATA drive and threw that in the case. Unplugged the SATA drives so as not to risk messing with the existing working OS. Installed the latest 1218 x64 beta and it worked well.
The problem was that when I shut down and reconnected my old RAID array, windows wouldn't boot from it. I lost everything and had to rebuild Windows from scratch. So now I know to never unplug the SATA drives
Rebuilt WinXP on the RAID array and then tried rebooting with the PATA drive with the 64 bit OS. Came up with the "drive needs checking" screen, and proceeds to "fix" the RAID array while ignoring my frantic pounding on the Logitech USB keyboard to stop. Rebooted and yes, the new install was nuked. Okay, since it's gone anyway, reboot to the 64 bit OS and make sure it's got the 64 bit RAID drivers installed.
Reinstall WinXP on the RAID array, reboot to the 64 bit OS on the other drive and the same old scandisk comes and nukes it AGAIN!
So now the PATA drive is sitting on the shelf again, unless someone here can suggest what is causing this problem.
System Specs
Athlon64 3500
gig of PQI 3200 at 2-2-2-5 2.6
2x36 gig Raptors on ports 3-4
Plextor PX-716a DVD+_RW
Visiontek X800 Pro.

The first time you re-installed Win 32 on the raid that was a bit drastic. A repair ought to have done the job.
The problem was probably that you disconnected the array but that's where the boot.ini was and that file needed to be modified to add the path to the Win64 install.
Since you took out the array the Win64 install created a new boot.ini on the PATA drive. Even when you tell BIOS to boot off the array, Windows has a bad habit of looking at the IDE channels & using the boot.ini if it finds one there - but the file it found didn't point to the array of course.
So basically if you already have Win32 on the array I would leave that array connected normally when installing Win64 on the PATA drive and all should be well.
I've installed Win64 on the same array as my Win32 install and they co-exist happily. I reckon that's the most efficient way to do it. The main thing is to make separate partitions for Win32, Win64 and data files when you install Win32 in the first place. The two OSs can share the same data files, incuding stuff like email.

Expanding the drives into a raid 5 array?

I am going to purchase a powermac soon, but I want to understand raid arrays a bit better. I am an HD video editor, and am getting into large files sizes...Red, XDCam, 2K etc. I can buy any 4TB raid array with a card, or I read that I can add 3 extra 1TB hard drives inside the mac pro and stripe them raid 5? I know 3 drives aren't the best for redundancy, but will it work? Will I also need Apple's raid controller for this.
As a side not, someone said use all 4 drives as an array, but the OS has to operate on its own drive unless there is something I don't know.
Any ideas are appreciated.

I know 3 drives aren't the best for redundancy, but will it work?
Hi,
If you are thinking of using the 2009 Mac Pro internal hard disk sleds to create a RAID 5 you would need a $699 Mac Pro RAID Card. http://store.apple.com/us/product/MA849Z/B
Three HDs can be used in a RAID 5, but as one disk is used for parity data this only leaves you with the volume size of two HDs and performance = to two hard disks in RAID 0. This is not an option I would select. The other downside to this configuration is the Mac Pro RAID Card does NOT support Boot Camp.
RR 2314 & SeriTek/5PM
If you want RAID 5, Boot Camp and the ability to use the internal bays for a Mac OS X system an external RAID 5 is a good choice. The HighPoint RR 2314 and the SeriTek/5PM provide a nice solution at a reasonable price.
http://www.amug.org/amug-web/html/amug/reviews/articles/highpoint/2314/
http://www.amug.org/amug-web/html/amug/reviews/articles/firmtek/5pm/
As the SeriTek/5PM only requires one port on the RR 2314, users can expand to up to 20 hard disks using four enclosures. Even a single 5-bay, RAID 5 can support a 4TB volume using inexpensive 1TB hard disks. Larger hard disks are also supported. This option provides more hard disk mounting options and costs about the same as the Apple RAID 5 card.
RocketRAID 4322 & Proavio EB8MS
Another option is the HighPoint RR 4322. The controller supports RAID levels 0, 1, 3, 5, 6, 10, 50, hot spare and JBOD configurations. While more expensive, the RocketRAID 4322 adds RAID 6, SAS compatibility and supports an 8-bay enclosure like the Proavio EB8MS.
http://www.amug.org/amug-web/html/amug/reviews/articles/highpoint/4322/
http://www.proavio.com/eb8ms.html
RocketRAID 4322 & Enhance UltraStor RS16 JS
Another amazing performance option is the RR 4322 matched with the Enhance UltraStor RS16 JS. This 16-bay configuration provides high performance and supports large volume sizes. When AMUG tested this configuration with 16 Samsung 1TB hard disks in RAID 6 mode the volume size was 11.8TB and the average write performance across the volume was 696MB/sec. while the average read performance was 833MB/sec.
http://www.amug.org/amug-web/html/amug/reviews/articles/highpoint/4322/
http://www.amug.org/members/reviews/articles/enhance/rs16js/
Have fun!

P35 Neo2 - OS died, need help restoring RAID after re-install of XP

I have a P35 Neo2 with on-board Intel RAID. I need a bit of help getting a two drive RAID going again after reinstalling XP.
Here's my situation:
Same hardware, MB, etc. I originally set up the system with a 20gb IDE and two 320gb SATA drives. I put the OS on the 20gb, and set the two 320's up as a RAID. I partitioned the 320's into 200gb + 120gb sections on each drive. The 200gb partitions were mirrored between the two drives, and the remaining 120gb on each drive was used as non-RAID storage space.
I picked up a nasty virus-spyware a month or two ago that I was struggling to find a fix for when the OS began to BSOD. I put the 20gb IDE to the side, and put a 40gb IDE in it's place. I re-installed XP on it last night, and now need to get the RAID up and running again.
I went into Disk Management and it showed three dynamic drives with a yellow triangle icon and labeled 'foreign'. I right clicked and found an option to 'import'. I clicked on import and a window popped up showing all of the partitions and logical drives I had previously created on the two drive RAID. I figured I was in business, so I clicked OK.
Disk Management now shows one dynamic disk as 'Online', but still shows two as 'Foreign'. If I right click on them, and chose import, I get the same window showing my partitions and logical drives, but if I click OK, I get a warning message that: "Some of the volumes you are importing will lose data because you have not moved all of your disks to the system."
I'm in over my head at this point, so any help would be appreciated.
Thanks,
GeoD

A 200gb partition is restored, but the 120gb is not, which is confusing. ALso, when I look at the logical drives in the partition, I'm beginning to think I had the 200gb mirror /120 gb storage backwards. The data restored is not something I would be concerned with losing. It's installed applications, and multimedia files that I could lose without worry.
There is also 70gb dynamic drive labeled Missing. I know I left a small portion of all three of the drives unallocated as a reserve, so that must be what this is. It's like the RAID info is incomplete which leads me to the next piece of info.
Something I didn't initially mention for the sake of brevity, was when I right-clicked on 'Import Disk' the applet noted the disk was 3/3. I assumed that meant disk 3 of 3 disks. I've since begun to wonder if I imported the disks in the wrong order. ie) I should have imported disk 1/3 first.
Do you know how to clear out Disk Mgt's info, so I can start over?
I also noticed only one of the 320 SATA's shows up in Device Mgr, (DM). What I found both confused me and encouraged me.
When I created the array, I named the the drives RAID0 and RAID1. They both show up in DM. But only one of them shows up as the drive model: WDC WD3201ABYS-01B9A0. There should be two of them.
The OS knows there should be a RAID, but for some reason only one of the drives show up as hardware. I rebooted and checked the data and power supply cables, (connected), the BIOS, (both drives show up) and both drives show up in Disk Mgt. Just not in DM.
Does that mean the HD has died?
Part of my difficulty is I had a brain injury in 2001, followed by another in 2003. The 2nd injury caused 6 months of what the docs call it a walking coma - I walked and talked, but have no memory of the time.
When I 'woke up' in the Fall of 2003, I found I had lost considerable cognitive function and other problems. These problem have ended up disabling me, (I'm now on SS Disability).
Until then I had been a 'System Admin' for micro-businesses, (max - 15 computers). I built systems and servers, installed networks, maintained them and did all the support. Basically I was these company's Sys Admin on an as-needed basis.
One thing I lost was the ability to troubleshoot and repair hardware. Combined with other cognitive problems, I was forced into closing my business. At the time, I was maintaining close to fifty offices; ~20 had Peer-to-Peer networks & ~20 had servers I had built.
What's doubly frustrating is I was just getting ready to sign up with an online backup service when I got hit with a nasty malware/virus that's so new there's no info on the 'net about it. I got entangled in trying to fix it and spaced out the online back up. Now I find myself in a situation where I desperately need to restore the data on these RAID drives. Because of the memory problems I now have, I completely depend on my computer as an auxiliary 'brain' - I have stuff on these drives that I have to have.
I didn't do much with RAID when I was still in the biz, and this is the first time I've had problems with a RAID of my own, so I'm struggling to figure this stuff out.
Should I be able to install one of these drives by itself so I can get the data from it? The way I understand the theory of RAID is that if one drive dies, you can put another in and the mirrored portion will re-create itself on the new drive. Couldn't that be a way to get the important data off the drive or drives if they don't want to go back together as a RAID?
I could back each up to the online service and then just rebuild them. Not my first choice, but it would reduce my stress level if I thought I could do it.
Sorry to go on, but now you can see why I'm both struggling & worried.
Thanks for any info or help.
Later,
GeoD

How can I install on a system w/RAID?

I know now that Boot Camp will not install on a system with RAID (in my case mirrored drives). THis is a major bummer as I need to run an engineering program and it only operates in Windows. So I either stick to my less than optimal laptop or I figure a way to use the power of my desktop.
So any suggestions? Can I somehow use an external drive and install boot camp and WinXP there? What if I converted one set of mirrored drives to two separate drives (with an external backup system) and leave one set of mirrored drives (I have two sets of mirrored drives) and install boot camp there? Am I talking about a complete redo of my system?
I need a straight forward solution (and no I don't want to buy a PC to run the software). Also the engineering software will not run in Parallels - it needs full access to the Video system (in my case a Quadro FX4500).
THanks for any suggestions.

It isn't a problem. I assume also that you don't have the Apple Pro RAID card, and that you have one drive bay that you can install Windows.
All you need to do is open Disk Utility, format a internal SATA drive as MBR and then create one or more FAT partitions. You can change FAT to NTFS later.
Then choose the OS of your choice (XP Pro x64 drivers aren't included or well supported, so I'd go with Vista x64 Business or Ultimate SP1).
No external booting. At least not without a bootable PCIe controller. There are RocketRAID cards that do support RAID in Windows but haven't tried creating bootable Windows. Maybe next week.
With a new raw unformatted drive, all you have to do is boot from Windows and select the drive.
You can also use the ODD ports to use for OS X for two of your drives because Windows can't see or use them.

How can I boot to a fakeRAID -Raid0 set drive from a non-raid hdd

Hi all,
First of all, my English is bad and I hope I can explain it what my problem is. Secondly, I need your expert help with my problem right now.
I'll just layout some hardware information and some history before I start. Currently, my motherboard has 3 hdd controllers which are:
1) Intel - 6 ports --> contains 2 sets of RAID drives = 2 x 60gb SSD (boot drive) and 2 x 500gb HDD (data drive) both in RAID 0
2) Jmicron - 2 ports --> 1 port is used by the DVDROM
3) Marvell - 2 ports --> I don't use these ports as they are slow and are so bad - currently disabled in BIOS
HISTORY: Before, my 2 x 60gb SSDs (RAID 0) contained Arch 64 + Windows 7 64 with Grub as the main bootloader. I remembered having a hard time setting up intel fakeraid with Arch linux + Win7 dual boot before, but fortunately, with your help, I found the solution and I've been using it ever since until today.
NOW is kind of a different issue. I bought a new 60gb SSD (just one). I totally reformatted everything with my 2 x 60gb SSD Raid 0 and I decided to just use that exclusively for windows, still in RAID 0. My brand new SSD will ONLY have Arch64 on it. So I installed Windows 7 first on my Raid SSD set. I plugged my new SSD to the Jmicron port so I can take advantage of AHCI. I don't want to mix my new SSD to the Intel Controllers since its not RAID anyway. Anyway, I installed Arch 64 on the new SSD in the JMicron Port fine.
Now here comes the problem, I set the Jmicron port where the Arch is installed to be the primary boot in the BIOS (since GRUB is there) and I can't boot to Windows! It gives me an error that It can't find the target drive (Win7 in the Raid 0 - intel ports). I've tried modifying the menu.lst and trying so many combinations and It still fails. Of course, I can boot to Arch fine since the drive is independent. It looks like grub legacy can't boot to fakeRaid drives if its not installed on that same drive.
Can you give me advice on how to fix this issue?
Also, I was just thinking, is there a 3rd party Windows Bootloader, that can be installed in Raid 0, that can pick up Linux and boot from it. I was thinking of just making the Windows 7 as primary boot in BIOS, with a 3rd party bootloader, then just boot to Arch.
Thank you!

Yes, I have redirected my User folder to the D: drive.
I know that some shared components must reside on the C: drive; that's fine. I just don't have room for the entire installation on there.
The real issue here is that, when a drive other than C: is selected as the destination, the CS6 package installs into a broken state every time, out of the gate, on my system. Some components get installed to D: and some to C:, but the various components of the programs seem confused about what exists where, as shown below:
I select a folder on D: as the destination folder for the install, and here is what I get:
64-bit versions of the package -- Program files are installed to the D: drive as specified, but attempting to start them results in a configuration error message stating that the program must be uninstalled and reinstalled, and lists "Error code: 1".
32-bit versions of the package -- Program files are installed to the C: drive against what I specified. The shortcuts installed in the Start menu for the 32-bit versions point to the locations where these program files SHOULD be, on the D: drive. If the Adobe folder containing the program files is copied over to the correct location on D:, these programs function normally with no errors.
I have the 32-bit versions working by copying the program files from C: to D:. I just want to get the 64-bit versions working as well.
Any help you could give would be greatly appreciated; I'm really looking forward to testing the CS6 suite on my system!

Unable to capture to external RAID drive FCP 7

Here are my specs:
Model Identifier: MacPro1,1
Processor Name: Dual-Core Intel Xeon
Processor Speed: 2.66 GHz
Number Of Processors: 2
Total Number Of Cores: 4
L2 Cache (per processor): 4 MB
Memory: 4 GB
Bus Speed: 1.33 GHz
Boot ROM Version: MP11.005C.B08
Running:
OS X 10.5.8
Final Cut Studio 3 (recently upgraded from Studio 1)
At the end of last year I had a problem with capturing and upon research it seemed to be that the most recent update of QuickTime was not compatible with Final Cut Pro 5, which was causing my machine to not be able to capture at all. So we upgraded to Final Cut Studio 3 (FCP7) and part of the problem was solved but an issue still remains.
For over 3 years we have been using an external Raid drive as a capture scratch and we still have over 5 TBs free. The Raid is connected by SCSI. Earlier last year I was able to capture to the Raid drive without any problems but now the capture will freeze whenever that is set as the capture scratch. If I set the internal drive as the capture scratch it captures without any issues.
The problem is that using the internal as the capture scratch can only be a short term solution. The drive is only so large and I have a problem with finder if I try to move files from the internal drive to the external. Finder freezes up and I can't even force quit properly. So being able to once again use the external as the main capture scratch is the only real solution. The external is fully functionally and communicating with the Mac.
Any help with resolving this would be appreciated!

Off the top of my head, because I haven't worked with SCSI in years--
"The problem is that using the internal as the capture scratch can only be a short term solution. The drive is only so large and I have a problem with finder if I try to move files from the internal drive to the external. Finder freezes up and I can't even force quit properly. So being able to once again use the external as the main capture scratch is the only real solution. The external is fully functionally and communicating with the Mac."
Are you trying to move files while you have FCP open? The fact that simply moving files is giving you finder issues and freezing you up, says that all is not well with the scsi raid. You should not see that at all.
You might try powering down the mac and the raid, unplugging and letting the machine sit for a while to discharge the capacitors. Then try reseating the scsi card. (pull it out carefully and plug it back in.)
On another note, when you upgraded fcp, did you do a clean install?

Video Capture: is this a good idea? Also RAID 1 vs. 2 separate HDs

Family videos on VHS. Original idea was to copy them all to DVD before the tapes degrade. Now thinking to capture the video on hard drives at the same time. This by taking video out of vhs/dvd combo unit (RCA connectors) into Canopus box, then via fire wire into my mac.
I like the HD redundancy idea of something like the OWC Guardian Maximus RAID 1 but wonder if I'd be better off with two separate HDs daisy chained together.
(Using iMovie HD6, ultimately editing this stuff down, maybe with FCE)
Thanks much!

Hi
Don't know all You ask - but I share what I know and do.
I use a Canopus ADVC-300 and a VHS-VCR
• this gives as good quality possibly
• the ADVC-300 doesn't need to be baby-sit as much though it can do a bit of Timecode
mending/correcting.
And import to iMovie HD6 or FinalCut Express or Pro - all works greatly.
I import to a project on the inrternal hard disk and only FW-connection to the
Canopus A/D-box.
This to make it as simple possibly.
Yours Bengt W

'Disk Utility has lost connection with Disk Management Tool' w/ RAID 10 set

Using 4 internal drives, I have specified the following setup for each:
2 partitions, 1 'speed' of 5 GB and 1 'data' of whatever remains.
The 4 speed partitions stripe to a single RAID volume correctly.
The 4 data partitions are used to make a RAID 10 volume as follows:
The first 2 data partitions are mirrored to make a 'data-A'
The next 2 data partitions are mirrored to make a 'data-B'
These complete correctly.
Upon attempting to strip data-A and data-B in order to finish the RAID 10 setup, Disk Utility quits with the following message:
"Disk Utility has lost connection with the Disk Management Tool and cannot continue. Please quit and relaunch Disk Utility'.
A search here and on the nets reveals only that this message appeared in 10.3.x when attempting to repair disk permissions and had to do with a rogue iTunes support file. This is occurring on a blank system (no iTunes installed) so I don't think its the same cause.
Note that I was able to complete this setup under Tiger several times without issue, so it seems to be unique to Leopard. Does anyone know what is going on and hopefully suggest a workaround?

To answer my own issue and leave a marker here for others, I was able to successfully set up a RAID 10 partition using diskutil, indicating that the problem is Disk Utility itself and not the RAID implementation.
Disk Utility has proven itself to be bugridden (must restart frequently to get updated view of volumes; drops device names at various times; etc.) and this latest bug would seem to suggest that it should be avoided in favor of diskutil for any serious RAID construction.

MSI K7N2 Delta ILSR - RAID BIOS Option ???

hi ho,
i have my 2 storage devices pluged into the promise 376 onboard controller. they are not connected as a real raid (not mirror nor real stripe). my OS is win2k on the first sata device and everything was fine for a long time.
but now when my system boots, it detects the ide drives and then i see the irq board.
right after that the system stops and tells me 'disk boot failure'. so i don`t get the chance to configure my raidcontroller or my sata devices.
it is as the controller is deactivated. i remember a bios version where you could activate and deactivate the sata controller. but in my bios (right now it is v7.8) there is no such option.
i have tested so far:
- reset cmos
- flash bios v7.5 to 7.8
- disconnected sata drives
anyone with similar problems or any suggestion?
> MoBo : K7N2 Delta-ILSR Bios v7.8
> CPU : AMD Barton 2500+ (not overclocked)
> Ram : TwinMos 1GB 3200 400Mhz
> Sata : 2 x Maxtor 120GB Sata (as single Devices on Raid-Controller)
> Ide : 60GB IBM DeckStar
> Gra : ATI 9600 pro 128MB
> Aud : SB Audigy 2 ZS
> Pow : SilverPower 350W, +3,3V/+5V@25A and 12V@18A
> OS : win 2000 SP4 + Security Updates 31.07.04 + DirectX 9.0c

watch the bottom of the screen after pressing Enter on the "Welcome to Setup" screen. There will be some moments of files being loaded, and then you should see a message appear which says "Press F6 if you need to install a 3rd party SCSI or RAID driver". This message will only stay on the screen for a couple of seconds, so press F6 as soon as you see it appear. After this is done, you will see other messages appear, and it will act as though nothing is happening, but eventually a screen will appear which will allow you to install the drivers for the sata controller.
specify a device press S, select "win 2000 promise fasttrak 376 controller" it will read floppy and load, dot not remove floppy yet, continue win2000 install it may nead to access floppy to finish installing raid driver, did you do it like this.
try making some floppy boot disks and boot to floppy instead of cd.
http://freepctech.com/pc/002/files010.shtml
when you say there not listed, where did you see this? they wont be listed, windows will search for fasttrak controller so it will see sata's conected to it with out you knowing, so long as you load the controller from floppy that came with mobo as above.

MSI K7N2 Delta ILSR Questions & RAID Promise FastTrak Controller Issue

I have recently rebuilt my system replacing the MSI KT3 with an MSI K7N2 Delta. I have been impressed with the features and stability of the system, however, I have some questions that I hope some of you that have more experience of this board can answer:
1. I am using the AMD Athlon XP 2200 (and all the other components including the Lian Li case) which I was using on the KT3 board. The CPU temperature is around 45 degrees C but on the KT3 it was only 35 degrees C when idle. Any ideas ? The heatsink is definetly mounted properly. The temperature did drop by 10 degrees C when I flashed the
BIOS to fix the known CPU temperature issue but I think its still high.
2. I do not have any serial ATA devices or anything connected to IDE3 channel and during the BIOS boot up I get the message:
"No drives attached to FastTrak Controller. Bios Not installed."
Is this correct ? Should I be getting this message ?
I would like to disable the onboard Promise Controller since it is taking up resources and it slows down the boot speed (although only slightly). The MSI website says that the onboard RAID controller can't be disabled. I think this is poor design. Does anyone know if this is going to be addressed in future BIOS releases ?
3. Which of the USB ports are USB 2.0 and USB 1.1. I thought it was rather strange that only 2 of the 4 ports on the header actually active.
Many thanks for your help.
Rupesh

First off your temp is ok on that board. If you have not loaded the onboard raid driver do so and it is something you have to suffer with on the MSI board. All of your USB ports should run at USB 2.0 and you also should be able enable all of them in the bios.

Cannot install Windows XP on MS-6330 w/RAID

Hardware:
MSI-6330 K7T Turbo Limited Edition w/RAID (latest BIOS - 3.6)
256MB Kingston (2 sticks of 133mhz 128mb, the recommended memory)
AMD Athlon XP 1800
Hercules 3D Prophet 4000XT (kyro chipset)
3COM 3C905B NIC
Standard CDROM and Floppy
x2 Maxtor 30gb Diamondmax Plus 8 HDD's
Before I begin, all parts (CPU, mem, etc.) is tested good in another system. Tested in system with a MSI-6330 K7T Turbo 2, tests pass, and XP installs without ANY hitch. I have also been a PC tech by trade for the last 8 years, not tooting my own horn, just letting you know I have tried everything I know. I have also tried searching the net, and this forum, and have'nt been able to come up with anything concrete.
So, Windows XP Pro will not install for anything. I have set the array, deleted array, tried drives on just the standard IDE channel. Tried just one HDD on array, then standard. Booted with fail-safe BIOS settings, etc etc. Tried everything.
Windows starts the install, feed it the drivers from MSI's site for the RAID (PDC20265R). From there, I get a variety of errors. Sometimes it will start and finish the format of the drive, sometimes it will error and say that the disk is corrupt (it's not). Sometimes it will finish formatting, copy some files, then say it can't copy. Sometimes it will just blue screen and give a "stop" error. The stop error has always been random, no particular one.
I sent this board back to the dealer and they said it is fine. But they had a drive with XP already installed, they didn't try a clean install. I did try putting one of the drives into my other system with the K7T Turbo 2, install XP, and installed the inf for the RAID on this board in question. Didn't think it would work, and it didn't.
ANYONE have a solution? Any ideas? I am at a brick wall. And really don't want to junk this board just to get another one and a PCI RAID card.

I am having very similar issues with the K7T Turbo-r limited edition(w/ raid) board. I tried to upgrade to bios v3.6 and the raid funtion failed to load and then would lock on the Windows XP screen. Did safe mode boot and locked up on gernuwa.sys. Went all the way back to bios v2.6 and worked my up to v3.1, where the problems started over again. v3.0 seems to work just fine. In v3.1 they changed the promise raid in the bios. I have downloaded the latest drivers for the raid on that board, but have not installed yet. To install these drivers, do I just right click on .inf file and install from there, or should I use the liveUpdate program to do it? I am hoping that these new drivers will fix the raid issues and allow me to upgrade to a newer bios.

K7T Turbo-R Limited Edition W/Raid

Two questions,
first how do you tell if your XP 1800+ is a palomino? I purchased one but all it says is AMD Athlon XP 1800+ on the factory sticker.
Second when I use this processor with my K7T Turbo-R Limited W/Raid it will boot up fine, displays the correct processor speed (shows XP 1800+ in post) but the pc will at random times out of the blue just re-boot. I have a 400 watt psu AMD approved. and my memory is good. I've done all the bios updates also. Is it possible that this is an unsupported cpu?

http://www.amdboard.com/amdid.html
http://www.overclockers.com/tips00173/

RAID 5?

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