I would like to restore my Dimension 9100 to full working order, and -- if possible -- upgrade it to make it usable for a few more years.

I have been using it with a RAID0 failure for the last two years. Every time I switch it on, I see a RAID error -- but  I have always been able to carry on after hitting F1.

Intel Matrix Storage Manager gives me this information -

RAID0 Volume Errors.

Some data requests to a hard drive in a RAID 0 volume failed, but a backup may be possible. Please try to back up data immediately.

Of course, I have been backing up assiduously since this thing started. But nothing else has ever happened. My total capacity on the volume is 298 Gb, which is what I would expect from from 2 * 160 GB drives in RAID0. However, I think there must be a problem with at least one of the Maxtor drives, and I doubt if I am getting any benefit at all from RAID0.

So I would appreciate any advice on how I should proceed now. I want this problem to go away.

How can I find out what, if anything, is wrong with one of the Maxtor drives?

Should I upgrade to RAID1? How?

Should I replace the Maxtor drives with new drives? What would you recommend?

Or should I just try to downgrade from RAID0 to two distinct drives?

What would you do?

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Here are the specs ..

Dimension 9100 / BIOS: Dell Inc. A01 05/25/2005 / OS: XP Pro SP 3 / Processor: 3.20 gigahertz Intel Pentium 4 / Main circuit board: Dell Inc. 0X8582

And here is an extract from the Intel Matrix Storage Manager report  ...

RAID Plug-In Version: 5.0.1.1001

Array 0
Status: No active migration(s)
Hard Drive Write Cache Enabled: Yes
Size: 298 GB
Free Space: 0 GB
Number of Hard Drives: 2
Hard Drive Member 1: Maxtor 6L160M0
Hard Drive Member 2: Maxtor 6L160M0
Number of Volumes: 1
Volume Member 1: ARRAY
 
Volume 0
Status: Normal
System Volume: Yes
RAID Level: RAID 0 (striping)
Strip Size: 128 KB
Size: 298 GB
Number of Hard Drives: 2
Hard Drive Member 1: Maxtor 6L160M0
Hard Drive Member 2: Maxtor 6L160M0
Parent Array: Array 0
 
Hard Drive 0
Usage: Array member
Status: Error occurred
Device Port: 0
Model: Maxtor 6L160M0
Hard Drive Write Cache Enabled: Yes
Number of Volumes: 1
Volume Member 1: ARRAY
Parent Array: Array 0
 
Hard Drive 1
Usage: Array member
Status: Error occurred
Device Port: 2
Model: Maxtor 6L160M0
Hard Drive Write Cache Enabled: Yes
Number of Volumes: 1
Volume Member 1: ARRAY
Parent Array: Array 0

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By the way, I have been around computers for more than 20 years, but I have never been a hardware person. I still get confused.

Thanks in advance for sharing any help, advice, information, pointers or encouragement.