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danwoodward

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danwoodward

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December 22nd, 2006 04:00

XPS 410 RAID Migration

A few months back I purchased a new XPS 410 that cam pre-configured as RAID 1 with twin 250GB drives. 
 
Board Specs: Intel G965 with Intel 82801HR RAID controller
 
Needing faster performace, I used the Intel Matrix Storage Manager to migrate the drives from RAID 1 to RAID 0. 
 
As expected, the size of the volume did not change with the conversion from RAID 1 to RAID 0.  So, I tried to increase its size of the partition using Partition Magic 8 as I have done before with no success.  PM8 does not even see the empty 232 GB in the RAID 0 array.
 
Q1: How can I increase the size of the partition to take advantage of the entire space available?
 
Q2: If I am able to increase the volume to the maximum size avaiable in the array, can I then add a thrid 250 GB HD to convert to RAID 5? Currently the Intel utility options to modify any properties of the current volume such as migrating to RAID 5 are all "greyed out" except the option to change the volume name.
 
Thanks.
 
 
  • T

    Timdrouilard

    628 Posts

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    Posted December 22nd, 2006 14:00

    The best way to do it is to back up everything , break the current RAID configuration and start from scratch. make up your mind ahead of time what type of RAID to want to move to, and do it now.
     
    Remember,
    RAID 1 gives you safety, but only the capacity of 1 drive.
    RAID 0 gives you speed and the capacity of all drives combined, at the cost of safety.
    RAID 5 is a balance between the two. with RAID 5 the total capacity will be the number of hard drives, -1 times the capacity of each drive. A 3-drive RAID 5 will give you the capacity of 2 drives combined.
     
    You can have as many drives in a RAID 0 or RAID 5 as your system can handle, but you need a minimum of 3 drives to creat a RAID 5 array.
     
    Changing between RAID types on the fly (RAID 1 to a RAID 0, etc) is not reccomended. It's painful to be sure, but the best way it to always start over.

    Message Edited by Timdrouilard on 12-22-200611:47 AM

  • T

    Timdrouilard

    628 Posts

    109

    0

    Posted December 22nd, 2006 14:00

    The best way to do it is to back up everything , break the current RAID configuration and start from scratch. make up your mind ahead of time what type of RAID to want to move to, and do it now.
     
    Remember,
    RAID 1 give
  • UR

    Uncle Ripper

    591 Posts

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    Posted December 22nd, 2006 16:00

    I'm not 100% but I think dells 410's only support Raid 0 and 1.  If your want 5 you'll have to buy a differant raid controller.
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    danwoodward

    2 Posts

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    0

    Posted December 22nd, 2006 18:00

    Thanks. You confirmed what I was beginning to realize... that starting over might be the best option. I definitely want to go RAID 5 with a 3 drive array

    The documentation that came from Dell only makes mention of RAID 0/1 as options, however, Intel states that the RAID controller on this motherboard is capable of supporting RAID 0/1/5/10.

    Can anyone confirm for certain that this chipset and RAID controller supports RAID 5/10?

    If I use Ghost 10 to backup first... when I re-build the array, can I boot from the Ghost CD to "re-image" the drive from an external USB hard drive?

    Thanks.

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