Setting up RAID between 80 GB and 500 GB?

[Omlet]

I ordered a second drive to RAID with my new 500 GB drive. Some sites, however, say that you should only RAID together two identical drives. Is this correct? Both drives are from Western Digital. Thanks!

 

[pparks1]

It's best for them to be identical, but it's not absolutely required. What is required is for the drives to be the same size.

 

[mpcrsc562]

What is required is for the drives to be the same size.

If the two drives were together in RAID, won't the array be based off of the smaller drive? In RAID 0 at least, right? RAIDing the two drives together would net a 160GB array--essentially wasting 420GB of the 500GB drive, right?

 

[Omlet]

So RAID wouldn't be the best option? My goal is to install Windows in the smaller drive and install all my games on the larger one. Would just plugging in the drives work fine and installing from there?

 

[pparks1]

So RAID wouldn't be the best option? My goal is to install Windows in the smaller drive and install all my games on the larger one. Would just plugging in the drives work fine and installing from there?

You don't need RAID to do that. You simply would have 2 drives. A C drive for Windows and a D drive for your games.

Yes, just plug them both in and install to the appropriate drive.

 

[mpcrsc562]

Seems to be solved, but more info on RAID 0...
Standard RAID levels - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Omlet]

Alright, I just wanted to be sure. I've heard great things about RAID but it's apparent it wouldn't be useful for this type of thing. Thanks for the help, you can mark this as solved!

 

[pparks1]

RAID 0 is a mixed bag. On one hand, it increases your read and write speeds and drops your access time slightly. On the other hand, your chances of data loss double since you have 2 hard drives and if either one fails, you lose everything.

Personally, RAID 0 is great in some scenarios...for example if you are doing very large file copies or file manipulations. But for booting the OS and running most games, I've really not seen much of an improvement.

If you really want to speed things up, get a single SSD drive for your operating system. These have almost instantaneous access....usually in the .1ms range...versus 12-15ms for a standard hard drive. Plus, they have sequential read times of 200-250MB/s. These really make the computer fly. On problem is that they are somewhat pricey for a small amount of disk space. But trust me, it's the best upgrade investment that one can make. I don't know a single person who purchased an SSD drive and regretted it.

 

[mpcrsc562]

I don't know a single person who purchased an SSD drive and regretted it.

I'll second that.

And I've gone the budget route with the SSD, but it does give an overall improvement to system speed.

(Kingston SSDNow V Series SNV425-S2 64GB @ $144 on Newegg.com)

If you can do it, do it. If you got the money for better, do it.

 

[Omlet]

I'll definitely look into investing in one of these. I've heard great things about SSD, but the price really turned me off. That Kingston drive is actually pretty reasonable compared to the other ones out there.

 

[mpcrsc562]

I like it. But, there are two V series drives out now so get the right one.

SNV125-S2 is the first generation and I believe that Kingston is already starting to phase them out.

SNV425-S2 is the one I have.

There are also V+ drives, which as you might guess, are superior to the SNV425 drive and they also carry a heavier price tag.

Also, check here: http://www.sevenforums.com/performance-maintenance/18229-show-us-your-ssd-performance.html
Though it was a thread started to show off your SSD performance, there is a wealth of knowledge being traded back and forth within this thread concerning all things SSD.

 

[BugMeister]

yes, get an SSD and run the OS from it..
they're really amazing..!!

 

[DeaconFrost]

If you've read good things about RAID (which means they were over-hyped marketing fluff), then surely you would have seen that in your situation, you'd be left with a total usable space of 160 GB. That's derived from 80 GB x 2. Would you really want to waste all that space for very little to absolutely no gain?

RAID on a desktop, in a single user environment is a waste of time and effort. Anandtech did a very thorough review that has been considered the standard, end-all answer to this for several years now.

In your situation, the word RAID shouldn't be present...no in planning, or in BIOS settings. Chances are, the 80 GB drive is slower than the 500 GB. I'd either invest in an SSD, or get a second 500 GB drive. You could use one as your OS, apps, and games, and then save the second as your D drive, for user created data, pics, etc. You aren't going to see any real measurable difference in performance in games by separating them out from your OS drive.

 

[Omlet]

Oh, I plan on only using the desktop for games. I used to have my OS and games on the same drive, but it failed on me. I didn't lost anything important, but I did lose about a day and a half of installing. Even so, if the drive holding the OS failed again, I think I would have to reinstall all the games again since there re no registry entries, paths, etc.