How to install Win7 to an SSD Raid array?

I see you have the P6t as do I so I am assuming you got the RAID driver from Asus? If I recall there were drivers for the x64 and x86. Any possibility of a mixup there?

Always a chance of a mixup. I did, however, double check this.

Just happened to look in the floppy drive box and there was the floppy that I used when Windows asks you to press F6 or whatever if you want to install drivers before the setup continues. The disk has the following files:
iaahci.cat
iaAHCI.inf
iastor.cat
iaStor.inf
IaStor.sys
license.txt
TXTSETUP.OEM
Did you get something like those when you downloaded the drivers?

Yes, in fact, the iastor.inf file is the driver for the raid systems and iaAHCI.inf is the driver file for the non-raid systems. During the Win7 install, it gets to the point where you can format the HD, and you can also add drivers. At this point I direct it to my USB stick with all the iastor.inf files (plus all the ones you list). It seems to be updating the install and then the install program continues from there.

That is the procedure I used for all of the attempts I made (except for the ones where I tried to install the RST drivers after the Win7 install). In fact, the RST drivers would not install in IDE mode, only AHCI mode.

My drivers are the ones that shipped with the mboard. I never updated them because there were apparently some issues that honestly are beyond me. New RST Drivers 32 bit only?...: Intel Communities There are some concerns expressed here. The drivers I am using are 2009 vintage and I never touched them. If you have the newer ones could there be a problem? I'm still running the obsolete Intel Matrix Storage Manager that came with the mboard. RAID actually makes me a little nervous I guess but it is quick and runs perfectly. I'm probably dreaming but I thought when I was installing there was a driver install successful message before the format? Also I could not get an install with the USB. Don't understand that to this day?

I needed TXTSETUP.OEM recently for an XP install, found it here

Add mass storage drivers to a Windows XP configuration set

And download http://download.microsoft.com/downlo...scsicfgset.exe then drop it in.

7 version ??

I haven't tried myself, but I have read in several places that RAIDing SSDs accomplishes very little. I can believe it, because it accomplished very little with HDDs (RAID0, I mean).

If it was up to me, I'd get one larger SSD, as opposed to two smaller SSDs.

You guys have got to be kidding right? I have an SSD boot drive, and by buddy right beside me has a hard drive RAID0. He gets the same performance from his mechanical RAID as I get from my SSD (SATAII). I have just spent a few hours reading on SSD RAID arrays, and people are getting excellent results from them. All I can say for people who have had so much trouble with RAID0 is that your experience is not typical. Over the last five or more years I have seen various RAID systems out perform regular systems. I doubt so much effort would be put into RAID by manufacturers if no one was having any success with it. I have just purchased a second SSD (a 60G Corsair SATAII) that I am investigating RAID0ing with my current Patriot Inferno 60Gb SATAII. I'll let you know how it goes. My biggest problem at the moment is trying to find a way to back up my system and restore it to the RAID. An image is out of the question, but some type of file/software backup I can restore after reinstalling Windows would be perfect.

Mergatroid said:

You guys have got to be kidding right? I have an SSD boot drive, and by buddy right beside me has a hard drive RAID0. He gets the same performance from his mechanical RAID as I get from my SSD (SATAII).

We're the ones who have got to be kidding? If your SSD isn't spanking the spinner drive, you have some issues to figure out, such as the wrong drivers being loaded, or the alignment being off. If you've done any reading on SSDs, you should already know that something isn't right with your system.

As for SSD RAID, I'll stand by my comments and those of the others here. I'm also going to question how much reading you did, considering you bought mismatched drives. That's the very basic principle of any type of RAID...that you need identical drives.

If you want my honest suggestion...solve the problem at hand with one single SSD. Once you get that fixed, you can return the second one and get a larger storage drive.