Can I create some sort of raid disk with two usb drives in vista/7

  • Thread starter Thread starter Aussie Rules
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A

Aussie Rules

Hi,

I want to have two flash drives working in like a raid mirror.

I can plug in one of the usb flash drives and get say a new E:\, but of
course if I plug in the second one I get a f:\

Is there a way to have windows vista (or 7 I guess) configured so that the
two flash drives are just the E:\ and they are working in a raid mirror
config via software ??

Thanks
 
Hi

Thanks for your reply.

I am nut sure I fully understand your reply.

I already have an internal drive (C:) which has the windows OS on it. I just
want to have another drive which has the raid function.

THanks
 
Leroy said:
No. Windows operating systems are only supported on internal hard drives.
Click to expand...

You must have reading comprehension problems. That wasn't the question he
asked you IDIOT. Take your thumb out of your ass and pay attention.
 
You must have reading comprehension problems. That wasn't the question he
asked you IDIOT. Take your thumb out of your ass and pay attention.
Click to expand...

He misunderstood the question you asked.

AFAIK, you need a specialized hard-disk controller to do RAID, and so you
can do it only with hard drives connected to that controller.

In fact, you would have the same problem with two (separate) USB hard
drives. RAID drives that plug into USB (etc.) contain two or more drives in
a single case with a RAID controller inside.
 
Aussie Rules said:
Hi,

I want to have two flash drives working in like a raid mirror.

I can plug in one of the usb flash drives and get say a new E:\, but of
course if I plug in the second one I get a f:\

Is there a way to have windows vista (or 7 I guess) configured so that the
two flash drives are just the E:\ and they are working in a raid mirror
config via software ??

Thanks
Click to expand...

While there may be third party software out there that will create a
software raid setup for flash drives in a mirrored configuration you are
talking about USB speed and that isn't great and because the data must be
written twice it probably will slow down the computer anytime a write to the
raid is made.

Vista, at least to my knowledge, can not do what you want. Don't know about
Win 7.

Now, for my own curiosity, why would you want to do something like this? If
it is for data backup you do realize that if you write to one drive the
other will be changed also and a data error introduced to one will also be
introduced to the other and you would defeat the purpose of a backup. There
are many other ways to do effective automatic backups but this is really a
poor way. If for another purpose I would really like to know why.
 
Hi,

The PC runs a very small, low transaction volume sql express database. The
PC is housed often in warehouse locations and lives a pretty hard life.

The failure rate on these devices are often related to the hard disk, with
heat and dust the main killer.

The idea is to keep the PC and our application running on a typical internal
hard disk, but just move the database file off to a flash drive. Performance
is not a big deal on this, and the volume of data we write or read is very
small. (maybe 100 write/reads a day)

So we already know that we can have an SQL database on a flash drive, which
performs well. So for further to improve the situation it would be great if
we could have the flash drive in some sort of software raid, so that if the
flash drive has an issue we have a back up.

We have designed the application so that if the PC fails, you can just swap
it out, so thats covered.. now its just making sure the data is safe, and
that we can take the flash drive to another machine and get the application
up and running quickly.

Thanks
 
Aussie Rules said:
Hi,

The PC runs a very small, low transaction volume sql express database. The
PC is housed often in warehouse locations and lives a pretty hard life.

The failure rate on these devices are often related to the hard disk, with
heat and dust the main killer.

The idea is to keep the PC and our application running on a typical
internal hard disk, but just move the database file off to a flash drive.
Performance is not a big deal on this, and the volume of data we write or
read is very small. (maybe 100 write/reads a day)

So we already know that we can have an SQL database on a flash drive,
which performs well. So for further to improve the situation it would be
great if we could have the flash drive in some sort of software raid, so
that if the flash drive has an issue we have a back up.

We have designed the application so that if the PC fails, you can just
swap it out, so thats covered.. now its just making sure the data is safe,
and that we can take the flash drive to another machine and get the
application up and running quickly.

Thanks
Click to expand...

Thanks for explaining. Interesting thought. Fault tolerance for data is
important. One suggestion is possibly you could place one of the new solid
state hard drives in the computer. No spinning disk and as long as the
power supply and other fans work heat is not normally an issue. Because no
heat produced from the hard drive the fans are much more efficient. Sounds
like the processor would be just loafing along even with the SQL database
running.
 
LVTravel said:
Thanks for explaining. Interesting thought. Fault tolerance for data is
important. One suggestion is possibly you could place one of the new
solid state hard drives in the computer. No spinning disk and as long as
the power supply and other fans work heat is not normally an issue.
Because no heat produced from the hard drive the fans are much more
efficient. Sounds like the processor would be just loafing along even
with the SQL database running.
Click to expand...

And a second thought. Install a SATA RAID adapter card in the computer and
put two of the new SATA solid state hard drives in a mirrored configuration.
Even better than my first thought.
 
Yeah, I did think of that, but the PC is not a standard PC, its one of those
all in one POS terminals, so no capacity to add or remove any devices such
as this.

I am thinking that the solid state drive is going to be the best option....
 
Aussie Rules said:
Yeah, I did think of that, but the PC is not a standard PC, its one of
those all in one POS terminals, so no capacity to add or remove any
devices such as this.

I am thinking that the solid state drive is going to be the best
option....
Click to expand...

There is the possibility of replacing the internal drive of the POS to a
solid state drive. If the unit has a current SATA drive the replacement
would be relatively easy. SATA drives are fairly plentiful and getting a
larger capacity is easy. If IDE (ATA) the only problem there would be the
problem of finding an IDE solid state drive. IDE is a dying standard and
there are few larger drives available for them but they can be found.

If these POS systems are ever networked you could put the SQL database on
the server, create your backups there.
 
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