S-ATA hard drives

  • Thread starter Thread starter Carl
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Carl

Hi All
I am trying to learn the raid setup, I know nothing about it.
I have the Intel D865PERL board , 2.4C cpu.
I have two S-ATA hard drives , 120 gig and 80 gig , Now i was told that they
both have to be the same size , Please tell me this is not true (ha ha). Did
i screw up here by getting two different sizes ?
And also can anyone direct me to a good site to learn how to set up and run
raid.
I just want to set it up and learn about it, Is there any real advantage to
it compared to just running Sata hard drives.
I have no real need for it , just playin around , I'm retired and nothing
better to do yet, till the fishing weather arives.
Thanks--
Carl
 
-----Original Message-----
Hi All
I am trying to learn the raid setup, I know nothing about it.
I have the Intel D865PERL board , 2.4C cpu.
I have two S-ATA hard drives , 120 gig and 80 gig , Now i was told that they
both have to be the same size , Please tell me this is not true (ha ha). Did
i screw up here by getting two different sizes ?
And also can anyone direct me to a good site to learn how to set up and run
raid.
I just want to set it up and learn about it, Is there any real advantage to
it compared to just running Sata hard drives.
I have no real need for it , just playin around , I'm retired and nothing
better to do yet, till the fishing weather arives.
Thanks--
Carl


.
5. RAID setup
Click to expand...


5.1 General setup
This is what you need for any of the RAID levels:

A kernel. Preferably a kernel from the 2.4 series.
Alternatively a 2.0 or 2.2 kernel with the RAID patches
applied.
The RAID tools.
Patience, Pizza, and your favorite caffeinated beverage.
All of this is included as standard in most GNU/Linux
distributions today.

If your system has RAID support, you should have a file
called /proc/mdstat. Remember it, that file is your
friend. If you do not have that file, maybe your kernel
does not have RAID support. See what the contains, by
doing a cat /proc/mdstat. It should tell you that you
have the right RAID personality (eg. RAID mode)
registered, and that no RAID devices are currently
active.

Create the partitions you want to include in your RAID
set.
check out
http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/Software-RAID-HOWTO-5.html
 
-----Original Message-----
Hi All
I am trying to learn the raid setup, I know nothing about it.
I have the Intel D865PERL board , 2.4C cpu.
I have two S-ATA hard drives , 120 gig and 80 gig , Now i was told that they
both have to be the same size , Please tell me this is not true (ha ha). Did
i screw up here by getting two different sizes ?
And also can anyone direct me to a good site to learn how to set up and run
raid.
I just want to set it up and learn about it, Is there any real advantage to
it compared to just running Sata hard drives.
I have no real need for it , just playin around , I'm retired and nothing
better to do yet, till the fishing weather arives.
Thanks--
Carl


.
You have two devices of approximately same size, and you
Click to expand...
want the two to be mirrors of each other. Eventually you
have more devices, which you want to keep as stand-by
spare-disks, that will automatically become a part of the
mirror if one of the active devices break.
 
-----Original Message-----
Hi All
I am trying to learn the raid setup, I know nothing about it.
I have the Intel D865PERL board , 2.4C cpu.
I have two S-ATA hard drives , 120 gig and 80 gig , Now i was told that they
both have to be the same size , Please tell me this is not true (ha ha). Did
i screw up here by getting two different sizes ?
And also can anyone direct me to a good site to learn how to set up and run
raid.
I just want to set it up and learn about it, Is there any real advantage to
it compared to just running Sata hard drives.
I have no real need for it , just playin around , I'm retired and nothing
better to do yet, till the fishing weather arives.
Thanks--
Carl


.
http://www.linuxgazette.com/issue45/nielsen.html#Strip
Click to expand...
good luck,can't wait for my fishing trips to the great
lakes,don't have the time to understanding raid so i let
others do it for me.
 
Carl said:
Hi All
I am trying to learn the raid setup, I know nothing about it.
I have the Intel D865PERL board , 2.4C cpu.
I have two S-ATA hard drives , 120 gig and 80 gig , Now i was told that they
both have to be the same size , Please tell me this is not true (ha ha). Did
i screw up here by getting two different sizes ?
And also can anyone direct me to a good site to learn how to set up and run
raid.
I just want to set it up and learn about it, Is there any real advantage to
it compared to just running Sata hard drives.
I have no real need for it , just playin around , I'm retired and nothing
better to do yet, till the fishing weather arives.
Thanks--
Carl
Click to expand...

Read this three part series -

http://www.tomshardware.com/storage/20020806/
Tom's Hardware Guide Mass Storage: IDE Training Course, Part 1: A
Detailed Look at the Basics and Technology - Introduction

http://www.tomshardware.com/storage/20020813/index.html
Tom's Hardware Guide Mass Storage: IDE Training Course, Part 2:
Performance and Data Security with RAID - Introduction

http://www.tomshardware.com/storage/20020830/index.html
Tom's Hardware Guide Mass Storage: IDE Training Course, Part 3: Using
RAID - IDE Training Course, Part 3: Using RAID

Bob
 
I hope you're enjoying your retirement, I envy you!

RAID is not all that complicated frankly. For the consumer level
implementation, you basically have two choices, RAID 0 (stripping) or RAID 1
(mirroring). Striping allows you to send read/write requests to BOTH HDs in
parallel, thus improving throughput. Mirroring is about data protection,
you *clone* one HD to the other in realtime, so you always have a duplicate,
should one HD fail. That's basically it. There is one other option you
*sometimes* get, varies depending on controller, and that's JBOD (Just a
Bunch Of Drives). This is nothing more than "spanning", where you can throw
a bunch of HDs on to a RAID controller, difference sizes, different speeds,
etc., and it all looks like one big HD. No performance improvements, no
data protection, "just a bunch of drives".

So first you have to determine WHAT type of RAID the controller supports,
then what type of RAID you're interested in pursuing. Are you looking for
performance improvement? Data protection? Both? (some controllers will
support BOTH RAID 0 and RAID 1 at the same time, but it requires FOUR HDs,
and since most on-board SATA controllers only have two ports these days,
it's not likely to be an option, so I won't discuss it further).

In most cases, the HDs doesn't *have* to be the same size, although, it's
usually makes more sense and is more economical if they are. If you attempt
to mirror the two HDs (RAID 1), you'll lose access to the other 40GB on the
120GB HD, since the RAID controller will allocate according to the minimum
HD capacity (2 x 80GB). IOW, it's just wasteful. In the case of stripping
(RAID 0), you should see all the HD capacity (80 + 120 = 200GB), but it
won't be as efficient since ideally you want ALL your writes to be split to
both HDs. Once the 80GB HD is nearing capacity, all further writing will be
directed at the 120GB HD, thereby negating the benefit of RAID 0, you're
back to writing (and reading) a single HD. Again, it's a matter of what
makes the most sense. You can usually use different capacity HDs (there may
be exceptions, controllers do differ), but it's not ideal.

Setup isn't all that complicated. You simply install the HDs on the SATA
controller, and when the system boots, a configuration screen appears so you
can define the type of RAID (array) you want. Save it, reboot, and you're
in business. Now when you install the OS, just make sure to have the SATA
drivers ready, and when prompted for mass storage devices, hit F6 (I think
that's the key, not positive), it will prompt for the floppy, and install.
Once the OS is installed, you'll be running RAID.

HTH

Jim
 
Thanks fo all the response , After reading those links i don't know if i
really want to get into it.
But could you spicificaly answer this question , if i do try it can i use my
120 gig and my 80 gig hard drives or do they have both be the same size ?
thanks.
Ok Bob Dietz, I live up here in minnesota so i go fishing on lake superior
often. Great time.
Thanks
 
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