Looking to make a bios raid1 for storage, will a re-install of win7 x64 be necessary?

[Counter-Strike Player]

This involves changing the sata type from "ahci" to "raid" on my z87 sabertooth (on-board Intel RST chipset).........the last time this was the other way around...I already had disassembled the raid and attempted to boot to windows after going back from raid to ahci, instant bsod upon boot -- but that was on a p6t board, with sata II only.

 

Not worried about throughput or parity, just want a mirror of 2 identical hdd's. The Asus raid section of the manual is still vague (of course), and I'm assuming that win7 x64 already has appropriate archived raid drivers -- not to mention I already have the Intel RST utility already installed (currently on ahci.)

 

The win7 boot device is a 840 pro ssd and will not be a part of the raid. The manual says unfortunately that all sata devices will operate in "raid" mode when selected but I still plan on using samsung's rapidmode anyway.

[Altecice]

All data on both drives will be lost and you will need to reinstall Windows. You need to set your Sata type to RAID and then enter the RAID utility to set up your RAID1. Windows may not have your RAID drivers and may require you to download them onto a USB and to load the driver during the drive selection part of the Windows install.

[Counter-Strike Player]

All data on both drives will be lost and you will need to reinstall Windows. You need to set your Sata type to RAID and then enter the RAID utility to set up your RAID1. Windows may not have your RAID drivers and may require you to download them onto a USB and to load the driver during the drive selection part of the Windows install.

 

Just to be clear again, the win7 boot device is an ssd and will not be a part of the array (and hoping an entire reinstall won't be necessary because why would it, since the win7 files aren't being touched?) And IIRC, the last time I did this on the p6t, no raid drivers needed to be loaded on a fresh install (at that time starting with sata type: raid) and the install worked. And this was pre-RST days, the app then was known as "intel matrix storage manager."

[Counter-Strike Player]

I suspect this can work because this Irish kid did it:

 

Although his setup was so disorganized...calling the volume "raid 1" on a raid0 config...not sure if the OS volume was on it, but he initially called it "games" so I suspect not.

[Altecice]

Just to be clear again, the win7 boot device is an ssd and will not be a part of the array (and hoping an entire reinstall won't be necessary because why would it, since the win7 files aren't being touched?) And IIRC, the last time I did this on the p6t, no raid drivers needed to be loaded on a fresh install (at that time starting with sata type: raid) and the install worked. And this was pre-RST days, the app then was known as "intel matrix storage manager."

 

Riiiiiiiiight, I misread your post. If you are putting two other drives in RAID 1 (but not touching the SSD with Windows in it) then that will be fine. Your SSD will still work even if its in RAID mode, just dont include it in the Array you make.

[Counter-Strike Player]

Riiiiiiiiight, I misread your post. If you are putting two other drives in RAID 1 (but not touching the SSD with Windows in it) then that will be fine. Your SSD will still work even if its in RAID mode, just dont include it in the Array you make.

 

Thanks for correcting yourself. The 2 hdd's I want to mirror are currently in jbod, and I'll be waiting on a new 3TB $75 toshiba drive (confirmed 3-year warranty btw) to get here before migrating data to and building the array. In case you're wondering, here's the primary reason why I want to get these older drives mirrored, one of them has 2 re-allocated sectors:

 

 

Not bad I guess for a hitachi deathstar that's now age 7 with 30k hours on it, and sata II nonetheless.

[Altecice]

Thanks for correcting yourself. The 2 hdd's I want to mirror are currently in jbod, and I'll be waiting on a new 3TB $75 toshiba drive (confirmed 3-year warranty btw) to get here before migrating data to and building the array. In case you're wondering, here's the primary reason why I want to get these older drives mirrored, one of them has 2 re-allocated sectors:

 

deathstar-bad.sector.count.png

 

Not bad I guess for a hitachi deathstar that's now age 7 with 30k hours on it, and sata II nonetheless.

 

So long as that sector count is not rising then the drive is fine, its natural for an older drive to start to get a few. You will need to migrate all the data off the 2 drives you wish to put into RAID1 remember.

[Hlong]

Been down the exact same road as you......always had to reinstall Windows.

[Counter-Strike Player]

Been down the exact same road as you......always had to reinstall Windows.

 

Well it's worth a try. I usually end up re-installing windows about every 6 months anyway for various reasons. Almost need a checklist now on "things to when re-installing." Really practical things that MS devs got all wrong like:

• uninstall IE immediately
• show hidden files and folders
• show file extension names
• disable the win10 update offer via group policy
• more checklist things like trying to import windows firewall and IPSec rules that probably won't work on your new installation...

...all before checking windows updates (uninstalling IE immediately saves saves you from downloading so many security updates it's not even funny.)

 

Let's hope that Newegg "Super Saver" shipping gets the drive here by next week.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

...and isn't another "open box" item sold as "new"

[Counter-Strike Player]

...and isn't another "open box" item sold as "new"

 

Speaking of this unreleated note, this guy is actually working with Newegg now, didn't see that coming lol. I would say a smart move considering the entire old Newegg cast basically left that channel and the stewards replaced it with "today on this episode of Gamer Chicks..."

 

If you don't care about any of that, here's a more-relevant recent cat vid from Linus:

 

Anyway, you can be damn sure that I'll be checking the SMART status on that drive as a litmus test on Newegg to see if it's been previously used. A nice feature that I wish mobo's and gpu's had -- total hours powered on, total times power-cycled, etc. I might still-yet buy Newegg's "AIG" $11 extended 3-year warranty on this drive, giving it an effective 6 years of warranty -- not bad, and I'm not allowing myself to be conned again by a drive that shits itself 2 months after the standard warranty is over, like the gen-1 Vertex ssd from OCZ back in 2009. Never again. I'm holding a lifetime grudge about that.

 

So if everything works out, that comes to 2.87 cents/GB on a 6-year warranty drive. And yes I know, we "amerifags" get cheap components, but we also get massively crippled by a lifetime of college debt while you Europeans get paid to go to college. So that works out to be "fair" imo.

[Counter-Strike Player]

Good news boys, the drive has arrived and appears to be new (SMART info looks clean...thankfully I won't have to delete my Newegg account after all) and working. And also thankfully my local post office didn't utterly destroy my package this time #UPSSurePost. Now migrating data at an astounding 69MB/s #sata2ToSata3 #GPT.

 

Raid config tinkering will commence soon™.

[Counter-Strike Player]

Ok, I appear to be up and running (without a reinstall of windows) with a few points.

• First of all, in the bios -> boot ->  "option ROM messages" setting, make sure "force bios" is selected, not "keep current" -- otherwise the raid bios utility (opened via ctrl+i) won't even show up during post. Nice job Asus for documenting that on page 5-3 /s. And yes, that did take me 15+ minutes to figure out on my own.
• Changing sata type from ahci to raid will indeed throw "7b" bsod's (that apparently don't show up in the event log where they should.) That was remedied by the fix-it tool MS kindly provides on this KB page. +1 for MS there.
• Here is when I decided to make a new simple NTFS volume in MS's disk management. Initialized by MBR. Expected and saw 1 drive to do so.
• The Intel RST app completely shitted itself in the later startup phase of win7. So, I re-installed the sata driver (in my case, "RAID_AHCI_Win7_8_8-1_VER12801016.zip", ~18MB), selected "repair," restarted, and now the app seems fine.

Poking around in a functional RST app again, under "manage," I decided to "initialize" (you would think Intel could come up with a better unambiguous name than that) the volume. This is apparently needed if you want to "verify" data on the array later. Now I'm wondering when this process is done, if I should go back into MS's disk management and re-make the simple volume again?

[Counter-Strike Player]

Been down the exact same road as you......always had to reinstall Windows.

 

Was yours larger than a 2TB array...because that's not going to work the way I did it because we're talking about native MS sata drivers when the OS is loaded. According to the official Intel documentation (page 21), the "f6" method of installing raid drivers is needed on win7 on a 2TB+ drive volume.

 

And how might you create f6 drivers? Well, by floppy -- of course:

 

Btw, a search for "initialize" turns up 0 results in that pdf. Great work guys, I'm out.

[Hlong]

Was yours larger than a 2TB array...because that's not going to work the way I did it because we're talking about native MS sata drivers when the OS is loaded. According to the official Intel documentation (page 21), the "f6" method of installing raid drivers is needed on win7 on a 2TB+ drive volume.

 

And how might you create f6 drivers? Well, by floppy -- of course:

lel3.png

 

Btw, a search for "initialize" turns up 0 results in that pdf. Great work guys, I'm out.

2 x 1TB RAID1

[Counter-Strike Player]

Man my OCD is really getting to me. Before I put too much data on this new raid volume, do you guys think I should just make an entirely new array -- now that Intel RST isn't fucked up anymore? Because I realize now that it was when I made this simple volume in disk management. Should I now: delete this array in the bios, make a new one, boot into windows (now that the drivers are sorted), disk management, and make the new MBR volume?

 

I'm trying to think of how a normal person would make an array from a fresh install of windows (one that doesn't require the f6 method.) My reasoning is that they'll install the raid/RST drivers first when they get to the desktop before making the volume. Thoughts?

[Counter-Strike Player]

What the hey, I re-did the process and RST picked up the new array immediately. I'm wondering for those of you who actually use RST, have you personally "Intel initialized" your own array? Because that option is fairly well-hidden in the advanced features -- and RST won't tell you about it (unless a sudden power loss happens or bsod from what I've read):

 

 

Again, that RST version of "initialize" won't kill your data, unlike MS's disk management will, so again a poor word choice on Intel. I'm foregoing it for now and already migrating data back onto the functional array because the "Intel initialization" process takes nearly 2 hours to finish on my box (1TB array)...and if 1 drive is gonna die, it's not like the array will also die.