SSD/HDD RAID question

[carlos9759]

so lets say, i want to buy 2 SSDs, both 120 GBs

and 2 HDD that are 2 TBs each

for a RAID config.

 

is it possible to run both sets as RAID 1? each set?

 

just testing the waters thats all

[exercutor5]

Yes, the SSDs in one array, the HDDs in another.

[tt2468]

9 minutes ago, carlos9759 said:

so lets say, i want to buy 2 SSDs, both 120 GBs

and 2 HDD that are 2 TBs each

for a RAID config.

 

is it possible to run both sets as RAID 1? each set?

 

just testing the waters thats all

Well, you could have as many raid arrays as you want, as long as you have the drives. You can't raid together one hdd and one ssd. You can create one raid1 or 0 of both ssds, and you can create one raid 1 of both hdds. If you want to speed up your hdds, you can use the ssds as caches, but that gets complicated.

[carlos9759]

SSD to SSD, and HDD to HDD yes.

 

i want to do this RAID config one day, now that i know its possible. im very causious about my data lol

[scottyseng]

5 minutes ago, carlos9759 said:

SSD to SSD, and HDD to HDD yes.

 

i want to do this RAID config one day, now that i know its possible. im very causious about my data lol

Yeah, it's possible. Remember though, RAID isn't a backup. You'll want a external hard drive as well to back up your stuff outside of the PC.

 

I would recommend 240GB and up on the SSD...120 is kind of small these days...Depends on your needs though.

[carlos9759]

54 minutes ago, scottyseng said:

Yeah, it's possible. Remember though, RAID isn't a backup. You'll want a external hard drive as well to back up your stuff outside of the PC.

 

I would recommend 240GB and up on the SSD...120 is kind of small these days...Depends on your needs though.

but wouldnt one SSD run fine if the other one broke? amd use the working SSD as the main ??

[scottyseng]

1 minute ago, carlos9759 said:

but wouldnt one SSD run fine if the other one broke? amd use the working SSD as the main ??

Yeah, it would, but I'm just saying, a proper backup is where you have two separate copies of the important files you have.

 

RAID1 is used to help reliability. It is a not a proper backup solution. You don't want to risk having the array fail while you're rebuilding the array. Or if it does, you can fall back on said backup drive.

[icey]

RAID 0 means if 1 SSD fails, the data on the one that didn't fail is useless, unreadable nonsense. Wiki search RAID to get a better understanding.

[scottyseng]

4 minutes ago, icey said:

RAID 0 means if 1 SSD fails, the data on the one that didn't fail is useless, unreadable nonsense. Wiki search RAID to get a better understanding.

The OP is planning on doing two RAID1 arrays, one with two SSDs, the other with two HDDs. No mention of RAID0.

[Captain_WD]

2 hours ago, carlos9759 said:

~snip~

Hey carlos9759,

 

The short answer is - yes, you can have a RAID1 from the two SSDs to boot from and another RAID1 from the HDDs to store your data.

A few notes from me:
- RAID1 offers good redundancy and a somewhat good read speed, but shouldn't be considered a backup in any way as it doesn't provide safety in case of a user mistake, controller failure or other physical damage to the computer (theft, power outage, etc.). 

 

- In order to boot fro a RAID array you would need to set it up as a hardware one from the BIOS. For this your motherboard needs to support it. The secondary storage RAID array can be done either through the motherboard or through your OS. I'd check out the differences between hardware and software RAID. 

 

- If you are truly valuing your data I'd rather consider a backup solution such as an external drive or a NAS where you can store regular copies of your important data. 

 

- In case a drive fails in a RAID1 array you would need to rebuild the array, but this is done quite fast as the data is mirrored block by block.

 

- You can have RAID arrays with mixed SSDs and HDDs, but it is not recommended as you would be limiting all the drives in the array to the capacity of the smallest and the speed of the slowest, meaning you would have larger HDDs limited to the capacity of the small SSDs and the fast SSDs limited to the speed of the slow HDDs. 

 

Captain_WD.

[icey]

18 hours ago, scottyseng said:

The OP is planning on doing two RAID1 arrays, one with two SSDs, the other with two HDDs. No mention of RAID0.

Whoops, getting my threads mixed up. Don't know why you wouldn't do SSD RAID 0 if you have 2 of them as well as RAID1 storage. I do that in my systems.