Wanting to set up 2xSSD in RAID 0 (boot drive) and additional HDD as separate drive for media

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md0u9147

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Jan 2, 2015
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Hi all,

Hitting a bit of a road block with my current build. It's been about 3 years since my last build and my goodness things have changed!

What I am attempting to do with this new build is to set up a RAID 0 boot drive with 2x SSD, and also have a secondary separate single 2TB HDD to put all my media on (music, movies etc)

So far having hit a few road blocks, i have managed to get the raid set up, windows 7 installed on the raid drive, but for love nor money cannot get windows to then use the second drive.

I've read somewhere of the OS being installed first, then the drive physically put into the machine afterwards - however that was done in a machine using a single drive, then adding a RAID drive later.

Is it the same approach in reverse or am I missing something?

To guide the responses I have bought an ASUS mobo Z97-K and have flashed the BIOS to the latest version. Only way I could get win 7 to install was to do so using the latest intel RAID contorllers/Drivers but now I am stuck.

Pls help!
Thanks
 
Solution
RealBeast
I expect that the issue is simply that the HDD is not initialized, which is required prior to formatting.

While I do not recommend using motherboard RAID 0 for SSDs, if that is your choice set up the array and install as you did earlier. Insure that the HDD is attached to one of your main SATA ports, not a secondary like Marvell if you have any. Drives on the SATA controller in RAID mode do not need to be a part of the array, and then the AHCI subset is all that is used.

Then simply enter disk management and initialize the drive, then it will show up everywhere. You can format it in DM or in the Windows Explorer.

I agree that a stable setup starts at the beginning, and it is worth getting right prior to installing all your...
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RealBeast

RealBeast

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If it is a new 2TB drive, can you see it at all in disk management? If so, just click on it and initialize using the wizard, then it can be formatted and used. The HDD will run fine with RAID mode selected in the bios, but will actually just run as AHCI, which is a subset of the RAID set.

I'm not clear on what you are saying with this: "I've read somewhere of the OS being installed first, then the drive physically put into the machine afterwards - however that was done in a machine using a single drive, then adding a RAID drive later."
 
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md0u9147

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Jan 2, 2015
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My apologies, to clarify:- when i was reading through similar other threads on the matter ive seen that several people have set up their rig with a SINGLE SSD as their boot drive, and wanted a large RAIDED 2xHDD as additional storage single drive. The solutions offered to that problem were to set the MOBO bios to RAID, but install the OS on the SDD first, then physically add the HDD RAID later.

The drive, as you assumed, is new and is recognised as being connected by the BIOS (therefore i assume is working). The the windows installation screen i get the option of installing windows onto one of 2 drives, first being my RAIDED SSD, the second being my single HDD.

The issue i'm having is that when windows finishes the installation on the SSD RAID, it no longer 'sees' the HDD - therefore i can't put any data on it. I tried fiddling with some settings in the BIOS to see if i could fix this. Made the fatal error of switching the set up from RAID -> AHCI, which then murdered my original windows installation and promted this post :)

I'm just trying to get it right at the start to save myself some headaches down the road. All help and suggestions are very appreciated :)
 
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RealBeast

RealBeast

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Sep 13, 2010
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104,790
I expect that the issue is simply that the HDD is not initialized, which is required prior to formatting.

While I do not recommend using motherboard RAID 0 for SSDs, if that is your choice set up the array and install as you did earlier. Insure that the HDD is attached to one of your main SATA ports, not a secondary like Marvell if you have any. Drives on the SATA controller in RAID mode do not need to be a part of the array, and then the AHCI subset is all that is used.

Then simply enter disk management and initialize the drive, then it will show up everywhere. You can format it in DM or in the Windows Explorer.

I agree that a stable setup starts at the beginning, and it is worth getting right prior to installing all your programs and data. Been there many times. :D
 
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