Raid

[lwidas]

I don't know where to start but I would like to have a RAID setup on my computer

AMD Phenom 9600 Agena 2.3GHz 4 x 512KB L2 Cache 2MB L3 Cache Socket AM2+ 95W

ECS BLACK SERIES A780GM-A AM2+/AM2 AMD 780G HDMI ATX AMD Motherboard

OCZ 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 1066 (PC2 8500) Dual Channel

SAMSUNG Spinpoint F1 HD103UJ 1TB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5\" Internal Hard Drive

1 LG DVD Rom

Coolmax / V-400 / 400-Watt

 

[outlw6669]

What would be the goal from your raid setup?
Are you looking for more speed or data redundancy?
If you post back your budget and goals we may be able to get you pointed in the right direction.

 

[sminlal]

^ +1

Also, do you have external drives that you use for backup? If not, and if your data is important to you then your data will be safer if you use the extra drives for backup rather than RAID.

 

[lwidas]

^ +1

Also, do you have external drives that you use for backup? If not, and if your data is important to you then your data will be safer if you use the extra drives for backup rather than RAID.

I Have two external drives one for backup of essential files and one for music both are backed up regularly and I want to have more speed and data redundancy. MY budget is close to $700

 

[bliq]

With your budget, RAID 5 will provide both data redundancy and additional speed but requires 3 drives at a minimum. RAID 0+1/10 will also provide both, arguably with a little more of each, but 4 drives minimum and I don't believe you can add drives to increase capacity. Also not many motherboards support RAID 10/0+1.

hit up wikipedia to find out pros and cons of each.

 

[sminlal]

Good to hear you've got backup covered!

You didn't say what your capacity needs are. If they're small, an SSD will be faster than RAID for most cases (with the exception of writing large files).

If your capacity needs are moderate, a RAID 1 set of Velociraptors will likely work well.

If your capacity needs are larger, then perhaps four 1TB drives in a RAID 0+1 configuration would be a good choice.

Be aware that RAID 5 has very poor write performance, so it's not a good choice if you expect to be doing things that write a lot of data to the RAID set.