Need help - SSD and RAID 1 new install

[bill fox]

I'm doing a new build and will have the following setup.

Windows 7 Home Premium
128Gb Vertex 4 SSd
two - 1TB Seagate Barracuda HDD's
Asus P8Z77-V LK
Intel i5-3570K

I'm not sure if I got the wrong information, but assume I had just the SSD and never had any other drives. Windows 7 already is installed on the SSD (only drive) and in the BIOS since there was only one drive, the SATA setup was not for RAID but ACHI. Now I get two new HDD's - 1TB and now want them to be in RAID1. The BIOS had been set to ACHI and now if I understand correctly needs to be to set to RAID. I change it to RAID, reboot and get enter <CTRL> I to access the utility. I see all the drives and now select the two new Seagate HDD's as the drives I want to include in the array. It asks me to confirm and then formats the new drives for RAID 1. I exit and the system when it reboots will NOT load Windows and keeps looping back. I go back into the BIOS and check the SATA setting (it's in RAID) and also check the utility that indicates the SSD in a Non RAID disk and the two 1TB Seagate HDD's and Member Disk, so that looks righ to me. However, I am not able to get Windows to load. I disconnected the two HDDs, went back inot BIOS and set SATA back to ACHI, rebooted and Windows loaded fine. What am I missing?

Can't I setup a RAID array AFTER having installed Windows in a non RAID array? Do I need to re-install Windows and select RAID for the SATA? I saw on a few posts that on a new install, select in the BIOS the RAID for SATA settings, do not connect the two HDDs, install Windows, connect the two HDDs and in utilties, select these drives. This seems fine for a new install, but what about previous installs - how do you get new drives to be in a RAID array once you have a running system which used ACHI as the SATA setting?

Help please.......

 

[tripledouce]

When you Installed Windows and your SATA Function was set to AHCI thats the driver windows used to install the Hard Drive. when you Switch to RAID mode without Changing those drivers to RAID in Windows your OS will not be able to boot. and lastly why are you using a RAID 1 array? you basically have a mirror of your 1 TB Drives nice for redundancy but a waste of half your storage.

 

[bill fox]

I thought it may be a driver issue. Question is how can you get Windows to update the driver if in fact I can't get into Windows when I do change the BIOS setting to RAID?

And the RAID 1 array is for a friend, his system, his call. Really not sure why to be honest. What would you suggest instead and still have the "mirror"?

 

[tripledouce]

you will need to reset your SATA Operation Back Into AHCI then Change the HD Driver to RAID then reboot and change the SATA Operation Back to RAID. or just leave it all AHCI and use Windows disk management to set up a software RAID 1 Array with those two disks. his computer his call.

 

[bill fox]

Found a very good article for RAID 1 setup after Windows 7 OS has been installed.

http://buildegg.com/bewp/?p=44

WIll try this as it tells me exactly what and why.

 

[bill fox]

After checking into this further, what was failed to be mentioned in the article was that this feature is only available in Windows 7 Professional, Ultimate and Enterprise. It is NOT a feature in Home Premium...... =( and of course, that's what I'm running. Oh well, at least I know and if you didn't, now you do as well.