Help me setup Raid on ASrock Z77 Extreme4 please

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Bigfishy

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Jan 11, 2010
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Having a hard time understanding some of this.

I am UPGRADING mobo and chip only. Installed mobo, i5-3570 (no k because I ordered incorrectly like an idiot and didnt notice) fine.

Plugged in my SSD and reinstalled Win 7.
Pretty sure I have all the drivers updated. Not positive, but fairly sure.

My SSD is in SATA port 2_4
DVD ROM in SATA port 3_1

Now I have to plug in my two WD Caviar Black 650gb HDD's and set up raid. I don't care if raid 0 or raid 1, your suggestions are fine.

Questions:
1. Which ports to install the HDD's?
2. I presume I'll have to reformat and erase everything on them? *I have ext HDD with backups and files to transfer once I have programs installed.
3. Suggestions on use bios or the intel utility to setup raid?

Thanks for your guidance!
 
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alvine

alvine

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raid 0 makes your drives running as one meaning they will give you faster speeds but if one drive fails you loose all of the data
raid 1 makes a mirror copy of your drive so you get no speed improvement but redundancy if one drive fails you always have the second drive with all of your data

ok so firt you have to go to bios and change sata mode from ahci to RAID
from there save and restart
you will be prompted with a new window (your raid configuration)
press ctrl+i or ctrl+f (it will tell you what to press to enter the raid configuration utility)
from there you will set up your raid

1. it doesnt matter which ports just make sure they are both in the same sata speed port (to check which sata port gives you 3gb or 6gb per sec look into your motherboards manual)
2. you're right when creating raid volume (either 0 or 1) it will prompt you the hard drives will be formatted

 
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Bigfishy

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Hey thanks for responding Alvine.

I'm sitting here with coffee in hand impatiently waiting for such responses to continue my adventure.

Couple quick questions: *(I've not gone back to bios yet as I post this)
Would my process now be:
1. shut down system
2. plug in hdd's in proper ports
3. go into bios (or let reformat start, whichever happens first) and set ONLY the HDD's to raid, save and restart.
4. go into raid config and set up raid.

Do I have it right?

Thanks!
 
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alvine

alvine

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yessir you got it right. just make sure to backup your data from the drives if you have anything important. the raid configuration utility will warn you about the format after you have selected the two drives you want to configure and which raid type you want implement

to make it easier on yourself have the ssd on separate sata controller as the motheboard comes with two..one controller for sata 3gb and one for 6gb...have the ssd on 6gb sata and the two drives on sata 3gb ports...if you're confused as to which sata port is which read up on the motherboard manual..im 99% sure it will outline raid configuration process too
 
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Bigfishy

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Ok, I just don't know what to think or say.

I had to switch ports on the ssd to sata 3 as I had it in sata 2.
Plugged in the HDD's and did as instructed, but was not offered on restart anywhere to setup raid config. Yet when it showed the drives in the black screen just before Win7 I quickly saw it recognized my ssd and HDD's but it was so fast I couldnt see if it said raid stripe or not.

So windows opens, I get a popup to restart, do so, and when windows comes back I open computer and my 2 x 650gb hdd's are Disk F with 1.08 TB free of 1.16!

I opened the disk and everything from my old system was there. So it looks like it worked even better than expected.

No reformat of hdd's. Interesting indeed.
 
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Himea

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i need some help too i have the same z77 asrock extreme 4 3570k i got my drives in port 1 and port A1 sata 3 what do i need since we got same mobo im confuse how it works do i download anything floppy etc or what? i 1 750 hydrid drive with stuff and the other drive is New samething 750 hydrid just need step by step how to set it up or what to do since we got same mobo please guide me thank you
 
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Bigfishy

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everything is pretty much stated above. Adapt it to what you're doing. Once you get into the bios I bet you figure it out and it goes just fine. Just set for raid and save and reboot basically all I ended up doing.
 
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Himea

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So I go to advance then to storage configuration? Then enable sata controller sata mode to raid? Sata aggressive link power enable
As media sata 3 AHCI?
Sata boot enable? Then exit and save? Because it give me a disk read error occurred press Ctrl+alt+del
 
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Bigfishy

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Ok, I can't be 100% positive on this, but here's my thought.

You said OS was installed on one hard drive and not the other. I think that's where your problem is. But I could be wrong.

I have not installed an OS on one drive and then tried to raid with a 2nd drive. Again, not familiar with that. But I think raid is (if installing os on those drives) supposed to have os on both the drives.

On my computer, I installed the OS on to my ssd. THEN, I plugged in the HDD's and set up raid. Again, after the os was installed on my ssd.

Here's two pics in the bios of what mine looks like.
http://imageshack.us/g/651/p1020008y.jpg/
 
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Bigfishy

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Again, I'm in totally unfamiliar territory, as I have only done this with three drives, one being the ssd which held the os.

I think, you need to reformat and clean the hdd with the os. Then set raid, then install os and it will properly install on both drives. But that's just my logical thought process.
 
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Himea

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Didn't work >.< I install new OS on the hard drive which was on A1 did same setups as urs I plug my existing drive to sata 3 (1) and put the options u did and give me error 21 selected disk does not exist

 
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tkoreaper

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I am having this exact same issue. I have 2 brand new SSDs and I want to set them up in Raid 0 before I install windows.

EDIT: As per the manual - "Please be noted that SATA3_A0 and SATA3_A1 do not support RAID function. If you want to use RAID function on SATA3 connectors, please use
SATA3_0 and SATA3_1 connectors."

Here's where you want to plug them in:
GA60m.png
 
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Himea

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I re-install both already lol my old hydrid had problems installing sound blaster z and had to install new windows on it. Both can be fresh now but that's a downside because hydrid drives the more u use it and longer the faster it is.
By the way big fishy has them in sata 1 and A1 too and his work >.<
 
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Himea

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http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/845/photonuc.jpg/

http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/40/photo1ajsh.jpg/

I want to put it in Raid 0 now what i do :D
 
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tkoreaper

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According to his pictures form earlier his are in the SATA2_4 and _5 spots which should support RAID as well. He also mentioned that he had them in the SATA2 ports and then switched them over to the 3's so I'm not exactly sure where he plugged them in. As for losing all your data, that will always happen if you plan on building an array with the drive you're already using. Building a RAID wipes the drives before it builds it.
 
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tkoreaper

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Select the first option to start crating the RAID. You'll be using your 2 drives in RAID 0 so make sure to set it to that with 128k stripe, you can name it whatever. Make sure you also select the correct drives. It will wipe everything and the RAID array will be created.

If you plan on installing Windows on this RAID make sure you have the drivers on a floppy disk or something (Anything should work) just in case the windows installer doesn't see your RAID. Everything else from then on is the same as a regular installation.
 
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tkoreaper

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Just to make sure, you have both the drives that you want to RAID plugged in to the ports that I circled in the picture I posted above? And everything in your BIOS is configured in the way that was mentioned earlier in this thread?
 
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