RAID backup - what if controller dies?

**PatO** · 10-21-2005, 11:08 PM

So I have a RAID 1 (Mirror) for backups on my D drive. I also have a RAID 0 (Striping) setup for performance on my C drive. (Both SATA)

My RAID controller is on the motherboard. What happens if the motherboard or HDD controller dies? Can I get another RAID controller and plug the drives back in and expect everything to work? Board is an MSI Neo II Platinum (NForce3 Ultra Chipset w/RAID ctrlr)

I'd anticipate the Striping wouldn't work, but I have no clue about the mirror....

Same theory applies to any controller on the market. If it dies after the product line is discontinued, is the RAID standard solid enough that drives can be recognized by any manufacturer?

Thanks in advance! And yes, I'm knocking on wood right now!

**0l33l** · 10-21-2005, 11:30 PM

Mirroring will work for sure. Not too sure about the stiping.

**WebDog** · 10-21-2005, 11:59 PM

I know with RAID-1 you can just rebuild the mirror using one of the two and it will sync the two... (i have had to do that a few times in my servers)

But for RAID-0 i am not sure i would think you could rebild it...

**PatO** · 10-22-2005, 12:26 AM

Ya - RAID-0 is dead. That's fine. No problem.
But what if the controller (rather than the HDD's) dies?

Is the RAID spec solid enough that I can plug my drives into any controller out there? And building on that question, is NVidia's RAID technology (from 1 yr ago) compatible with newer chipsets (out now or out 1 or 2 yrs from now)?

My question elludes to the possibility that onboard RAID is crap (for redundancy). And that external controllers are also crap - unless you buy two. The former might be true. The latter I find hard to believe. Anyone have clarity on this?

**WebDog** · 10-22-2005, 12:57 AM

Originally Posted by PatO

Ya - RAID-0 is dead. That's fine. No problem.
But what if the controller (rather than the HDD's) dies?

Is the RAID spec solid enough that I can plug my drives into any controller out there? And building on that question, is NVidia's RAID technology (from 1 yr ago) compatible with newer chipsets (out now or out 1 or 2 yrs from now)?

My question elludes to the possibility that onboard RAID is crap (for redundancy). And that external controllers are also crap - unless you buy two. The former might be true. The latter I find hard to believe. Anyone have clarity on this?

If you are really looking for reliabilty you should get a dedicated PCI raid card...
I have been using a 3ware escalade card in my servers for the last 2 years and have not had any problems with them.

I do not trust onboard raid wether is for dektop or server.

**0l33l** · 10-22-2005, 01:00 AM

Originally Posted by WebDog

I do not trust onboard raid wether is for dektop or server.

Why not? Maybe not raid 0, but why not raid 1?

I definately don't trust software raid

**Curiosity** · 10-22-2005, 01:02 AM

#1 most important thing: Backup, Backup, Backup!

#2, don't move/delete anything or run CHKDSK, until you get what you need off the disks.

I'm trying to recover a RAID-0 right now! This is my system disk with everything important to me on it, so I'm learning a lot at the moment by reading sectors off the disks directly. RAID-0 stripes the data in segments of 64K (by default - unless you changed that), meaning if you connected them to a non-RAID controller, the data is like every 64K goes to each disk. R Studio can read the raw data to a file, and then you can virtual stripe them, or tell it the 2 disks are striped and then read all the files out to another disk. With RAID-1, you can just connect the main disk to a non-RAID controller and it will show up as a normal disk with all the data on it. Same with the mirror disk. Noting is formatted differently in a RAID, or encrypted or anything. It's the same bytes you would see on any other disk. It's safe to do this, just don't format, or change partitions, or anything like that until you've use a recovery program or ghosted it.

**Curiosity** · 10-22-2005, 01:20 AM

Sorry, I'm frantic right now.

Yes, another RAID controller, even a different brand is going to work. You just have to copy the parameters (block size, etc.) and connect the disks in the same order (master, slave, primary, secondary) and it will work. They all format the data the same way.

**PatO** · 10-22-2005, 01:31 AM

Originally Posted by Curiosity

#1 most important thing: Backup, Backup, Backup!
With RAID-1, you can just connect the main disk to a non-RAID controller and it will show up as a normal disk with all the data on it. Same with the mirror disk. Noting is formatted differently in a RAID, or encrypted or anything. It's the same bytes you would see on any other disk.

Awesome! That's what I wanted to hear (and was suspecting).
That being the case, I would suspect that I can live out this system's life without another card. However, I will test one of the mirrors in another computer to verify. Thanks!