Basic or Dynamic

ndeller · 12 Dec 2007 at 13:06

Hi,

From what I understand there are 2 types of drive format
Basic and Dynamic.

I currently have 2 500GB drives and on the first one have setup the following partitions. This drive is also set to Basic:
50GB - XP
50GB - Games
150GB - Windows Server 2003 (to be installed)
110GB - Data eg My Documents
110GB - Free Unallocated space

What are the advantages of me converting this drive to Dynamic format? If I convert before I have installed Windows Server 2003 will it mean I can not install any additional OS on this drive.

Thanks
Nick

jbloggs · 12 Dec 2007 at 13:51

Have a look Here

Uhtred · 12 Dec 2007 at 13:57

Basic, you will almost never need to use otherwise. If you want RAID there are better ways to do it.

pendulum666 · 12 Dec 2007 at 14:10

If you want RAID I thought you HAD to convert the disk to dynamic?

marc2003 · 12 Dec 2007 at 14:17

pendulum666 said:
If you want RAID I thought you HAD to convert the disk to dynamic?

you would if you wanted to use software raid. but why would you? it's completely pointless. as mentioned above, there are better ways...... (hardware)

jbloggs · 12 Dec 2007 at 14:19

pendulum666 said:
If you want RAID I thought you HAD to convert the disk to dynamic?

I certainly wouldn't recommend using the Windows OS RAID facility....far better to use what is supplied as part of the mobo contollers, ie. Intel ICHxR etc (which require "Basic" HDD)...

ndeller · 12 Dec 2007 at 16:04

Okay so Im thinking of doing the following:

HDD1 (500GB):
50GB XP (stripped)
200GB Data (mirrored)
50GB Server 2003 (stripped)
50GB Games (stripped)

HDD2 (500GB):
50GB XP (stripped)
200GB Data (mirrored)
50GB Server 2003 (stripped)
50GB Games (stripped)

So in effect I have:
100GB XP
200GB Data (with the backup mirrored version)
100GB Server 2003
100GB Games

If I was going to do this what is the best way forward?
From what I can understand I will need to do the following:
Purchase Floppy drive and isntall
Create ICHxR Raid boot disk
Format both HDD's
Boot with ICHxR and create 3 stripped and 1 mirror partition.

Both drives should be left as Basic format? If I do it this way will I be able to dual boot between XP and Server 2003?

Thanks