Creating RAID 0 in XP Home

schumi84 · 24 May 2007 at 15:20

Hi there,

Have just received my 2 brand new Barracuda 160GB SATA 2 hard drives as i was wanting to use them in a RAID-0 array for games etc.

This is the first time that i have tried to setup RAID so i tried using the manual for my Mobo (in sig) and am a bit confused.

It says to put the Onboard SATA/IDE Ctrl mode to RAID/IDE, but when i do this my DVD drive that is IDE isnt detected. It then explains that when i restart my pc after the POST there should be an option to press CTRL-G to get to the RAID BIOS, but this option isnt available.

At the moment then i have installed my 2 new HDs (newly formatted) and m current 120GB HD that has my Windows install on etc.

Any help would be much appreciated, thanks very much in advance.

schumi84 · 24 May 2007 at 16:38

Just to add to this, is it actually possible to create a RAID-0 array with Windows XP Home.

Cheers again.

rpstewart · 25 May 2007 at 09:21

What you're attempting to do is create an array using the onboard RAID controller, this is independent of the OS being used.

EDIT: Which ports are the two new drives attached to? To create an array on them they'll need to be on the two GIGARAID ports, those are the two nearest the rear edge of the board in the group of four next to the IDE port. They're a different colour to the rest, orange or purple, I forget which. The Ctrl+G option won't show unless there are drives on those ports.

schumi84 · 25 May 2007 at 11:00

Hi there,

Ah right, thanks very much for that, at the moment they are plugged in to the orange ones (the same as my original disk).

I shall plug them in to the purple ones and give it a go.

Thanks very much again, much appreciated.

schumi84 · 25 May 2007 at 11:38

Right, have managed to set up the RAID-0 array, cheers again for your help.

However for some reason i am still having the same problem with me IDE DVD drive not being recognised in the BIOS or windows when the Onboard SATA/IDE Ctrl mode is set to RAID/IDE.

Have tried changing the IDE drive to Slave and still no luck. The only way it will detect it again is if i set the above Onboard SATA/IDE Ctrl mode to IDE only. My RAID-0 array is still detected in My Computer (reads the 2x160GB drives as 320GB) but the Gigabyte RAID manager program doesnt appear in the quick launch bar.

Is this ok to do or will it destroy my array?

Cheers again.