Migrating an existing install to Raid

Lumeycom · 15 Aug 2008 at 17:21

Hi Guys

I need to move a complete existing install from a single hard drive onto a pair of drives running Raid1. Doing so to offer a little bit more data security against physical failures.

Whats the best way of doing this? Re-installing the OS and software would be a nightmare so i'd really like to just 'copy it across'. I know thats wishful thinking but there has to be an easy way of doing so.

2 machines I need to do it on and they are both running XP pro.

Also, if you could offer some advice on an old style PCI raid controller card that'd be great

Lumey

DustyMiller · 15 Aug 2008 at 17:45

Image the drive and re-install, the only problem you will have will be the raid drivers, they need to be native to the OS, or it wont see the raid pack

Cob · 15 Aug 2008 at 17:47

In theory you should be able to do it by installing the RAID drivers and then ghosting an image of the drive over to the RAID using Acronis or Ghost. Used to do it all the time with XP as getting it to install onto some RAID comtrollers can be a nightmare.

IAmATeaf · 15 Aug 2008 at 19:49

What mobo is it? If it has a second SATA controller then temp move the existing system disk to controller, then set the main controller in RAID mode, boot up install the drivers when prompted, then shutdown and move the disk over to where it was prior, check that it still boots up. Then image the drive, create RAID pack and then drop the image onto the RAID pack.

Dano · 15 Aug 2008 at 20:21

Raid 1 should allow for migration as far as I am aware, Raid 0 is another matter.

EsaT · 15 Aug 2008 at 20:31

What motherboard that PC has?
If it's one with any of later Intel chipsets moving to RAID1 might be very easy.

Lumeycom · 18 Aug 2008 at 10:41

Thanks for the advice so far.

The motherboards offer no raid support so it will be migrated onto a PCI (not express) raid controller card.

The 2 PC's i need to do carry some mildly important business stuffs which are backed up weekly, I just want to add a little extra security to the system incase of hardware failure (as has recently happened

)

So i'm looking for the easiest way to do that and also advice on a reasonably priced PCI controller card.

Thanks

Lumey

DustyMiller · 18 Aug 2008 at 14:29

If you are restoring to a PCI Raid crd then that might work, but you will still need the raid drivers on the OS before you do your drive image ready for the restore onto the new hardware raid. And it might fall down around your ears.

The other option is to retore the image, and then do a repair install to get the drivers, but from a decent XP SP3 disk, or Nlite'd XP SP3 disk. - might Work. Maybe worth a try.

Or use the hardware raid card, in a seperate box, and backup all the important business data to it. Then a client failure is not an issue.