Moving bootable OS onto RAID0 drive

Dr_Evil · 4 Dec 2006 at 12:52

I installed MCE with RAID drivers, on a non-RAID disk. Now I've added 2 disks in RAID0 setup to my system.

I have tried restoring a ghost image of the OS onto the RAID0 drive, as well as the Ghost -> Copy Drive. Both fail to start when booting from the RAID0. Windows seems to load, but halfway through it freezes.

Any suggestions as to how to do this?

I still have the OS on the non-RAID drive, as well as the Ghost image. On the non-Raid drive, i can actually "see" the RAID0 drive through the RAID manager application, which indicates the RAID drivers are installed correctly and working properly.

Dr_Evil · 4 Dec 2006 at 17:22

Come on RAID guru's I need some help or i'm just going to install as double non-RAID....

brummie · 4 Dec 2006 at 18:00

Sounds like your using a software raid set up.
Not sure you'll ever get it working.

Dr_Evil · 4 Dec 2006 at 18:01

No I'm using a hardware RAID setup, just want to be able to "migrate" my operating system over onto the RAID drive so I don't have to re-install.

james32 · 4 Dec 2006 at 18:03

install raid drivers on the non-RAID disk 1st

then you copy the image onto the raid 0 drives,
now it will boot up because it will have raid drivers installed
make sure you change boot order before it boots up

brummie · 4 Dec 2006 at 18:06

Dr_Evil said:
No I'm using a hardware RAID setup, just want to be able to "migrate" my operating system over onto the RAID drive so I don't have to re-install.

Why ya needing drivers then???

Dr_Evil · 4 Dec 2006 at 18:07

That's exactly what I did. Still doesn't work. It's RAID0. Did i miss something perhaps?

SATA0 - 74Gb - RAID0
SATA1 - 36Gb
SATA2 - 74Gb - RAID0
SATA4 - 250Gb

Normally the system boots from SATA1, which is the drive i took the ghost image from (after installing the RAID drivers)

then i created the RAID and in fact, when booted from SATA1 i could access and format the RAID drive. (RAID drivers working ok i guess..). I restore the Ghost image onto the RAID drive...

Now i boot from SATA0, system hangs whilst loading windows...

any thoughts?

Dr_Evil · 4 Dec 2006 at 18:08

brummie said:
Why ya needing drivers then???

ehm.. Cuz otherwise XP doesn't recognize the RAID drive?

james32 · 4 Dec 2006 at 18:12

hey it would be better if i new, your raid card, motherboard, etc backup software used, becomes guess work

Dr_Evil · 5 Dec 2006 at 10:56

nForce 950 SLI integrated RAID.

XP MCE 2005.

It's more the process how it's done what i'm interested in. I'm starting to think it may be best to just re-install my OS onto the RAID drive and stop wasting time trying to "move" my current install over....

Bolerus · 5 Dec 2006 at 13:44

I might be missing the point here

but when windows starts installing it comes up on the moving message bar at the bottom

hit f6 to install drivers

you need to hit f6 there, then put your raid drivers floppy drive in (you have made one from your motherbaord cd right) and follow the instructions

or are you trying to ghost a ready set up op system onto a newly created raid

Dr_Evil · 5 Dec 2006 at 13:58

Bolerus said:
or are you trying to ghost a ready set up op system onto a newly created raid

Yes, that's what I'm trying to do. I know how to set it up through re-installing my OS, but want to "move" my already installed OS (with RAID drivers) onto the new RAID drive...

Bolerus · 5 Dec 2006 at 14:29

I think you will spend a lot more time and effort trying to do that than you woudl just settign up from scratch and then copying data over afterwards.

Sounds like one of those wonderfull time saving ideas that end up being a nightmare time and effort sink

snowdog · 5 Dec 2006 at 14:32

Windows needs other drivers when the mobo controller is changed from normall to raid mode ( no matter if there is or isnt a raid array ), goto your non raid drive, boot up with raid mode enabled, install (raid) drivers, then clone it again and then you should be able to boot up...

brummie · 5 Dec 2006 at 20:59

Its windows that is the problem here, and the fact that its a software raid set up.

just reinstall.

snowdog · 5 Dec 2006 at 22:57

brummie said:
Its windows that is the problem here, and the fact that its a software raid set up.

just reinstall.

No its not, any hardware raid setup needs drivers too, do you have a raid array?
Im 100% sure i had to install different drivers for using my southbridge chip in raid than when in normall mode

Even the OP said this:

No I'm using a hardware RAID setup

Im sure he knows better what raid he is using than you...

Why ya needing drivers then???

All mainboards need different drivers when setting the controller from ide/normall to RAID mode, the controller works in a different way, and windows needs different drivers for it to work...
In normall/ide mode, windows knows what drivers to use, as a result on most mobo's there aren't any drivers needed for the ide/sata controller, however windows doesn't recognize/install a controller in raid mode, it needs the drivers from ( usually ) a floppy for that.

Also Bolerus: Perhaps, but some people would need to reinstall over 48 hours to get all the stuff back on, personally i'd do the same as the OP...

brummie · 6 Dec 2006 at 08:31

I use RAID 3 as it goes. And Windows or Linux DO NOT need drivers on my system as the array isn't handled by the OS/CPU like what obviously is being described here.

airchie · 6 Dec 2006 at 09:24

I think there's a lot of confusion here.
Windows doesn't need drivers for a raid disk.
It needs drivers for the disk controller that handles the raid.
If installing to a disk that's attached to a disk controller that windows doesn't recognise, you're more than liely to need the drivers at install time.

The current install of windows seems to recognise all hardware in the system and as such, should be able to boot from a raid disk attached to the same controller as he's currently using for the single disk.

I think you'll likely have to modify the boot.ini file to point to the correct disk.
Not sure what the disk's designation would be in your particular setup though.

The last time I set raid and had a similar issue it was caused by the fact that the raid controller hadn't set the partition I wanted to boot from as active and bootable in the raid bios.

If I were you, I would go for a fresh install as it's likely to be less mucking about.

Depending what it is about your current install you want to keep, you could maybe copy your user profile over to the new install?

Good luck anyway.

Dr_Evil · 7 Dec 2006 at 12:10

Again, Ghosting the image from my previous non-raid disk to my new RAID0 disk worked however completed a bit too fast imo. I booted from the new RAID0 partition, and at some point actually got it working. Windows was very irresponsive, the local disk became G: and i think things were messed quite a bit - it didn't shut down properly, sometimes took 10 minutes before ready after booting.

I've decided to stop wasting time and just re-install. Now everything is running very smooth and fast, the way i wanted it to.

Had to slip-stream my nVidia nForce RAID drivers into my XP install (i have no floppy drive) and create a custom install CD. It works good now.

thanks for all the advice !!!