New case - help moving RAID array

robbiemc · 14 Dec 2009 at 15:25

Guys
I'm moving all my gear into a new case and am currently running a RAID 5 array (3 disks) and some separate HDs, all from the on-board motherboard SATA ports.

I'm terrified that during the move I'll wreck the RAID array, so is there anything specific I need to do? Will I need to use the exact same SATA ports for my RAID array, or does the raid controller know which drives are part of the array and not care which ports they're plugged into to?

It's an ASUS P5Q, thanks!

CoxyBoy123 · 14 Dec 2009 at 15:37

I have the pro model, runnin Raid 0, whenever i move anything i just plug them back in same sata ports, on boot make sure (in BIOS) its set to raid, and that has never failed

JonJ678 · 14 Dec 2009 at 15:54

If you're using the same motherboard as you are now there shouldn't be any problems. I have a suspicion you could plug the drives in any order you like, but as I've not used onboard raid (I've done is through mdadm, more directly software) I'm not 100% on that. Get some masking tape and put numbers on the hard drives corresponding to the sata port it's currently connected to, and match them up in the new case just to be sure?

Out of interest, have you managed to get the board to run a raid 5 while letting you boot from a different drive? I spent ages trying to get a raid 10 to run with a separate boot drive and failed terribly, ending up doing this through software instead. This was on an older Asus board, curious to know if things have changed.

Werewolf · 14 Dec 2009 at 16:28

I would suggest if you're just moving them to the new case stick a small label/sticker on the back of each drive near the SATA port with the number of the SATA port it connects to on it

Then write the drive/sata port numbers on the cables

I tend to do something similar with all my drives to assist in ID'ing them when working on the computer (at the minimum my labels tend to have the capacity/make/date bought so I can ID them without taking them out).

robbiemc · 14 Dec 2009 at 16:41

Cool, thanks for your thoughts guys. I was considering labeling each drive with its corresponding port, but just wanted to prepare in case they got mixed up.