RAID really needed?

[ahmnasa]

Hi all,

I bought the following bundle from overclockers:

Intel Core 2 Quad Pro Q6600 "Energy Efficient SLACR Edition" Retail / OcUK Value IP35 Pro Intel P35 Motherboard / 4GB OCZ PC-6400 Reaper Dual Channel DDR2 Kit - Bundle

Little did I know that the motherboard didn't support raid (my own fault).

Do you think it's worth all the hassle to send it back and get something different or just skip raid?

I will be using my rig for mostly games and casual work on webdesign software.


Thanks for your time.

Aki

p.s.
sorry if i posted in wrong cat

 

[Bin Boy]

Only for high speed transfers will raid come in to play, other wise a raptor for example will be better if raid isn't an option.

 

[Final8y]

Only for high speed transfers will raid come in to play, other wise a raptor for example will be better if raid isn't an option.

Not true.
The OS is more responsive & opening draws & displaying contents is quicker with raid to the point that i will not go with out raid.

 

[semi-pro waster]

Not true.
The OS is more responsive & opening draws & displaying contents is quicker with raid to the point that i will not go with out raid.

Experiences do differ though, I've used Raid0 before both IDE and SATA drives and then went back to individual drives and I can't say I noticed a huge amount of difference at all. There was maybe a little bit less speed in loading large contiguous files but hardly enough to bother me, advances in drive technology overall would probably make more of a difference for me than re-Raiding the drives.

//edit and welcome to the forums ahmnasa.

 

[Phemo]

RAID didn't make much difference for me but it depends what you do.

I wouldn't worry about onboard RAID so much - maybe consider picking up a PCI-E SATA RAID card as this also allow you to easily transplant your RAID array to another system at a later date if required.

However, an x1 card is going to be limited to 250MB/sec - this should be more than sufficient for a pair of drives though.

 

[ahmnasa]

Thanks a lot for your opinions. I've decided to keep the motherboard.

I never really cared for RAID, just my friend convinced me to get it but I screwed up a bit with the specs

//edit and welcome to the forums ahmnasa.

thanks