Luttuce
I have the same mobo as you and have set up 2x 150Gb VRaptors. Some general steps to follow as below but as helmutcheese suggests it would be beteer to read a guide then ask questions on anything you're stuck on. This is what I did and now have a RAID 0 setup.
1) Using your old non-RAID system or a different computer, download the latest RAID drivers / Matrix storage manager software from the Intel website. Ignore anything provided on your motherboard CD or advice suggesting that it will work straight off on a Vista install. This will ensure your RAID install is clean and up-to-date from the outset. Files can be downloaded from here
http://downloadcenter.intel.com/Product_Filter.aspx?ProductID=2101 and you need to download the Intel(R) Matrix Storage Manager file and the Floppy Configuration Utility.
2) You should now have two files assuming things havent changed from when I did it. a) the RAID drivers (zip file), the one for my Vista 64 system was called f6flpy6486.zip at the time of download b) Matrix manager software file (.exe file) which was called iata86enu.exe at the time I downloaded it. There are actually 2 Matrix Manager files available being iata86cd.exe and iata86enu.exe with the difference just being the ..enu version is in English only whereas ..cd version is multi-language.
3) Put the RAID drivers on a CD or USB stick or something. Make sure you actually extract the contents from the zip file first rather than just dumping the zip file onto a CD, USB, floppy etc....
4) Shut down your computer and install the hard drives (power and SATA connectors)
5) Restart your computer and enter the BIOS, set your SATA mode to RAID.
6) Still in the BIOS, set up your boot order so you can boot from the Vista disc. * On my IP35 Pro instead of using the general "optical drive" or "CD/DVD ROM drive" or whatever option it is, I had to select the specific DVD drive model by looking further down the menu list * Once this and the above step has been completed then save changes, exit and restart.
7) Keep your eye on the startup screen and press CTRL and I when prompted to do so to enter the RAID setup screen.
8) Assuming your drives are connected properly you should now see them in this setup screen. It's pretty self explanatory but choose the correct disks and set them up in RAID 0. You will be wondering what stripe size to use at this point, I'd suggest doing some research on this before you go ahead and make an informed choice on what is best for you. I used 32kb though.
9) Restart with the Vista disc in to start off the fresh install. Some peple would recommend at this point to disconnect all HDD's with exception to your RAID 0 VRaptors so Windows doesn't install on the wrong disc or something.
10) Follow the installation steps and keep your eye open for when you can install additional drivers. When this comes up, select the option, insert the media with the RAID drivers on then select them. You should be looking for the ICH9R controller.
11) Away you go with the rest of the installation procedure.
12) Get into Vista, install the Matrix Storage Manager file that you previously downloaded, probably now on your old hard disc so that'll need reconnecting come to think of it.
13) Download and install all of the Vista updates to get rid of all the up front HDD activity.
14) Defrag your disc. This is not strictly necessary but good practice after the big installation / updates and prior to bencmarking.
15) Enable / disable write-back cache within Matrix Storage Manager (now in your Start menu / programs list) depending on your preference, mine is enabled and gives a significantly higher burst speed. Research write-back cache to find out what all this is about.
16) Run a benchmark like HD Tach once all this is complete to make sure everything is running as fast as it should, this is where you can do before / after write-back cache tests too.
17) Report back here to let us know how it goes.
This should be enough for you to work off and do further reading.
Hope it helps,
Mike
