Backing up a Raid 0 configuration?

[acid16]

Is there anyway to backup a raid 0 configuration onto a single hard drive? If I have two 40GB drives in Raid 0, can I backup all the content from both to a single 80GB drive if I made two seperate partitions on the 80GB drive (each partition 40GB)?????? Would this work? I want to find a good backup solution for a raid 0 configuration. Preferably what I would eventually like to have is 4 40GB hard drives in Raid 0, and one 160GB drive for backups split into 3 partitions. This would rock. Does anyone know if this is possible and if there is any software to do it? Would DriveCopy work (from the people who make PartitionMagic?)

 

[Platoface]

Thats a good question as I too would like to do the same. I have my current system in Raid 0 and when I build my new system this week I was going to get 2 more 60 gis HD for Raid 0+1. I hane a High Point Rocketraid 404 PCI card to do this with but if I can get by on getting one 120 gig HD that would be sweet. i will chck back soon. Thanks for bringing this up.

 

[LED]

The answer is YES as I do it 3 times weekly from RAID0, 2- 20 gigs and 2-40 gigs to 1-WD 120 Gig and 1-WD 80Gig with the Ghost Program and it works in the reverse order as well when RAID crashes.

 

[lorlabnew]

What the chances are that RAID 0 will crash? Just doubled (with 2-drive RAID setup) compared to single drive setup, or there are other factors to consider?

 

[Insidious]

Norton Ghost is a GEM!

(worth every penny!)

 

[HGC]

Check out www.duocor.com. Far superior to Ghost or Partition Magic in my opinion.

 

[acid16]

Originally posted by: LED
The answer is YES as I do it 3 times weekly from RAID0, 2- 20 gigs and 2-40 gigs to 1-WD 120 Gig and 1-WD 80Gig with the Ghost Program and it works in the reverse order as well when RAID crashes.

This is good news

So... assuming I had 2 hard drives in Raid 0, both 80GB. And on the side, I had 1 additional hard drive, a 160GB. I split the 160GB into two partitions and copy each of the 80GB's to their own partition on the 160GB drive. I can do that, right? With norton ghost? So now... what happens if one of my hard drives were to fail in the Raid 0. How would I beable to recover using the 160GB backup drive? .... trying to figure how that would work

 

[LED]

1st off because you have 2 80gig parts on RAID 0 doesn't mean each HD has it's on Part because in RAID0 they are working together...You can Ghost by HD (your RAID will equal 1 HD no matter how many parts you have) or you can RAID by Parts. If Just a Part blows on me then I RAID that Part only. If the OS blows then I RAID all Parts invloved (usually 3 on my dual boot-up, normally 1 on a sigle part OS) 1 by 1.

 

[acid16]

Originally posted by: LED
1st off because you have 2 80gig parts on RAID 0 doesn't mean each HD has it's on Part because in RAID0 they are working together...You can Ghost by HD (your RAID will equal 1 HD no matter how many parts you have) or you can RAID by Parts. If Just a Part blows on me then I RAID that Part only. If the OS blows then I RAID all Parts invloved (usually 3 on my dual boot-up, normally 1 on a sigle part OS) 1 by 1.

Hmmm, well, im not exactly a pro on Raid 0....... but the operating system sees a raid 0 setup as one big hard drive, one big partition. So assuming I had two 80GB drives in raid 0, are you saying it would be possible to copy it over to a single 160GB drive on ONE partition? Would that single 160GB drive be bootable??? So that way if one of my 80GB drives died, then I could just put in the 160GB and run normally

 

[LED]

Originally posted by: acid16

Originally posted by: LED
1st off because you have 2 80gig parts on RAID 0 doesn't mean each HD has it's on Part because in RAID0 they are working together...You can Ghost by HD (your RAID will equal 1 HD no matter how many parts you have) or you can RAID by Parts. If Just a Part blows on me then I RAID that Part only. If the OS blows then I RAID all Parts invloved (usually 3 on my dual boot-up, normally 1 on a sigle part OS) 1 by 1.

Hmmm, well, im not exactly a pro on Raid 0....... but the operating system sees a raid 0 setup as one big hard drive, one big partition. So assuming I had two 80GB drives in raid 0, are you saying it would be possible to copy it over to a single 160GB drive on ONE partition? Would that single 160GB drive be bootable??? So that way if one of my 80GB drives died, then I could just put in the 160GB and run normally

Simply put YES then remember to start backing up the 160giger . The only problem with backing up in this method is if the Main HD crashes while Ghosting then your SOL...that's why I have 2 copy's which I alternate and backup @ least twice weekly so I never loose more then 1 weeks of Data...so RAID 1 with RAID 0 is not that expensive (although a tad slower) in Comparison to having 2 Back-up Drives with Ghost but I like it cause I'm alway selling em off to get better ones

 

[HGC]

After years of Partition Magic I tried Duocor System Guardian XC 2000. It is so much faster, easier and more reliable that I will never go back. I haven't tried it with RAID, bu they say it works fine in most RAID setups. They have a 30-day free trial download. It costs a bit more ($149), but it's so much better. Ok, I'll stop hyping it now I just love this product, it has saved me on more than one occasion and daily backups of my 80 GB drive take about three minutes.

 

[LED]

I'm going to try Duocor System Guardian as I like the features but @ that price I can buy a MoBo that comes with Ghost for cheaper

 

[HGC]

That's a good point!

 

[dj4005]

When I put my system together, I purchased 3 of the WD 80-gig JB drives. Two of them are for the RAID that runs my system, the third is for backups, and for being on-site and ready to go should one of the RAID drives ever bite the bullet.

I'm using XP-Pro's backup program to do backups and have the third drive in a removable tray so that the backups can be stored 'off-machine'.

I do worry that my backup drive has only HALF the capacity of my system. But that provides the incentive to keep it clean.

I ***HAVE*** done a restore using this system. (I corrupted the system - can't blame hardware or software). The backup / rebuild went flawlessly.