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adding windows xp to a laptop with a RAID 0

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by pejsmith 2 views

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Can anyone advise me how to add Windows xp to my laptop that CAN be configured to a raid? It seems to me that as soon as I convert the two matched drives (one of them having xp installed on it) to raid 0, The set up to raid 0 will erase the OS. that is already installed and cause a crash. Any advice would be very welcome. Peter Smith

15 replies

by bart777

When you use RAID-0 you are striping the disks. This will split all of the data between the drives. When this process is done it will wipe the drive to setup the stripe. Are you sure you want RAID-0? I would think you would want RAID-1 (Mirror).

by pejsmith

Thanks for the response. I need the speed of raid 0 and am prepared to accept the risks of this type of configuration. At present the laptop has a C drive with xp pro as an OS and a D drive (which is in the dvd drive slot). I can't config. the raid until I install the raid drivers during a fresh xp. install. Now I will have XP with my drivers for raid on C drive. As soon as I try to configure the raid the process will erase the OS and crash. Since this laptop can be purchased with the HD?s configured as a raid I know it can be done, but how? Any thought would be welcome Peter Smith

by scott_heath

So, you can't install Windows when you have the RAID enabled because it doesn't find any disks so you install Windows then try to conver it to RAID? It sounds like you may have done this more than once by the wording of your email. You need to find the appropriate driver for your RAID chipset and when Windows Setup is first loading you press F6 and supply the driver.

Changing a RAID config will almost always cause data loss. The only exeption I can think of is breaking a mirror, because you have two complete copies of the data. Let me know how it goes.

by pejsmith

Thanks for the response. I need the speed of raid 0 and am prepared to accept the risks of this type of configuration. At present the laptop has a C drive with xp pro as an OS and a D drive (which is in the dvd drive slot). I can't config. the raid until I install the raid drivers during a fresh xp. install. Now I will have XP with my drivers for raid on C drive. As soon as I try to configure the raid the process will erase the OS and crash. Since this laptop can be purchased with the HD?s configured as a raid I know it can be done but how? Any thought would be welcome Peter Smith

by mark ovk

1. You have to have an external disk (USB etc.) and copy the local disk to the ext. drive. (Use Ghost or something similar, a 1:1 copy will fail.)
2. Boot from the external disk and make sure it works.
3. Configure your internal drive to RAID-0
4. Install the drivers to that drive in the windows installation that is now on the external drive. If you don't do this, it won't boot after step 5.
5. Copy the windows install to the RAID-0 drive and reboot.

It should now work (let me know).

Cheers,

Mark

by scott_heath

This is not possible without HW RAID. Your system drive holds the drive setup info and since it has to be overwritten in order to stipe data, I just don't see it ever happening. What model is your laptop? Did you check and see in the BIOS if you can enable and configure HW RAID?

by pejsmith

Hi Mark, Thank you for your response. I am away from home at the moment but will try this in a couple of days when I get back. A couple of things though, I thought that you couldn?t boot windows from a external drive ( although I did download a way to reconfigure a modified boot cd ) and the only way to install raid drivers is during a fresh xp install (F6 with a floppy). The fresh install would be a none issue and I would have to install the raid drivers from a modified usb storage stick. I?m wondering whether I might get a conflict between the external HD and the stick as they are both usb. I?m looking forward to trying what you suggest and will let you know the results. Once again thank you for your help Peter Smith

by mark ovk

It works the same as a USB disk or a floppy drive.

It just has to be supported by your BIOS.
But if you have RAID 0 in your laptop, you must have USB HDD Support ;)

by pejsmith

Hi Mark, I did what you suggested with no luck. I created a ghost of the hd, created a raid 0 but couldn't reload the ghost image. Did I do something wrong? Peter

by mark ovk

Did you install the raid drivers before you reloaded the image?

by pejsmith

Hi Scott, Thank you for your response. This is the info on the laptop:- Hypersonic
Aviator CX7 Duo? Aviator CX7 Duo: High Performance 17" Centrino Duo Gaming laptop 2.33GHz Dual Core Intel Core 2 Duo T7600 | 4MB L2 Cache - Qty: 1 ? Intel? 945PM chipset + ICH7M Mobile Motherboard (CX7-Duo) - Qty: 1 ? 1024MB Mushkin PC5300 DDR2-667 SODIMM - Low Latency (5-5-5-15) - Qty: 1 ? 1024MB Mushkin PC5300 DDR2-667 SODIMM - Low Latency (5-5-5-15) - Qty: 1 ? Nvidia GeForce Go 7950 GTX PCI-Express 512MB GDDR3 - Qty: 1 ? 100GB 7200rpm Serial-ATA Hard Drive with NCQ & 8MB Cache - Qty: 1 ? 100GB 7200rpm Serial-ATA Hard Drive with NCQ & 8MB Cache - Qty: 1 ? 8X DVD ? R/W Drive Dual Layer w/ DVD Built-in High Definition 3D Sound System for CX7 - Qty: 1 ? Integrated 10/100/1000 Gigabit Ethernet Controller - Qty: 1 ? Internal 802.11A/G 54Mbps Wireless Mini PCI for CX7 - Qty: 1 ? Internal BluetoothT Module for CX7 - Qty: 1 ? Integrated V.92 56K Fax/Data Modem - Qty: 1 ? Microsoft Windows XP Professional CD & Manual SP2 Pre-Installed & Configured - Qty: 1 ? Custom Hypersonic Disaster Recovery DVD (Recommended) - Qty: 1

I did look in the bios and didn?t see the raid config. But I will look again. I could have ordered this laptop with the raid configured so we know it can be done. I had hoped that Hypersonic would have installed the raid drivers as a normal process. I have contacted Hypersonic support but no response. See the response from Mark re. an external HD. I thought this would be the way to go. What do you think? Best Peter Smith

by scott_heath

His idea isn't going to work as far as I can tell, but feel free to try. All the research I did said no software RAID for system drives. I found other laptops with this Intel 945PM chipset and RAID was listed as a config option. I really think it should be on the BIOS or there should be a key to press (like F8) during the boot sequence that allows you to configure it.

I went to the hypersonic-pc.com site but you need to log in to view the manuals.

by pejsmith

Hi Scott, Well you were right,I did find the raid set up in the bios and was able to set up a raid0. I couldn't load the OP from the usb HD. I created a ghost copy of the HD. I couldn't load a new install xp from a cd (OME or retail) The mystery is that Hypersonic are able to set up the Op on the Raid. Any other ideas? Peter

by scott_heath

So you set up the RAID but still can't load Windows? Not suprised. XP has no idea what SATA RAID is or how to handle it. You need the SATA RAID drivers for your system and you need to press F6 during the very start of setup when it asks if you want to add additional drivers. I have to do the same thing with Server 2003 and the occasional unlisted SCSI RAID controller.

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