5 Answers

1. Rick click on the “computer” icon on the desktop or the computer item in the Start Menu.
2. Select Manage.
3. Expand Storage.
4. Click on Disk Management.
5. In the bottom center pane you’ll see Disk 0, Disk 1, etc.
6. On the left column under the Disk number you’ll see the word Basic or Dynamic.

Windows Server 2008 R2 supports only RAID 0, RAID 1, and RAID 5 at the software level. Several of the more common RAID levels are listed in Table 1.

RAID (Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks) is a data storage virtualization technology that combines multiple disk drives into a single logical unit for faster performance, better hardware failover, and improved disk Input/Output reliability.

The RAID option must be enabled in the BIOS before the system can load the RAID option ROM code.

1. Press F2 during startup to enter the BIOS setup.
2. To enable RAID, use one of the following methods, depending on your board model. Go to Configuration > SATA Drives, set Chipset SATA Mode to RAID.
3. Press F10 to save and exit.

To view the RAID status, go to System Settings > RAID Management. The RAID Management pane displays the RAID level, status, and disk space usage. It also shows the status, size, and model of each disk in the RAID array.

(Redundant Array of Independent Disks Mode 3) A disk or solid state drive (SSD) subsystem that increases safety by computing parity data and increasing speed by interleaving data across two or more drives (striping). RAID 3 achieves the highest data transfer rate because all drives operate in parallel.

A Random Array of Independent Disks (RAID) is a set of multiple drives put together with the purpose of improving a single drives performance. Some RAID configurations provide a speed boost while others provide data protection in the event of failed drives. Some RAIDs can provide both.

How to Guide: Checking if a RAID is configured

1. Rick click on the “computer” icon on the desktop.
2. Select Manage.
3. Expand Storage.
4. Click Disk Management.
5. In the bottom center pane you’ll see different Disk numbers.
6. Under the Disk number you’ll see either Basic or Dynamic.

RAID 3 – another rare one in practice It is used to store checksums, and it supports a special processor in parity codes calculating – so we may call it “the parity disk”. In RAID 3, configuration data are divided into individual bytes and then saved on a disk.

That said, RAID 5 does provide considerable advantages that generally outweigh the disadvantages. A Windows Server 2008 RAID 5 configuration may be set up using the Disk Management snap-in. This is accessed either from the Server Manager or Computer Management tools.

To set up software RAID, do as following: 1. Open Server Disk Management. Right-click one of the volumes on the dynamic disk and select the “Add Mirror”. 2. Then, open a window. Please tick another dynamic disk, and click “Add Mirror” button: 3.

Select disks from the Available list and click on the Add> button to add the disk to the selected list. Once sufficient disks (in this case disks 1, 2 and 3) are selected the Next button will activate to allow the remainder of the configuration to be completed. Note that disk 0 (the system disk) is not included in the RAID 5 array:

RAID 5 consists of three or more volumes each located on a separate physical disk. As with RAID 0, RAID 5 also uses disk striping, whereby blocks of data are divided up into stripes with each stripe written to a different disk.