Hi guys,After a good few months now enjoying my new rig and getting to grips with FS9 and FSX, I want to expand my system a bit and at the same time, improve performance.At the moment I have a single Seagate Barracuda HD. I use my computer for "normal" use as well as gaming....office apps, internet surfing and digital photography being the biggest usesSo, I'd like to do the following but need some (lots?) of advice of how to go about it;1/ I want to put FS9 and FSX on a separate drive (probably WD raptor) for better performance2/ I want to build in some "redundancy" for my everyday office and digital photographyWith this in mind, is it possible to use a 3 drive setup....2xBarracudas in RAID1 and a single WD Raptor for FSX/FS9 which is not used in RAID? How would I go about setting this up in BIOS etc? When I install the second Barracuda as RAID1 will everything (including the OS) just copy itself across or do I need to set it up somehow?As you can probably tell, I have very little knowledge of RAID, or indeed computers in general! I have had a good nose through some of the threads here and on other sites but I'm completely confused as to whether what I want to acheive can be done and if so, whether it's easy enough for me to attempt?!Many thanks in advance

The 2 barracudas in RAID wouldn't be necissary for FSX. I would say just stick with your current HD for OS and other programs, and put FSX on a single 150GB Velociraptor.

Thanks Chris, I appreciate the RAID setup is not needed for FSX but maybe my original post wasn't as clear as I meant? In addition to better FSX performance I'm also looking at redundancy and back up for my everyday computer tasks such as digital photography. That is why I'd like the RAID1 setup for the Barracudas. Unfortunatley I can't justify the cost of two systems like you!So, is it possible to connect two Barracudas in RAID1 and then have an additional raptor which is completely separate from the RAID setup? Can they all be connected to the MOBO or do I need a separate PCI controller? Does the simple act of adding another Barracuda and selecting RAID1 from the BIOS mean that everything is copied across or would I need a completley new install of everything? Do the Barracudas need to exactly the same model or can I just purchase another HDD with the same capacity? Many, many questions I know,. and not neccesarily related to FSX but I'd really appreciate you guys help

Setting up RAID mirroring on an existing installation can sometimes be tricky. It may require a reload of your system as you have already considered, which isn't a great thing. Yes, they should be as close to identical as possible - you could use slightly different models, but best practices say you should get the same exact types. Your motherboard may support RAID, however this is a 'soft' implementation and saps a little bit of processor time from the CPU. It's not enough to usually be noticed, but it isn't performance oriented for certain. You can get a proper RAID controller, and this will improve performance. Overall, the question becomes "Is RAID1 useful on a home computer, or can you get a good backup strategy using a more conventional setup?" - and I think you will gain more flexability and simplicity if you stay away from RAID. Instead of connecting 2 drives into a RAID mirror, I think you might be better off using something like Acronis TrueImage and simply have it perform periodic (daily/weekly/monthly, whatever is your comfort level) backups to your 2nd Barracuda drive. Granted, this is not as "smooth" as having a RAID1 mirror, but it will catch your data and squirrel it away without the muss and fuss of setting up RAID. You would also not be bound to using the same exact type of drive. You could purchase a slower Seagate "Green" drive which spins at 5400RPM and is a great storage/backup/archive drive - it spins slower, generates far less heat, and is just fine for backup purposes. (*usually cheaper, too!). If you ran out of space, you also wouldn't be bound to getting 2 identical drives again... you could update each drive as needed. Going with a conventional installation also gives you a little protection against fat-finger mistakes, like deleting a file or directory. With RAID1, you're mirroring all changes as they happen... a deletion happens on both drives, and you've instantly lost some important photos. If you stick with a more conventional setup, the accidental deletion will not take effect on the backup drive until the backup job is run... giving you a way to cover your @$$ just in case you make a mistake! (*from experience, this does happen, so it's nice to have an "out")=======My personal storage strategy uses FOUR drives... (well, 5 if you include FSX, but lets leave that out for a moment)#1 is my boot drive with apps and goodies on it. Win7, programs, etc. etc. It's a smallish SSD drive, built for speed!#2 is a storage/archive drive, which contains all my music, photos, documents, video, etc. etc. It's a Seagate 1.5TB 7200RPM. Quick and spacious.#3 & #4 are both backup drives. Only one is installed at a time. I purchased a SATA slide-out dock for the computer to hold one of these two drives. The installed drive receives backup information from both drives #1 and #2, and every month or so I rotate the two backups between home and work. As someone who experienced an apartment fire several years ago (*didn't lose any computer gear, thankfully), I am acutely aware of what could happen to data if my house got flattened by an airplane or something. One of these drives is a "spare" 1.0TB drive I had, the other is a newly purchased 1.0 TB green drive which runs nice and cool. FSX is kept on a separate drive as well, but it is not backed up on a regular basis. This is on a traditional 7200RPM 1.5TB Seagate. With FSX installed on the outer edge, and with nothing else on the drive, it's pretty much just as fast as the 300GB VRaptor, but at a far lower price. I use Acronis TrueImage when I first installed my computer to create a nice baseline image of everything configured the way I want it. After that, I use a tool called ViceVersa to backup all my important files to the backup drive. By doing this, all my files remain easily usable - they aren't tucked away in any sort of special file only readable with Acronis or any other backup tool. They're literally just a "copy", made each day. My backup strategy is a little complex, however it requires minimal maintenance and because I've been doing this for so long, it's second nature to me. Your plan might not need to be this crazy! But I think you can get something working without RAID which will end up being more useful to your data needs. Good luck!-Greg

Thanks Greg,Not checked in here for a few weeks but in my absence have been thinking very similar thoughts but with only the one back-up drive rather than the two you use (not much room in my case!)Thinking of using the following;C: SSD for OS and programs for faster loadingH: Current Barracuda for files, music, photos etcJ: On your recommendation, a Seagate Green for backup of H: on a periodic basisK: Raptor for FS9, FSX and associated filesI also have an external back up drive so will just copy from J: to that on a weekly/monthly basis and take it to work with meIn order to acheive this I think I'm going to have to do a complete re-install of Win7 and all my programes. I'm guessing after that, it will be neccesary to format my Barracuda so I'll have to back up my files before I carry this out?Thanks againSteve