Appendix Ii: Sata Raid 0/1 Setup; Introduction To Raid - Albatron KM400A series User Manual

Appendix II: SATA RAID 0/1 Setup

Introduction to RAID

(Redundant Array of Independent Disks)
RAID technology is a sophisticated disk management system that manages multiple disk drives,
enhancing I/O performance and providing redundancy in order to prevent the loss of data in case any
of the individual disks fail. The SATA RAID facility on this board provides RAID 0 (striped), RAID
1 (mirrored) and RAID SPAN.
Disk Striping (RAID 0)
S triping is a performance-oriented, non-redundant disk storage technology. With RAID striping,
m ultiple disks are used to form a larger virtual disk. Data is then striped or mapped across all the
p hysical disks. In this way modern SATA and ATA bus mastering technology can be used to perform
m ultiple I/O operations in parallel, enhancing performance. While Striping is discussed as a RAID
S et type, it actually does not provide fault tolerance.
D isk Mirroring (RAID 1)
W ith Disk Mirroring there is a redundant disk that mirrors the main disk. Data that is written to the
m ain disk is also written to the redundant disk. This redundancy provides fa
from a single disk failure. If a read/write failure occurs on one drive, the system can still read and
w rite data using the other drive.
RAID SPAN
R AID SPAN is not one of the standard RAID levels. It is however considered a JBOD (Just Bundle
O f Disks) configuration which simply uses multiple disks to form a larger virtual disk without any
o ther specialized disk management functionality.
R AID BIOS Configuration
W hen the system boots up during the POST (Power-On Self Test), the user will be given an
o pportunity to enter the "VIA RAID BIOS Configuration" utility. Wait for the following prompt:
P ress <Tab> Key into User Window
T hen press the "Tab" key to enter the VIA RAID BIOS Configuration utility. The VIA RAID BIOS
sc reen will display as shown below.
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KM400A Series
ult tolerant protection