Hello everybody.

I recently installed a 500 GB hard drive. Previously, I had a 300 GB hard drive installed.

My 300 GB is the boot drive. I setup a RAID 0 configuration for performance. After everything was reinstalled and booted up, I looked into My Computer. I saw just one hard drive mapped and it was the C drive. It only shows 596 GB total space capacity.

Shouldn't there be about 100 GB more space? I am aware that some of the space is unusable from the get-go, but this seems a bit on the extreme side.

Is it that the RAID 0 configuration takes away space somehow, or is there something else going on? Is this normal?

If I had setup a RAID 1, would I be able to see two separate drives and be able to choose which files go where? Would I gain more free space with this type of configuration?

Please help!

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UPDATE = I just realized something. Before I setup all this RAID business, my original 300 GB drive was partitioned into two 150 GB drives -- The C and D drives. Now, my D drive is referring to my CD-Drive. Could it be that the original D drive data is there but not being mapped somehow?

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Hello Polyglot,

When you use RAID, you have to have identical sized drives....and preferably, identical specs. Typically when you set up RAID, it's best to buy two (or multiples of 2) of the exact same drive to ensure compatibility.

What's happening in your case is, since you have a 500 gig drive and a 300 gig drive, your motherboard is creating the array to have 2 x 300 gigs which is 600.

It would be best to use RAID 1 to explain. RAID 1 creates an exact duplicate of all your data on each drive. If you have a 300 gig drive and 500 gig drive, you wouldn't be able to make a copy of the data on the 500 gig drive once it went past 300 gigs cause your other drive only has 300 gigs of space.

RAID 0 essentially works the same way, except instead of creating a copy of your data, it separates the data evenly onto each of the drives. So if you went past 300 gigs on your 500 gig drive, it would mess the array up. So that's why your motherboard cut 200 gigs off of your 500 gig drive to equal the amount of your other drive.

If you don't need all that space, then just keep the array as is and don't worry about the 200 other gigs. If you want all that space, then just delete the array and keep the drives separate.

Hope that helps!

OK I see what you are saying. How exactly would I delete the array? Would this result in data loss?

If I reconfigured my RAID configuration to RAID 1, would I have to delete everything and start over? Essentially, I might as well use RAID 1 since I am limited to 600 GB total anyways, don't you think?

If I do delete the array and have two separate drives, how would that work? I want to have one drive as a storage drive and the other one for my OS. How could I set that up?

Thanks so much for your help!

Deleting your array will lose all data. You will basically be starting over. You delete/change the array in the array utility you used to set up the array in the first place.

RAID 1 is useful if you want to have a backup of data. It has a couple drawbacks. Firstly, it is slow cause you do everything twice when you use your hard drives. Also, you will cut your storage size in half. And in your case, you cut your size in half, and lose 200 gigs. You would only have 300 gigs available. But you'd have two identical copies of all your data.

People use RAID 1 if they are incredibly fearful of losing important data. If you put 2 - 500 gig hard drives together, you only have 500 gigs of storage available, but you have an identical copy of all your data in case one of the drives fail.

In your case, either leave your current setup as is and use RAID 0 to have 600 gigs and faster performance. Or get all your space back and have slightly lower performance by deleting the array, format both drives, and keep them separate. Install your OS and programs on your 300 gig drive, then use your 500 gig drive to store music/movies/docs/etc.

If you want option 2, first delete the array. Then turn your computer off and unplug your 500 gig hard drive. Then put your XP disk in and go to set up XP. When it asks where you want to install, just delete all the partitions till it says unpartitioned space (if it doesn't say that already). Then select the unpartitioned space and do a quick NTFS format and then finish the XP install. When it's all done, turn off your computer, plug your 500 gig hard drive back in.

When you get into Windows, right click on My Computer, Manage, Disk Management, right click on the 500 gig drive, click format, then do a quick NTFS format.

After that, you're set to go

Thanks so much for your help! Just a couple more questions:

1. How much faster is performance using the RAID 0 option as opposed to two separate drives?

2. To install XP, I am using a recovery / factory image disk. I don't think I have the choice to select where it gets installed. It automatically creates an equally split partition as well. Could I just install it without worrying about it and delete the partition later? Then replug the 500 GB drive and map it out?

3. What are the speeds like when transferring between hard drives? 1.5 GB / sec?

4. I hear lots of things about removing the 'jumpers' to double performance to 3.0 / sec. What is that all about?

THANKS A LOT!!