IDE disk array installation and common troubleshooting

There is a growing number of people choosing an IDE disk array card (IDE RAID card) to ensure data security, and it is also a learning how to use the IDE RAID card correctly. Let's take a Rocket100 RAID card with ht370a/372 control chip as an example to explain common malfunctions and techniques.

Installation need to know

First find a free PCI slot to insert the card and the hard drive cable and the card installation connection, after installation adapter card, in the process of starting the computer, you will see that the adapter card has been successfully installed and recognized by the system. When the system is powered on, its controller's BIOS will display the hard drive status information, press CTRL+H to enter the structure very clear setting menu, where you can set the disk array: Two hard drives can choose Stripe mode (RAID 0) and mirror mode (RAID 1), With three hard drives, you can only select spanning or stripe mode, while four blocks can be selected across mode, stripe mode or stripe combined mirror mode (RAID 0+1), and RAID 1 must be synchronized.

Troubleshooting Common installation Problems

When the Rocket100 RAID card is identified, the onboard BIOS begins to detect the connecting device. Note that the devices that appear on the screen, if all connected devices are properly scanned, indicate that the device is properly connected and recognized by the system, and then you can use the RAID feature once the driver is installed. And if some of the devices are not recognized, you can open the chassis, plug the power cord of the connected device and try a power plug if necessary; The data cable for the connected device is properly connected and plugged in, and if necessary, change a data line to try it; if two devices are attached to a data line, Verify that the master and slave jumpers for the two devices are set to conflict (two devices on one data line must be one master and one slave)

Selection of hard disk capacity

Taking into account the operating performance of the system and the utilization of the disk, we recommend that you make the same capacity hard drive. But if you have to use a different volume of disk, it is important to note that the capacity of the entire array is determined by the smallest capacity in the array, for example, in a RAID 0 array consisting of 3 disks, the total capacity is equal to 3 times times the capacity of the smallest disk. In a RAID 1 array, the capacity of the target disk cannot be smaller than the capacity of the source disk. The total capacity of the array is equal to the capacity of the smallest disk. But Jbod is an exception, two or more different volumes of hard drives can be combined to form a logical single disk.

BIOS Setup Instructions

The IDE RAID card is a Plug and Play device, so you don't have to change the system CMOS. The system will automatically indicate the interrupt and the address of the port. When all devices are in the None or unstalled state in the CMOS settings, the IDE RAID card can be set as the boot card, or the SCSI device will be called the 1th bit of the boot sequence, or the RAID card may be set as the boot card.

What about RAID corruption?

If a RAID level is compromised, you can check by shutting down the computer, checking the connection to the hard drive power supply, and whether the data cable is connected to the hard disk and RAID control card and then powering on; if the above does not solve the problem, it may be a hard drive problem for RAID 1 and raid 0+1, you can use a new hard disk to back up the data on the damaged hard disk, and all the data will not be lost. For RAID 0 and JBOD, you must first remove the original RAID level and RAID creation, but note that this action will cause all the data on your hard disk to be lost, so be sure to back up your data frequently on RAID 0 and JBOD.